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Expert warns Cloverdale about Potter Valley project risks to Russian River water supply
Summary
David Taber, representing a small regional water system, warned Cloverdale City Council that planned changes to the Potter Valley Project could reduce imported flows to the Russian River, possibly forcing rationing, new fees and long-term infrastructure costs.
David Taber, who operates a small water system at Palomino Lakes, told the Cloverdale City Council on Monday that changes planned for the Potter Valley Project could sharply reduce imported water to the Russian River and threaten summer supplies for cities and farms.
Taber, a longtime observer of the Potter Valley Project, said PG&E’s decision to move away from the project and a planned decommissioning of parts of the dam system could end the roughly 115-year pattern of water imports that now deliver on the order of 30,000,000,000 gallons a year into the Russian River watershed. “I’m only gonna tell you the truth,” Taber said at the presentation, adding that the topic is bedeviled by “a spectacular amount of misinformation.”
Why it matters: Cloverdale and neighboring jurisdictions rely on water that is now partly sustained by the Potter Valley diversion. Taber said that regulatory and funding decisions now being negotiated — including an…
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