> The project was certified by Governor Gavin Newsom in November 2023 under SB 149, a new law that provides certified projects streamlining benefits regarding legal challenges filed under the California Environmental Quality Act.[10][11] Construction is scheduled to begin in 2024 with final design expected to be done in 2025 and be completed in 2030.
If it was not for discretionary exemptions to regulations, it would likely not have been possible. It's also quite dystopian to have regulations that can be overwritten by executive discretion. This is a recipe for corruption.
Law-permitted discretionary exemptions are reasonable in extremis which I think California’s water situation is, a couple of good years notwithstanding. People can find any number of ways to be corrupt as well all know.
Since you’re not in the US: California’s woes are vastly overstated. There are indeed real problems, but the government here is remarkably clean — shockingly so by the standards of East Coast States (original colonies) and in general California has a good track record of dealing with many major issues. We can all list unresolved longstanding problems we hate (my list is pretty much prisons, schools, housing NIMBYs and prop 13) but as a general rule they do ok.
Also this is non partisan. Geographically CA is mostly “MAGA red” but corruption etc is pretty thinly and uniformly spread around.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sites_Reservoir
> The project was certified by Governor Gavin Newsom in November 2023 under SB 149, a new law that provides certified projects streamlining benefits regarding legal challenges filed under the California Environmental Quality Act.[10][11] Construction is scheduled to begin in 2024 with final design expected to be done in 2025 and be completed in 2030.
If it was not for discretionary exemptions to regulations, it would likely not have been possible. It's also quite dystopian to have regulations that can be overwritten by executive discretion. This is a recipe for corruption.