Water deal eludes Calif lawmakers at session’s end

From the Associated Press:

“SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California lawmakers ended a legislative year dominated by an unprecedented fiscal crisis without an agreement on their top policy priority — an ambitious upgrade of the state’s water delivery and storage system.

But Democrats and Republicans believed there was enough momentum to try again and vowed to continue meeting in an yet-announced special session. Each side said they are determined to fix a problem that has bedeviled lawmakers and governors for decades.

California lawmakers on Friday spent the last day of the regular legislative session passing a flurry of bills, including legislation that would reduce the state prison population by 16,000 inmates. Lawmakers also approved the nation’s most ambitious renewable-energy standards and were poised to restore about $16 million to domestic violence shelters.

They fell short of their goal to upgrade the state’s decades-old water system, which was expected to be the most contentious issue. The Democratic leaders of the Assembly and Senate said they would ask Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to call a special session so the water negotiations could continue.

“Everyone agrees that we are close and that we have made a decade’s worth of progress in just a few weeks, but there is still some more work to do,” Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg said in a statement. …”

Read more from the Associated Press by clicking here.

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