General Discussion

The three-day release from Lake Kaweah and Lake Success by the Army Corp of Engineers was water that’s typically saved for the drier, hotter growing season, as SFGATE reported at the time. The Army Corps’ move came after Los Angeles County’s devastating January fires prompted President Donald Trump to issue an executive order where he blasted California water policies and commanded federal department heads to “ensure water resources in Southern California.” But the corps’ decision, the Post reported, flew in the face of actual acts......

It’s now clear that Army Corps officials knew that the sudden dam releases wouldn’t help Southern California, per the Post’s Friday piece, which featured information from an internal memo. But they dumped the water anyway.

The memo was written four days after the releases by Col. Chad W. Caldwell, commander of the Army Corps’ Sacramento District, the Post reported. According to the outlet, he wrote that on the afternoon before releases began, federal and state water officials told him, “It would take more time for them to activate their systems and they likely could not utilize the additional water with such short notice.”

Per the Post, he also wrote in the memo that the water from the two reservoirs “could not be delivered to Southern California directly,” but that the releases were aimed at following Trump’s executive order.