SAVE Del Puerto Canyon

06/05/2026

The June 9th hearing for Assembly Concurrent Resolution 107 by the California Senate Natural Resources & Water Committee is coming up! This measure by Assembly member Rebecca Bauer-Kahan would acknowledge the Diablo Range, which Del Puerto Canyon belongs to, as a priority for CA conservation efforts. Get your letters of support in before 6/9!

On June 9, the California Senate Natural Resources & Water Committee will consider Assembly Concurrent Resolution 107 (ACR 107), recognizing the critical conservation importance of the Diablo Range. After successfully…

06/03/2026

Reminder: There are still ways we can all continue to speak out against the proposed Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir and for conserving Del Puerto Canyon. These include:

(1) Save Mt. Diablo's ongoing campaign allowing people to write to Stanislaus County officials to let them know you oppose the proposed non-potable reservoir project.
English: https://actionnetwork.org/letters/save-beautiful-del-puerto-canyon/
Spanish: https://actionnetwork.org/letters/salve-al-hermoso-canon-del-puerto-el-canon-del-puerto-debe-ser-un-parque

(2) Did you know there are lawmakers in other parts of CA who prioritize open space conservation and draft bills that apply across the state to support that? Here's a separate petition asking some of them to close loopholes Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir sponsors have been trying to use to get past opposition and general public oversight. It also asks others who initially supported/support the reservoir to change their mind. https://actionnetwork.org/letters/ask-state-officials-oppose-a-potential-model-for-industry-backed-groups-pushing-aside-public-lands-conservation-efforts-in-ca

*Tell state officials to repeal the parts of CA Govt Code § 53091 that give industry-backed sponsors of energy and water projects eminent domain-like powers to sometimes ignore the plans and concerns of neighboring communities and the counties they operate in! *Tell state officials to require speci...

05/30/2026

Come check out our booth at the Patterson Apricot Fiesta today 5/30 from now until 7:30pm. Here are a few pics of what we have to offer!

05/21/2026

Myths:
- All dams benefit drinking water supplies, and building more dams is the only option available for solving CA’s water issues.

Facts:
- Some water projects are designed mostly for non-potable (non-drinking uses). 80% of freshwater available for human use in CA actually goes to non-potable functions like for commercial ag and industrial activities. When early supporters of proposed water infrastructure projects bring up public concerns about drinking water to try to gain support, it’s important to look closely at available technical documents to make sure those projects are actually prioritizing direct benefits to drinking water versus non-potable uses.

- Most of CA’s major rivers have already been dammed, and future sites will yield diminishing returns. This is especially true for smaller dam sites in areas like the CA foothills where silt accumulation is an ongoing issue. https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-sac-skelton-water-storage-california-20190304-story.html

- While the idea of new dams remains as a last resort, alternatives like on-farm basin storage and replenishing groundwater through well injection and on-farm flooding are potentially more cost-effective and could store more water in aquifers for both drinking use and agriculture.

- If some growers, especially larger scale outfits specializing in certain crops for export, make some management and other operational changes, that could significantly lower demand for water in some cases. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-46031-2

05/17/2026

Thank you to the helpers who helped to clean up some of the trash and graffiti in the canyon. We also got to see a gopher snake, side-blotched lizard, and a few of the other critters that live here. At the end, we briefly stopped by the free Community Cleanup Day in Patterson, dropped off the bags of trash and a mattress we cleaned from the canyon, and also helped some of the volunteers and Supervisor Channce Condit working that event load some other stuff into bins.

As a reminder, Save Del Puerto Canyon holds its Del Puerto Canyon Cleanups on the third Saturdays of each month. For those who would like to attend these cleanups and our other events, check our page or sign up to receive email updates at www.savedelpuertocanyon.org

04/22/2026

Happy Earth Day!

Consider making a donation to Save Del Puerto Canyon's Go Fund Me https://gofund.me/80eddabcc managed by the Green Incubator http://sacgreenincubator.org/.

Your funds will go to help us advocate for protecting Del Puerto Canyon and supporting ongoing legal efforts to oppose the proposed non-potable Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir project threatening the pre-existing plans for a new public park here, the Native American artifact sites and sensitive habitats the park would conserve, and popular field trip spots just down the road like Allan Bennison’s historic dinosaur discovery site.

Learn more about Save Del Puerto Canyon at www.savedelpuertocanyon.org

"A series of proposed dams threatens Del Puerto Canyon, a beautiful natural area surroun… The Green Incubator needs your support for Save Del Puerto Canyon

04/20/2026

There's an upcoming Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors meeting on 4/21 at 6:30pm at 1010 10th Street, Modesto, CA. This is a chance for those of us opposed to the dam to respectfully ask them to withdraw their recently pledged $18 million in matching funds and to stop publicly endorsing the proposed Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir during the open public comment period. Here's the page with their FAQ for how to make public comments at their meetings: https://www.stancounty.com/board/faq.shtm

For a little inspiration, here's a group photo of some of the folks who came together to make public comments and show up to support each other at a previous meeting.

04/20/2026

Thank you to all the volunteers who showed up for our April 18th Del Puerto Canyon community cleanup through Love Patterson !

As a reminder, Save Del Puerto Canyon has regular canyon cleanups on the third Saturdays of the month (weather and other conditions permitting). Check out our page and the blog portion of our website (www.savedelpuertocanyon.org/blog) for updates on meeting times and other info.

04/17/2026

Del Puerto Canyon is known to be one of the top five most biodiverse areas of the Diablo Range. But there's still a lot more wildlife waiting to be documented and a lot more work needed to raise awareness among policy makers and the general public about what's there. This is a way anyone with a cell phone camera and the iNaturalist app can help out!

Our two-week BioBlitz up and down the Diablo Range starts this Saturday, April 18! This is your chance to take part in a citizen science research project spanning the whole 205-mile mountain range.

All you need to do to is download the free iNaturalist app, and upload the plants, animals, and fungi you find in the Diablo Range.

More info about where to go is on our website!

We'll post the link in the comments section below.

📸: American badgers in the Diablo Range | Juan Pablo Galván Martínez

04/17/2026

This month, the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors moved to endorse a 2026 Legislative Platform that includes up to $18 MILLION to match federal funds supporting the Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir non-potable storage project and to push for additional state and federal funding for it.https://www.stancounty.com/bos/agenda/2026/20260331/B30.pdf

This is in spite of serious questions over project sponsors' compliance with federal and state environmental laws, safety issues with nearby oil and natural gas wells, the proposed location of the main dam near the San Joaquin Fault, and Del Puerto Water District lacking water rights to flows from Del Puerto Creek brought up by the EPA, CalGEM, CDFW, Save Mt. Diablo, and many others. Combined with potential destruction of archaeological sites, this project is ripe for future legal delays.

As a reminder, this project is designed mainly to supply larger-scale export crop business down south and NOT directly provide local, potable water benefits for Patterson or Diablo Grande. There are other potential project locations and options, like making agreements to bank water in larger existing reservoirs. There are also generally cheaper and more efficient non-dam alternatives like direct groundwater recharge.

In addition to the ongoing petitions over 22K have signed opposing Del Puerto Canyon Reservoir, we also need to individually reach out to the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors to strongly but respectfully ask them to drop their plans to use county public funds to support it. We have the numbers to make a difference if we all speak up against this project!

Links to public office contact info for the 5 supervisors can be found on this page https://www.stancounty.com/board/. Also stay tuned for more updates from on possible opportunities to provide public comments to the Board.

Tell Stanislaus County officials to stop endorsing this increasingly unpopular project and use that $18 million for other projects that will provide more immediate and direct benefits to the general public!