UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation

The Metropolitan Water District (MWD) serves local member agencies which in turn supply water to nearly half of California’s population. The MWD’s Local Resources Program (LRP) helps fund projects designed and proposed by its member agencies to produce more locally-sourced water in Southern California, to bolster the region’s self-resiliency and reduce reliance on imported water sources. As of 2022, MWD states that its LRP supports close to half of the recycled water and groundwater recovery production in the district’s service area (MWD CAP, 2022). Southern California has been in a state of water crisis since patterns of record-breaking drought began in the early 1990s.Southern California’s reliance upon imported water supplied from the State Water Project (SWP) and the Colorado River has come under threat. Faced with expanding cuts in water supplies delivered via the SWP, the region has needed to draw more and more water from the Colorado River to meet residential needs, putting water sources at risk of drying up or being unable to produce hydroelectric power. Hence, programs like the LRP which stand to help reduce water demand from member agencies have only grown in importance. Before our study, an independent, public analysis of LRP funding distribution and an in-depth survey concerning the perspectives of receiving member agencies had not yet been conducted. Accordingly, in this study, in cooperation with MWD and many of its member agencies, our research team assessed existing documents, conducted interviews, and performed statistical analyses on funding trends from the program’s inception in 1984 to today. In our evaluation of the LRP, the overarching question we are aiming to address is: “What has been the effectiveness of MWD’s Local Resources Program in terms of water resilience and equity, and can it be improved?” This research seeks to inform how the LRP fits into a comprehensive vision for Southern California of a long-term transition to local water resources.