The health of California’s water supply is tied to the health of the headwaters, and the State Water Project depends on the short- and long-term resilience of the Upper Feather River in the Sierra Nevada. Photo courtesy of California Department of Water Resources

AUBURN, CA (MPG) – On July 7 and 8, the Sierra Nevada Conservancy (SNC), the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) and Blue Forest, held an Upper Feather River Tour for State Water Project contractors. The tour highlighted the importance of protecting and enhancing forest health and mountain meadows within the Feather River headwaters and showcased important work the State Water Project is doing to improve water quality, water supply, flow timing, public safety and ecosystem health.

The health of California’s water supply is tied to the health of the headwaters, and the State Water Project depends on the short- and long-term resilience of the Upper Feather River in the Sierra Nevada. The State Water Project supplies water to 27 million Californians and 750,000 acres of farmland. Managed by DWR, the project moves water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta down through the Central Valley, the San Francisco Bay Area, the Central Coast and into Southern California.

Twenty-nine public water agencies have long-term contracts for water delivery from the State Water Project and pay the costs of operating the system. The city of Los Angeles alone, through the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, receives up to 45 percent of its water from the project.

“The Feather River watershed is the main source of water for the State Water Project. This is our natural infrastructure. This is where the water supply comes from,” said Andrew Schwarz, DWR’s long-term planning officer. “We need to be a partner in these areas. There is so much work to be done. It’s more than one agency can do, but if we all partner together, we can do a lot.”

The tour group visited Thompson Meadow near Lake Davis where participants heard from DWR experts, including Schwarz and Senior Engineer Nathan Millingar, as well as from the nonprofit organization Plumas Corps, about the role meadows play in the water system. The group also discussed the results partners are seeing from restoration efforts in Thompson Meadow and other meadows throughout the Sierra Nevada.

“We have a lot of meadows up here that store, filter and slowly release water that is used by much of the state, and it is really important to understand how the forest and meadow complexes work together for downstream users,” said Millingar. “All the water that you get from your tap may start right here.”

Restoration efforts of Thompson Meadow by DWR and the Plumas Corp have increased the percentage of wet meadow from five to 25%, decreased bare soil and sage brush and increased large stands of cattail – all of which has helped restore the ecological function and biodiversity in the area.

“Mountain meadows are an important part of our watershed ecosystem,” said Schwarz. “They act as sponges and the problem is that 90 percent of meadows throughout the Sierra have been degraded through logging and cattle grazing. So, what we want to do is restore them so the water will slow down and spread out, which will bring water tables up and store water that is released more slowly into channels throughout the spring and summer to sustain base flows in our rivers.”

On day two of the tour, members of the Sierra Institute for Community and Environment (Sierra Institute) discussed the negative impacts high-severity wildfire can have on the landscape and surrounding communities. By visiting a high severity burn scar from the Dixie Fire outside Taylorsville, State Water Project contractors saw first-hand the devastating local and regional impacts California’s largest single fire in history had on the Feather River watershed.

Tour attendees also heard about Blue Forest’s North Feather I Forest Resilience Bond
that is being used to help fund and finance forest restoration efforts on the Plumas National Forest and surrounding areas, helping to mitigate catastrophic wildfire risks within the Feather River watershed. The initiative was born from a partnership between Blue Forest and organizations spanning multiple sectors, including the Sierra Institute, U.S. Forest Service, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, Pacific Gas & Electric, DWR (through funding from the State Water Project), the Greenville Rancheria and the SNC. As of December 2025, the North Feather I Forest Resilience Bond secured more than $9.5 million.

“Our vision is to work toward a world where financial collaboration sustains resilient landscapes, ecosystems, and communities. Our priority is to get more funding on the ground to support land managers like the Forest Service and implementers like the Sierra Institute to get these important landscape-scale, ecological resilience projects going at a faster pace and greater scale,” said Amber Moore, senior project development manager at Blue Forest.

Looking over the North Fork Forest Recovery Project area, attendees learned about restoration efforts implemented by the Sierra Institute, which is coordinating vegetation management, hazard tree removal, reforestation, invasive species management, prescribed fire, and other hydrological improvement practices on 800-1,000 priority acres within the project area. The entire North Fork Forest Recovery Project is a 166,889-acre project developed by the US Forest Service to strategically enhance landscape resilience within the greater Feather River watershed.

“To have a healthy watershed we need to have healthy forests that aren’t burning up in high-intensity wildfires, we need to have hydrologically functioning meadows that play a role in how fires move through the landscapes,” said Sarah Campe, SNC regional scientist. “With healthy watersheds we have all the biodiversity benefits, carbon benefits and all the benefits to water.”

Downstream water users from Northern California to San Diego all have an interest in the health of the Feather River watershed and the tour showcased the importance of forest and meadow-restoration efforts not only in protecting the local and regional landscape, but to the water supply for millions throughout the state.

“There is a ton of data being collected to prove the concept that there is actually a benefit in terms of watershed improvements that will help in the long-term improvements with runoff within the watershed, especially given climate change and being able to buffer the loss of spring runoff with these kind of projects,” said Chandra Chilmakuri, assistant general manager for water policy at the State Water Contractors. “This is very exciting stuff.”