Appointments
Water Education for Latino Leaders and UC Davis studied who governs California water.
They sampled 688 public water agencies. 90% of board members were insiders, with prior advantages in the sector.
Part I published in August 2025. Women, Latinos, and BIPOC professionals were underrepresented on boards and in executive roles. At 26% of agencies there were no women in either.
Part II went wider. 364 Groundwater Sustainability Agencies. 12 state water agencies. The State Water Resources Control Board, nine Regional Water Boards, the Department of Water Resources, and the Colorado River Board. The same disparities held.
CAAWEF works the appointments process. We have an interest in who fills these seats and we will say so before we argue.
Source: Water Education for Latino Leaders and UC Davis, Parts I and II.
A water board sets allocations. It sets tariff structures. It decides which infrastructure gets funded.
CAAWEF works to move deeper capital into the water systems serving Black communities. It also works to widen the workforce.
Both of those run through people who already hold a seat. Put equity-minded leaders in those seats and under-resourced communities get considered first.
California managed water as an engineering problem for a century. That era is closing.
Governance now runs on environmental justice and community knowledge. A board member who has lived with a dry well knows something the model does not.
AB 2108 requires environmental justice representation on water boards. That is the statute.
Appointees turn statute into the rules utilities actually follow. The seat decides what the law becomes in practice.
The study found they held the career path, the relationships, or the sector knowledge before they ever got the seat.
Those networks are closed. That is not an accident.
Educate To Lead exists to get around them. The program builds the record a candidate needs before a seat opens.
Source: Water Education for Latino Leaders and UC Davis, Parts I and II.
The window
The next governor appoints thousands of exempt positions. Some serve at the pleasure of the Governor. Others are fixed-term.
Fixed-term seats outlast the administration that made them. That is where continuity gets protected.
CAAWEF is preparing E2L graduates now. The list has to exist before the window opens.
The only open question is who fills them.