To: Governor Gavin Newsom

Protect California’s Water From Corporate Water Abusers like Big Ag, Big Oil and Nestlé!

California is in a serious drought, and thus far, restrictions have been disproportionately placed on residents, while big agribusiness, oil interests and bottled water giants continue to deplete and pollute California's groundwater resources instead of taking steps to save water.

We must protect California’s precious water from corporate water abusers like Big Ag, Big Oil and Nestlé.

Governor Brown, I urge you to regulate groundwater as a public resource and to stop these egregious water users from abusing our water for profit!

Why is this important?

California is in a water crisis — yet recent water restrictions mandated by Governor Brown are inadequate.

While we support individual efforts to conserve, it's clear that the severity of this drought calls for much more than just individual action (residential use accounts for less than 15% of water use in the state). It's time for Governor Brown to take bold action to stop wasteful and unreasonable uses by corporate agriculture, oil interests and the bottled water industry.

Big Ag: Big agribusiness is over-pumping California's precious groundwater, especially the water-guzzling almond empire that has doubled in size in the driest part of the state over the last five years. But Governor Brown’s mandate places little burden and no new restrictions on agriculture.

Big Oil: Not only does fracking and drilling use tens of millions of gallons of water a year, but the oil and gas industry has been dumping toxic waste water into California's aquifers. This toxic practice needs to end today.

Bottled Water Companies: While restaurants will only serve drinking water upon request, water bottling giants like Nestlé continue to suck the state dry.

California’s groundwater (that is, the water that exists in our natural aquifers underground) is considered private property and is not treated as the public resource it is. This means that corporations can use it up with little to no restrictions, leading to extreme over-pumping and depleting the state’s already dwindling aquifers. We need real and meaningful action to save our water now!