DOI: 10.6071/m3bm24
title: San Joaquin Valley community land use preferences

description: Agriculture dominates California’s San Joaquin Valley with over five
 million acres in production, producing 400 different commodities ranging
 from nuts, tree fruits, vines, and row crops. During dry years this
 agricultural production uses about 53% of total applied water in the
 state. Implementation of California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management
 Act (SGMA) will restrict groundwater pumping, likely reducing agricultural
 land use resulting in conversion to alternative land uses. This paper
 examines public perceptions of future land uses under SGMA through a SMS
 distributed web survey. Respondents (n=197) were recruited through a
 stratified random sample of mobile numbers registered within communities
 in the San Joaquin valley classified as DACs (n=32). Our results show that
 most respondents were somewhat (33%) or not at all (54%) familiar with
 SGMA, highlighting the need for outreach efforts to overcome barriers to
 representation, translation, and education about future water and land use
 decisions. Survey respondents identified secure water supplies (e.g.,
 groundwater recharge) (35%) and less-water intensive agriculture (27%) as
 their top land use priorities to address groundwater overdraft under SGMA,
 indicating that the status quo for land use is preferred to alternative
 land uses such as habitat restoration or recreation. We correlated
 preference for maintaining agriculture as primary land use (27%) with
 agricultural identity and lack of interest in community or global benefits
 such as schools and climate change mitigation. The findings from this
 study underscore the challenges to engaging local communities in land use
 decision-making, especially as they relate to changing current practices
 toward a more climate-resilient but agriculturally productive future with
 less land and less water.
description: An online survey focused on alternative land uses that could
 address groundwater overdraft by 2040 under SGMA was developed by our
 multi-disciplinary research team and distributed via short message service
 (SMS text) from March to June 2021. Sampling was
 focused on 32 DACs in the San Joaquin Valley. The sampling frame was based
 on the number of people in each census area, this number was then adjusted
 based on a power analysis resulting in a sampling frame containing 20,778
 individuals. DACs were included to have a varied representation in terms
 of population size, environmental risk exposure, and geographic location
 across the San Joaquin Valley. To be included, DACs also needed to fulfill
 the following criteria—1) not be embedded within a major city (population
 greater than 5,000), 2) CalEnviroScreen 4.0 score percentiles ranging from
 40–100%, based on pollution burden and population characteristics
 (California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, 2021), and
 3) have a population less than 5,000 in 2018 (California Office of
 Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, 2018). Cell
 phone numbers were purchased from Marketing Systems Group (MSG), which
 provides samples linked to geographic and demographic information
 (Marketing Systems Group, 2021), noted as records herein. This allowed us
 to capture potential spatial gradients of community land use perspectives
 across the study region and oversample smaller DACs, to improve the
 representativity of collected data. The initial sample size within each
 DAC was relative to the number of records in that DAC. In other words,
 sampling was structured by record census within a DAC. If total records
 within DACs ranged from 1001 to 5000, total DAC population surveys were
 attempted; if records ranged from 101 to 1000, twice as many surveys were
 attempted, and for 100 or less records, three times as many surveys were
 attempted. To stay within funding limits, 405 samples were removed from
 the entire sample. The survey was administered using
 Qualtrics (Qualtrics, 2021) and distributed via SMS text services by a
 Qualtrics third-party partner, Twilio. Following standard survey research
 practices (Dillman, 2010), distribution was done across weekdays and
 non-holiday weekends varying distribution times (morning and noon). The
 survey was also offered in both English and Spanish to promote
 inclusion.  The survey consisted of three sections
 focused on questions related to land use, agriculture, and climate change:
 The first section of the survey contained questions related to employment
 (e.g., current job and residential postal code) and familiarity with SGMA.
 The second section contained questions related to community vision, in
 which respondents were asked to what extent they agreed or disagreed with
 how the following five agricultural land repurposing options benefitted
 their community and local economy: 1) renewable energy (e.g., solar and
 wind), 2) habitat restoration (e.g., places to see wildlife), 3)
 groundwater recharge, 4) carbon sequestration (e.g., storing carbon on
 farmland, getting carbon credits), and 5) parks and green space (e.g.,
 parks, trails, bike paths, and playgrounds). Additionally, respondents
 were asked to identify their most and least important land use repurposing
 option out of seven options: 1) wildlife, 2) recreation, 3) clean energy,
 4) secure water supplies, 5) reduce GHG and climate change, 6) schools,
 grocery stores, and housing, and 7) less water-intensive agriculture.
 Participants were asked statements related to agriculture: 1) they live in
 the valley because of agriculture, 2) their job depends on agriculture, 3)
 agriculture is the core of the economy in their community, 4) there needs
 to be space between agriculture and where people live for health reasons,
 and 5) agricultural practices contribute to air and water pollution in
 their community. The third section of the survey was related to
 demographics: Participants were asked questions related to ethnic
 background, preferred gender pronouns, total household income, as well as
 three statements on climate change in their region: 1) climate change is
 happening, 2) climate change impacts water quantity, and 3) climate change
 impacts water quality. Participants were also given the opportunity to
 share anything else they would like to at the end of the survey.