Take a comprehensive look at the City of Mount Shasta Water Rights Ordinance - what the ordinance does; what it does not do; who enacts it into law; and why it focuses on "rights" and specifically the right of nature.

Initiative Measure to be submitted to City of Mount Shasta voters in November 2010 elections.

Mount Shasta, Calif. —

More than 100 community members offered vocal support during Monday night’s Mount Shasta City Council meeting for an ordinance that would prevent corporations from cloud seeding and bulk water extraction within city limits.

The council heard dozens of passionate appeals during public comments, then voted unanimously to order a special report on the Mt. Shasta Community Water Rights and Self Governance Ordinance, which will appear on the November election ballot.

More than 20 percent of the nation’s water treatment systems have violated key provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act over the last five years, according to a New York Times analysis of federal data.

That law requires communities to deliver safe tap water to local residents. But since 2004, the water provided to more than 49 million people has contained illegal concentrations of chemicals like arsenic or radioactive substances like uranium, as well as dangerous bacteria often found in sewage.

Davis attorney Don Mooney has agreed to take the case if the issue goes to court. Mooney represented McCloud residents in their six-year fight against a Nestlé Waters North America water-bottling plant near Mt. Shasta. The company abandoned plans for the plant in September.

The most powerful voices in the state's recent $11 billion water talks might have been two water districts – one speaking for half the state's population and the other for just 600 San Joaquin Valley farmers.

The negotiations led to legislation with the promise of epic change – restoring dying fisheries, building dams and easing gridlock that has dogged water system improvement for decades.

It made sense that Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which serves 19 million people, would wield big political clout in those talks. But who are those 600 farmers?

A $14 million retrofit of a proposed Nestlé water-bottling plant has ground to a halt after the city of Sacramento issued a stop-work order while investigating whether the work began before the company had legal authorization from the city.

Discussion over a Nestlé water-bottling plant appears to be growing in Sacramento, as the Swiss multinational prepares a facility for operation and new hires begin work.

The Sacramento City Council, which was not involved in the decision to approve the plant, will discuss the issue publicly for the first time after a request two weeks ago by council members Kevin McCarty and Lauren Hammond. They asked the council to consider an emergency ordinance requiring a special permit before Nestlé Waters North America begins bottling city tap water and spring water at a plant in South Sacramento.

Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson recently told The Bee that, "We need to light a fire under the city's efforts to save water." Most Sacramentans did not interpret this as meaning we should save water for Nestlé to truck away in disposable plastic bottles.

Nestlé wants to start taking a reported 30 million gallons of local municipal water a year in early 2010, despite objections that there was no public input or environmental review for their proposed water-bottling plant.