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People - Waterwoman Jean Auer

As the first woman appointed to the State Water Resources Control Board and the first woman mayor of Hillsborough, Jean Auer has blazed a lot of trails. Now she's working to help more women and minorities leave their own marks on California water policy.

"Women have made enormous strides in areas such as law, medicine and science, but at the policy level they haven't come quite as far, although that is changing," says Auer, pointing to new Resources Secretary Mary Nichols as an example of the shift.

Auer established and supervises the Water Education Foundation's Water Leaders Class, which focuses on teaching a new generation of diverse leaders about California water issues and preparing them to serve on water policy bodies. "As California's demographics change, it's important to make sure that the people who represent the state be ready to serve on these boards and commissions," says Auer.

Auer herself has put in plenty of time on such bodies over the past thirty years, beginning when she chaired a study of national and local water issues for the League of Women Voters in Santa Barbara County, where she then lived. That led to an appointment to the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, and following a move to the Bay Area, a transfer to the S.F. Regional Board, where she served for a year.

Auer's interest in water stems from childhood summers spent on Lake Erie. "The deteriorating quality of the Great Lakes was the impetus for a lot of the changes in the way we manage water resources," she says. "When I got the chance to work on water issues I jumped at it."

Upon returning from a Hawaiian vacation in 1972, Auer received a message that the governor's office had called to offer her a State Board appointment. Although she was the only woman on the Board, Auer says her colleagues never treated her any differently. "There was one witness who addressed us as 'members of the Board and Mrs. Auer,' though," she laughs.

Five years later Auer left the Board when she and her husband decided to take their sons out of school and travel around the world for a year. On her return, Auer re-entered the water world, serving on a variety of committees and panels. Among her positions were chair of the Bay Area Water Reuse Study, and vice-chair of the San Joaquin Valley Drainage Program. Of the latter she says "we made great steps forward towards identifying solutions, although there have been some efforts to undo our recommendations." Auer acknowledges that "nothing much has come of it," largely because the program didn't form a governance organization and relied on a very loose memorandum of understanding for implementation. "I'm afraid the same thing might happen to CALFED," she adds.

Auer's colleagues say that her deep understanding of California water issues and warm personal style make her an extremely valuable participant in consensus-based processes. "She's independent and has credibility with a very diverse group of people," says Marcia Brockbank of the S.F. Estuary Project, in which Auer has participated since its founding. "Plus she has a wonderful sense of humor."

Auer believes that educating political leaders about water issues is crucial. "In the past a lot of consensus efforts have ignored the legislature, which is a mistake because a lot of the solutions will have to come from there," she says "Water is a very complex subject and I think that is incumbent upon everyone to educate the legislature, particularly now that we have term limits and people are there for a briefer period of time."

The water leaders program is one way Auer hopes to achieve this. "The program would not exist if it were not for Jean," says the Water Education Foundation's Rita Sudman. "It takes a lot of hand-holding and patience to bring it all together, and she does it all." Auer is particularly thrilled that a member of the first class now serves in the legislature.

Auer says she herself has learned a lot from her experiences with consensus-based processes. "You have to keep at it and you have to be forthright and honest," she says. "You get as much consensus as you can, avoid the toughest issues until they're inevitable, and then you hope that you have accumulated enough good will among stakeholders that you'll be able to overcome what might have seemed to be an insurmountable difference. It doesn't always happen, but that's the approach you have to take."

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