2023 Methods for Domestic Wells and State Small Water Systems Water Shortage Vulnerability Assessment

This document presents the 2023 update methods to the Water Shortage Vulnerability scoring for rural communities, including the indicators, datasets, methods used, and a statistical summary of results. This is an update to the scoring and tool that the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) developed in collaboration with the County Drought Advisory Group (CDAG) and submitted to the Legislature in April 2021 (DWR 2021). This document presents the first update to the construction of the indicators and scoring for the state small water systems, rural communities, domestic wells and other self-supplied residents, per California Water Code Section 10609.80(a)(2)(B-C). Data used in the 2023 update and tool are updated as of the preparation of this analysis in October 2022.