Governor Jerry Brown has lifted California's drought emergency following one of the wettest winters in years.
The announcement Friday ends Brown's 2014 emergency declaration during California's driest four-year period on record. It led to the first conservation rules for the nation's most populated and agriculturally productive state, focused on turning off sprinklers and ripping out thirsty lawns.
Monster storms this winter doused the Sierra Nevada with a record snowpack, a key California water source, and boosted reservoirs to normal levels.
Felicia Marcus, chairwoman of the State Water Board, said the governor's move doesn't end water conservation in California. In his statement Brown also said, "the State Water Resources Control Board will maintain urban water use reporting requirements and prohibitions on wasteful practices such as watering during or after rainfall, hosing off sidewalks and irrigating ornamental turf on public street medians."
Susan Atkins of the charity Self-Help Enterprises said the drought isn't over for hundreds of families with dry wells who still live on bottled water.