"Farmworkers’ Dilemma: Affordable Housing, but Undrinkable Water"

"A sprawl of mobile home parks house 10,000 people in Southern California’s Coachella Valley, but their drinking water is chronically contaminated. Now some solutions are in sight."

"OASIS, California – September is the time of year that country clubs become ghost towns in Southern California’s Coachella Valley. It’s still too hot for tee times at the valley’s golf courses with temperatures often soaring to the century mark.

And while most tourists aren’t flocking to posh Indian Wells or parties in Palm Springs, it’s the busy season for the region’s other industry: date farming.

There are veritable forests of date palms growing here – tufts of green feathery fronds poke the horizon in almost every direction. Ladders dangle from 80ft trees, awaiting ascension by palmeros who will spend months picking most of the country’s date supply – some 44 million lbs."

Tara Lohan reports for Water Deeply September 26, 2017.