California on Wednesday got a promise of $260 million in federal economic stimulus funds for water projects, and an assurance that the administration of President Barack Obama will be an active partner in combating the state's water troubles.

U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced the funding at Sacramento's Mather Field, after an aerial tour of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. He was joined by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and leading state and federal legislators.

Funding will be directed at projects overseen by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. It includes $31 million for safety projects at Folsom Dam, mainly to assist ongoing construction of a new flood-control spillway.

Another $4 million will pay for planning related to a habitat conservation plan in the Delta, where a controversial diversion canal is proposed to address water supply and habitat concerns.

The biggest allocation is $110 million to build new pumps and fish screens at the Red Bluff Diversion Dam on the Sacramento River. The facility diverts water into the Tehama-Colusa Canal to irrigate 150,000 acres of farmland, mostly on the west side of the Sacramento Valley.

The archaic facility is the largest unscreened water diversion left on the Sacramento River and is blamed for killing endangered salmon and sturgeon. Improvements were authorized in the 1992 Central Valley Project Improvement Act but never funded.

The Tehama-Colusa Canal Authority is ready to start construction this spring, said General Manager Jeffrey Sutton.

"It's been a big problem for salmon and steelhead and sturgeon, which try to migrate past the dam, for a long time," said Kate Poole, an attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council. "This is the big sum of money they needed to actually fully construct the project."

Perhaps more important was Salazar's promise on Wednesday that the federal government will again assume a large role in helping solve California's water problems.

Reclamation's California projects are some of its biggest, irrigating nearly half the produce sold in the United States.

Yet the federal government has largely stood on the sidelines for nearly a decade while California struggled with its water infrastructure problems.

Salazar announced the funding after touring the Delta by helicopter with Schwarzenegger. The Delta is the locus of the state's water and environmental problems, where declining fish species and drought have reduced water deliveries.

Reclamation and the state operate separate Delta pump systems that provide water to 23 million Californians and 3 million acres of farmland.

"The Delta is a stark reminder that California's water supply has reached its limits," Salazar said. "It is time to make hard choices, and it is time for the federal government to re-engage in full partnership."

That was music to the ears of state officials, including Lester Snow, California's Water Resources boss.

Snow was in charge of the CalFed Bay Delta Authority in the 1990s, when the federal government made big promises about helping California solve the Delta's problems. In subsequent years, however, it largely failed to meet funding agreements.

"It's a sea change in the way we're going to deal with Delta issues," Snow said Wednesday. "We have a secretary of Interior showing a personal interest in these very difficult resource issues we have in California."

Other funding as part of Wednesday's announcement includes:

• $40 million for drought relief projects such as drilling new wells and assisting with water transfers, especially in the beleaguered San Joaquin Valley, where Delta water cutbacks have caused mass crop fallowing and unemployment.

• Battle Creek, a tributary of the Sacramento River, will get $26 million for salmon and steelhead habitat restoration.

The state is also now eligible for another $135 million in federal grants for water recycling projects. This brings California's potential stimulus water grants to about $400 million.

Jay Lund, a UC Davis professor of civil and environmental engineering, said stimulus money will help generate jobs in construction, among the hardest-hit sectors in California's downturn.

But he said Californians should not fool themselves into thinking this money will solve their water woes; the problems are too big.

"There will never be enough federal money to cover all of California's water problems," he said. "Local interests will find it's ultimately in their interest to pay either higher local water rates or higher local taxes, because there's just a lot to be done."

Call The Bee's Matt Weiser, (916) 321-1264.