[link to www.gopusa.com]

link:"All transactions are conducted, reviewed and approved internally by DCE staff and managers to maintain control and avoid unnecessary delays to schedule," the property plan outlines. "DCE shall seek to minimize external review and approval requirements."

DCE is short for Delta Conveyance Facilities Design and Construction Enterprise, a private-contractor group embedded within the state Department of Water Resources to work on the proposed tunnels.

In a June interview, Neil Gould, an attorney for the Department of Water Resources, said planning for the proposed tunnels was no more than 10 percent complete and had focused on assessing the environmental impact.

Asked if planning the process of eminent domain was warranted as part of the project's environmental review, Department of Water Resources spokeswoman Nancy Vogel said Monday in an email, "identification of properties that may be within the project area is necessary ... as DWR needs to estimate the proposed project's potential impacts to those properties."

Public water agencies paid for the property acquisition plan, Vogel said. Those include water agencies in the San Francisco Bay Area and Central California, as well as Southern California, she said.