Editing Porterville, California (section)

===Environmental issues===
Owing to geography, heavy reliance on [[automobile]]s and [[agriculture]], Porterville suffers from [[air pollution]] in the form of [[smog]]. The Porterville area and the rest of the [[San Joaquin Valley]] are susceptible to [[Inversion (meteorology)|atmospheric inversion]], which holds in the exhausts from road vehicles, airplanes, [[agriculture]], manufacturing and other sources. Unlike other cities that rely on rain to clear smog, Porterville gets only {{convert|13.00|in|mm|2}} of rain each year: pollution accumulates over many consecutive days. Issues of air quality in Porterville and other major cities led to the passage of early national environmental legislation, including the [[Clean Air Act (United States)|Clean Air Act]]. More recently, the state of California has led the nation in working to limit pollution by mandating [[low-emission vehicle]]s. Smog levels are only high during summers because it is dry and warm. In the winter, storms help to clear the smog and it is not as much of a problem. Smog should continue to drop in the coming years due to aggressive steps to reduce it, electric and hybrid cars and other pollution-reducing measures taken.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.driveclean.ca.gov/en/gv/driveclean/bguides.asp|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090807180655/http://www.driveclean.ca.gov/en/gv/driveclean/bguides.asp|url-status=dead|title=Driveclean from the California Government web site|archive-date=August 7, 2009}}</ref>

As a result, pollution levels have dropped in recent decades. The number of Stage 1 smog alerts has declined from over 100 per year in the 1970s to almost zero in the new millennium. Despite improvement, the 2006 annual report of the [[American Lung Association]] ranked the city as the 11th most polluted in the country, with short-term particle pollution and year-round particle pollution.<ref name="shortTermPollutedCities">[http://lungaction.org/reports/sota06_table2.html People at Risk In 25 U.S. Cities Most Polluted by Short-Term Particle Pollution.] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090122050859/http://lungaction.org/reports/sota06_table2.html |date=January 22, 2009 }} [[American Lung Association]]. Retrieved on January 5, 2007.</ref>  In 2007 the annual report of the [[American Lung Association]] ranked the city as the 4th most polluted in the country with short-term particle pollution and year-round particle pollution.<ref name="yearRoundPollutedCities">[http://lungaction.org/reports/sota06_table2a.html People at Risk In 25 U.S. Cities Most Polluted by Year-Round Particle Pollution.] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090122051003/http://lungaction.org/reports/sota06_table2a.html |date=January 22, 2009 }} [[American Lung Association]]. Retrieved on January 5, 2007.</ref>  In 2008, the city was ranked the third most polluted and again fourth for highest year-round particulate pollution.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.citymayors.com/environment/polluted_uscities.html|title=City Mayors: The most polluted US cities|website=www.citymayors.com}}</ref>

Porterville is also experiencing environmental issues due to California's extreme drought. Most of the nearby unincorporated area of East Porterville has run out of its supply of groundwater, an unfortunate consequence of the entire unincorporated area relying heavily on private wells. Porterville spent much of 2014 sending shipments of bottled water to East Porterville.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.dailynewsx.com/news/science-news/how-a-california-town-completely-ran-out-of-water-36496.html |title=How a California town completely ran out of water &#124; New York News |access-date=March 2, 2016 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160302164440/http://www.dailynewsx.com/news/science-news/how-a-california-town-completely-ran-out-of-water-36496.html |archive-date=March 2, 2016 }}</ref>