Industry Insight - Lisa Haney - From Monitoring to Management: Building Living Environmental Decision Systems

California has invested decades in environmental monitoring, creating extensive records of hydrology, water quality, habitat, species, groundwater, sediment, climate, and land use. Yet much of this information is still used as a snapshot: collect data, analyze it, produce a report, and repeat.

AI, GIS, remote sensing, and digital twins offer a different model. By connecting trusted historical monitoring with continuously updated observations, agencies can create living decision systems that identify change earlier, target monitoring where uncertainty is greatest, test predictions against field conditions, and evaluate management scenarios.

Using the Prado Basin Digital Twin as a case study, this presentation explores how decades of environmental and operational data can be integrated to better understand a complex system serving flood control, water supply, groundwater recharge, and habitat.

The statewide opportunity is much larger. Similar approaches could support watersheds, headwaters, reservoirs, groundwater basins, floodplains, ecosystems, and water infrastructure across California.

The goal is not to replace monitoring or professional judgment, but to make decades of public investment continuously useful—moving from documenting what happened toward understanding what is changing and informing what we do next.

Lisa Haney is a strategic leader in water and natural resources planning recognized for advancing innovative, collaborative, and future-focused solutions that integrate water supply operations with ecosystem stewardship. As Executive Director of Planning and Natural Resources at the Orange County Water District (OCWD), she oversees the Planning and Watershed Management Department and the Natural Resources Department, guiding development of the District’s Groundwater Management Plan, long-term water resilience strategies, environmental compliance and permitting, and programs for watershed planning, recharge planning, and natural resource management.

With more than 25 years of experience in public utilities and regulatory policy and compliance, Lisa has built a career at the intersection of science, infrastructure, and strategy. Prior to joining OCWD, she worked for Irvine Ranch Water District, Orange County Sanitation District, and Los Angeles County Sanitation District, developing a deep understanding of integrated water systems across wastewater, potable reuse, watershed, and groundwater management.

Lisa’s work centers on the nexus of operating large-scale water infrastructure while simultaneously managing and protecting natural resources so that both systems thrive. She brings a whole-systems framework perspective to planning, connecting land, water, habitat, infrastructure, and community needs into cohesive, adaptive frameworks that support resilient, multi-benefit outcomes.