From his law school days, Delta landowner and water warrior Tom Zuckerman remembers the phrase "dead hand control."

Think of a rich man who writes a will that seeks to control his heirs long after he has died.

Zuckerman sees this kind of control in perhaps the most crucial aspect of the state's new water policy: a council to oversee the Delta and maybe usher through a peripheral canal.

Today, The Record examines SBx7-1, Delta governance. Next: SBx7-2, the $11.14 billion bond.

Months before he leaves office, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will appoint four of the seven council members. In this sense, he will have a "dead hand" in Delta policy long after he leaves the governorship. (Council members' terms are four or six years.)

Schwarzenegger has made it clear he wants a canal or a tunnel to carry water past, rather than through, the Delta.

"We're taking some rather important decisions and turning them over to this group of people who are really not answerable to anybody," Zuckerman said.

Critics complain about the council's makeup, but they also contend that it lacks authority. For example, it must approve the Bay Delta Conservation Plan - of which a canal may be a key component - if that plan earns approval from the state Department of Fish and Game.

The council cannot independently say yes or no to a peripheral canal.

If the canal didn't dominate the discussion, there are aspects of the new Delta approach that local advocates might like. The law says, for example, that the policy of the state is to reduce reliance on the Delta to meet future water supplies.

Delta water is pumped as far south as San Diego. For decades, those exports have generally been increasing.

The law also says that water users must pay not only for a canal but also to make up for lost property tax revenue, a major concern for Delta counties.

The new council, and any canal that it might approve, is meant to complement other newly passed policies on water conservation, groundwater monitoring and those who take water illegally.

"We often run into people who say the solution to California's water problem is one thing," said Lester Snow, director of the state Department of Water Resources. "What this package recognizes is the solution ... is all of those things."

But many of these "solutions" are not as strong as various interest groups had hoped.

Also among new policies in the Delta governance bill, signed by Schwarzenegger in November:

? A new Delta conservancy will oversee restoration of habitat in the Delta, in part by buying land from willing sellers. Critics say the conservancy lacks adequate funding.

? The Delta Protection Commission, which oversees land use in the estuary, will be smaller but will have a greater concentration of local representatives.

? The State Water Resources Control Board, which oversees water rights, must decide how much water the Delta ecosystem needs. However, these flow "criteria" fall short of being enforceable standards.

? State or local agencies that pursue certain projects in the Delta in the future will need the council's approval. Mary Piepho, a Contra Costa County supervisor who worked closely with other supervisors on the Delta package, has warned that the council could override local land-use decisions.