The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California has a service area of about 5,200 square miles in parts of Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties.  The area served is only 3% of the total area of California.  However, the population served by the MWD of about 19,000,000 people represents over 50% of the entire state.  If the MWD achieved statehood, it would rank 5th in the nation in population.