Water Report

Water Watch
Statewide Meeting – September 2010
Joan Webster -Water Director

The 2010 water supply for many farmers throughout the state was better than first anticipated, but the attacks on our water rights and future continue with alarming fervor. The bills mentioned below from the CA Farm Bureau Federation Friday Review, as well as most of the other issues discussed in this report seem to have a frightening theme of increased fees and/or reduced water and property rights.

Over all for 2009 -10 the Water Bond was a central focus and removing it from the November ballot  certainly put a huge damper on many water users’ plans, and long range hopes.
AB 2092 (Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael) would require the Delta Stewardship Council by 2013 to develop a long-term finance plan to support implementation of the comprehensive Delta Plan. The measure would require the financing plan to allocate costs based on the beneficiary pays principle from the Delta Plan, including those outside the statutory Delta boundaries, thus expanding the authority of the Delta Stewardship Council outside the Delta. Farm Bureau is opposed. (CA Farm Bureau Federation Friday Review,

8/27/2010)
AB 2304 (Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael) would identify and map groundwater recharge areas and provide protections for those areas. The measure was amended earlier in the session to address some of Farm Bureau’s concerns, but property owner notification remains an unresolved issue. Farm Bureau remains opposed. (CA Farm Bureau Federation Friday Review, 8/27/2010)

AB 2595 (Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael) was pulled by the author this week.

SB 565 (Fran Pavley, D-San Diego), would establish an annual fee for all surface water statements of water diversion and use, including riparian and pre 1914 water right holders. The bill would authorize the State Water Resources Control Board to inspect the facilities of any person or entity to determine compliance, increases civil liability amounts and require costly studies from individual water users. The bill puts in jeopardy existing water rights permits and licenses. The measure was not brought up for a vote this week on the Assembly Floor but may yet be heard before the end of session on August 31. Farm Bureau is opposed. (CA Farm Bureau Federation Friday Review, 8/27/2010)

San Joaquin River – The first lawsuit, since the actual restoration of the San Joaquin River began in October 2009, has been filed.  The suit charges that the restored flows are causing seepage and damaging prime ag land on the Westside (Los Banos area). Water has not flowed consistently through this area since the Friant Dam was built some 60 years ago. This restoration effort is a result of a 20 year battle started by environment groups to restore the flows. (For more see The Fresno Bee, Modesto Bee, San Diego Tribune and other end of August 2010)

 The Delta Stewardship Council adopted the Interim Plan on August 27 at the conclusion of its two day meeting. There are major concerns with the Interim Delta Plan, because many believe that the flow criteria are not consistent with the coequal goals that are the fundamental principles that guide all of the Council’s work.  NCWA commented that, “the DWR’s Water Supply Modeling further demonstrates that the SWRCB’s Delta flow criteria cannot possibly help achieve the coequal goals because their implementation would devastate not only water supplies throughout California, but also would have very significant negative impacts on stream conditions that support fish that migrate through the Delta and are therefore part of its ecosystem.” http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/bay_delta/deltaflow/index.shtml

The Technical Issues Committee (TIC) of the Irrigated Lands Regulatory Program (ILRP) recently agreed to prioritize discussion of three monitoring and management plan requirements of water quality coalitions covered by the Coalition Conditional Waiver of Waste Discharge. While the goal of the TIC is to ensure that the monitoring programs use standardized procedures, with field and laboratory procedures that are scientifically sound and defensible, and that water quality data are defensible when characterizing agricultural discharges,  the SVWQC’s additional goal is to ensure practical and economically viable management plan obligations related to DO and/or pH, and E. coli are developed which recognizes the stewardship practices already used by growers to protect water quality. A majority of the SVWQC Management Plan requirements are related to DO and/or pH, and pathogens versus pesticides.

Fairgrounds overflows with water rights activists 
More than 500 people filled Winema hall on the Siskiyou Golden Fairgrounds Saturday evening to show support for Protect Our Water , a coalition  to combat what its membership believes to be an unconstitutional attempt to control water  in Siskiyou County, which has  been a legally adjudicated right of property owner. There are many point of contention in this far northern county including the plans to remove 3 of the 4 dams on the Klamath River, and the increasing requirements of permits and fees to use adjudicated water. At least one farmer in Scott Valley has been threatened with arrest by the Department of Fish & Game because the farmer is resisting the new permitting requirements on constitutional grounds. (Siskiyou Daily News - Monday, Aug. 30, 2010)

Butte County in Dispute with DWR
When Oroville Dam was completed in the 1960s, Butte County was allotted 27,500 acre-feet of water. Until 2007 DWR charged the county for the water they actually used. Since then DWR has charged for the full allotment, even when the water was not available for the county. Some years the county is able to sell to other agencies. This year the county may have to pay $1.2 million dollars for the a allotment. (Many believe that DWR is over stepping their authority with exorbitant fees)