Carrots farms v valley: the battle over a water-depleted California region
More than five years ago, Jim Wegis, a lifelong farmer in central California’s Cuyama valley, could see the writing on the wall for his water-intensive alfalfa fields.
He switched most of his 140 planted acres from seasonal hay to permanent olive and pistachio groves, drastically reducing his impact on the local aquifer. “I cut my water use just about in half,” he said.
The change was costly and stressful. Wegis had to spend over $150,000 to replace his irrigation systems and equipment, and he lost years of earnings while waiting for his orchards to mature. “There was a significant amount of time with not much income coming in,” said Wegis. “And it’s not over yet.”
In spite of his personal efforts to cut back on water use, Wegis along with landowners and institutions in Santa Barbara county’s Cuyama valley were hit by a lawsuit by two of the world’s largest carrot producers, Bolthouse Farms and Grimmway Farms. Together, those operations are big players in a $69m industry, and they’re requesting that a court decide just how much water they and all their neighbors can use.
The adjudication, which heads to state court on 8 January 2024, has wrangled in every homeowner, business, small-scale farmer, rancher and even the local schools in this series of state-defined “disadvantaged unincorporated communities” near Santa Barbara, which includes the townships of Cuyama, New Cuyama and Ventucopa. The nearly 1,200 residents throughout the valley all rely on the same dangerously diminishing basin for their water needs.
But the adjudication won’t be so simple. The geographic boundaries of the basin aren’t clear, so neither is which landowners will have to face off against the carrot companies in what’s bound to be a long process with multiple stages. The case will probably draw in neighboring residents from all of the small towns in the valley. And even when representatives for Bolthouse Farms and Grimmway Farms seem to be clear about a property that should be included in the case, they can’t always find them. Company reps have resorted to attaching documents to stakes placed on properties in question, in an attempt to serve landowners for adjudication.
If they don’t show up in court, these residents – who have no other source of household water – could potentially lose their right to pump forever. They are on the frontline of a national groundwater depletion problem, in which 40% of groundwater sites have hit all-time lows since 1920.
The 230-sq-mile Cuyama groundwater basin – which spans Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Kern and Ventura counties – is one of 21 basins in the state that are in “critical overdraft”. More water is being consumed than replenished; the valley gets an average of 8in of rain a year. And locals are angry they have been forced to lawyer up to preserve that increasingly rare resource.
Grimmway and Bolthouse are, by far, the top extractors. Most of the water in this dry valley comes from underground. Last year, it’s estimated that 66,700 acre-ft of water was pumped out of the Cuyama basin, with just 28,200 added. This year, two companies will probably pump more than 35,000 acre-ft of water – more than 75% of the water that’s been allocated to the entire valley. That’s enough to supply 70,000 California households, blasting from the companies’ overhead sprinklers. The verdant carrot fields stand in stark, bright contrast to the muted sandstone of the surrounding hillsides.
As the valley’s water levels have dropped, so has the quality. Harmful elements, like boron and arsenic, have begun turning up in tests in some areas of the basin. “The little town of New Cuyama had to install an arsenic removal system in order to meet drinking water standards,” said Stephen Gliessman, professor emeritus of agroecology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and co-owner of Condor’s Hope Ranch vineyard and farm. “They’re drawing ancient water from so deep it has high levels of contaminants that