COMMISSION BACKS DISTRICT PROPOSAL
OROVILLE >> A proposed water district in northwestern Butte County Wednesday won a split-vote endorsement from the Butte County Water Commission, after a lengthy public hearing.
The commission voted 6-3 to recommend the Board of Supervisors support formation of the Tuscan Water District.
Even though the vote was just advisory, there were two hours of public comment. When the supervisors take up the matter Sept. 14, their action will also just be advisory, as the Local Agency Formation Commission is the entity that will determine whether the district is formed.
Applicants say the Tuscan District is proposed as a means to get surface water to an area that is dependent on groundwater, and where pumping will have to be reduced under a recent state law.
The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, passed in 2014, requires all the areas that use groundwater to come up with a plan to eliminate “adverse effects” to the underground aquifers.
In Butte County, the law applies to the Sacramento Valley floor. That part of the county has been divided into three “sub-basins.” Two of them — the Butte and Wyandotte Creek sub-basins — don’t have significant overdraft problems. In those areas less water is taken from the ground than is restored by nature and irrigation.
That’s not the case in the northwest: the Vina Sub-Basin. Virtually every water user in
the region stretching from Butte Valley north and west to the Tehama County line and the Sacramento River is dependent on wells.
About 250,000 acre-feet — more than 8 billion gallons — are pumped from below ground in the Vina Sub-Basin in a normal year. That’s going to have to be cut by about 15,000 acrefeet a year under SGMA.
The region includes Chico, although the California Water Service’s Chico Division uses less than 20,000 acre-feet in an average year.
The big water user in the Vina Sub-Basin is agriculture.
Since conservation can’t produce the entire reduction in groundwater use that’s necessary, either surface water will have to be brought in from elsewhere, or orchards will have to be pulled out, and farmland left fallow.
That choice prompted a number of growers to form what’s called the Agricultural Groundwater Users of Butte County. Three members of that group filed the application with LAFCo to form the Tuscan Water District.
Wednesday
The Water Commission was given four questions by LAFCo to answer:
What effect would the water district have on Butte County’s operations?
Would formation of the Tuscan Water District help or hinder water management in Butte County?
Would Butte County work cooperatively with the new district?
Would the district be a threat to the overall agricultural water supply in the county?
LAFCo also asked if there were any other concerns.
Acting Water and Resource Conservation Director Christina Buck had prepared draft answers to the questions, with options supporting or opposing the district.
Before public comment was taken, Tuscan District spokesman Tovey Giezentanner gave an overview of the proposed 102,000acre district, emphasizing the the applicants were not seeking to control the Vina Sub-Basin.
He said there were four regulators of the basin: The Vina Groundwater Sustainability Agency, The Rock Creek Groundwater Sustainability Agency, Butte County, and — if local efforts are judged to be lacking — the state Department of Water Resources.
“The punch line here is that the district is an implementer, not a regulator,” Giezentanner said. “We can pursue projects but they have to be consistent with the GSPs.”
GSPs are groundwater sustainability plans. The groundwater sustainability agencies are drafting those plans now. The three Butte County subbasin plans have to be finished by January. Progress reports are required every five years, with full implementation of the plans by 2042.
Public comment
would do.
The arrangement is legal for water districts, and more than 300 in the state are set up that way. But opponents called it unconstitutional, undemocratic and illegal among other things.
Jim McCabe said there were 140,000 people in the Vina Sub-Basin who would be impacted by decisions made by less than 1,000 — a situation he called “constitutionally infirm.”
It was charged that the big landowners would do projects for their benefit and ignore the “little guys.” “If my well runs dry,” said Mark Kearns, “they’re not going to care.”
There were also doubts the district was necessary, that the services it was offering could be provided by the groundwater service agencies, or by the county taking a more active role.
There were concerns that the two largest farms have owners from out of the area. Deseret Farms, for example, is part of the Church of Latter-day Saints, based in Utah. It has holdings throughout the West.
And there was the question of where the additional water would come from. Two sources have been identified: The extra water the Paradise Irrigation District has due to 90 percent of the town being destroyed in the Camp Fire, and the 27,500 acre-foot allocation Butte County has from Lake Oroville.
“I’m strongly opposed to putting a public resource in private hands,” said Pam Stoecer. “If it’s legal, it’s unjust.”
“What happened to living within our means?”
When Giezentanner began his presentation, he said supporters and opponents of the district “have more common ground than not. It may not seem that way, but there’s common ground.”
And during the public comment period, it certainly did not seem there was common ground.
All told, 40 people addressed the commission, 32 in person and eight via Zoom. They were about evenly divided pro and con.
Supporters ranged from Durham High School freshman Emma Schneider, 14, who wore her FFA jacket as she addressed the commission, to James Strong, general manager of Deseret Farms, the largest landholder in the proposed district.
Most of the supporters’ comments hit on similar points — more water is needed and the district was the best way to accomplish that.
“We have an overdraft problem,” said Schneider. “We need to solve that problem or we and our neighbors will have to stop farming.”
“We believe forming a water district is the best way,” said Strong, “the fastest and most certain way of fixing the overdraft.”
Opponents had a number of objections, with the “governance” issue surfacing most frequently.
The Tuscan District is proposed to be a “landowner voter district” as opposed to a “registered voter district.” That means votes are allocated by acreage, After the public hearing rather than one vote closed, Commissioner Matt per person. Tennis quickly moved to
Since the 75 district applicants adopt the letter Buck had own 58 percent prepared, with all the answers of the land within the district, supporting formation they have a majority of the district. vote on what the district “I want to give a fullthroated
Commission action
endorsement of the Tuscan Water District,” he said. “I am greatly concerned about SGMA and the risk to our economy.”
Commissioners Richard Harriman and Aimee Raymond responded by questioning the need for a new government agency, suggesting the groundwater sustainability agencies, or the Butte County Resource Conservation District could do the job, or the county could.
“We have two functioning GSAs,” said Raymond, “that have all the powers this district is asking for.”
Harriman also doubted the possibility the area could “supply-side your way out of it.”
“There isn’t water outside to bring in.”
He also thought forming the district would hinder efforts to meet Sustainable Groundwater Management Act’s requirements, due to the potential of litigation about the district’s formation and structure.
Raymond suggested a county-wide water district, with the idea that the work done for the Tuscan District could be used as the foundation for the broader district.
Commissioner Fred Montgomery was supportive of the district, saying rather than being about control, it was “a funding mechanism to see projects happen. I haven’t seen anyone else stepping up yet.”
When it came to the vote, Harriman, Raymond and Ernie Washington voted no. Chairman Dave Skinner and Tennis, Montgomery, Mark Grover, Mauny Roethler and Donnie Stinnett voted yes.
Grover and Roethler attended the meeting remotely, via Zoom. At one point Grover announced he had to leave briefly because his neighbor’s house was on fire, and he had to guide the fire department in.
The house was destroyed, he reported later.