By Joel Hastings
The board of directors of the Chowchilla Water District met in regular session on May 14, 2025 at the District offices. President Roger Schuh called the meeting to order at 1:35 p.m. with four directors present and Russell Harris absent.
SGMA Requests
With public comment invited, Dr. Ronnie Singh of America United Farms introduced himself and his father, Dr. Paul Singh. He explained that his farming operation of 605 acres is located just south and west of the District boundary, bordering the Berenda Slough and the East Side Bypass. Distributing printed information to the board, he continued
saying he has a five-acre unlined reservoir, 30 feet deep that can hold 150 AF of water. He said he is expanding the reservoir to 15 acres and so could help the District with recharge. He said that he used 1207 AF of water, under his allocation of 1281 AF and therefore is not in overdraft. All that said, he asked if the District would expand in order to bring in his farm. He added that he has infrastructure in place to bring in water and that he would bear the expense for any additional turnouts that might be needed.
In response, Doug Welch, resource manager and head of the GSA, explained that all of the white area outside the District really is in overdraft, including Singh’s farm. The allocation for farmland right now allows overdraft but will continue to go down until 2040. He said he had no other comment about the request.
President Schuh explained that the District has a moratorium on bringing in additional properties. General Manager Brandon Tomlinson added that there is a “stack of requests” from landowners wanting to be brought into the District. He said this request could be put on this list.
Speaking next was a landowner with subordinate land in the District… Syam Maradani. He asked if subordinate water would be available this season. Schuh responded saying that there is no water for subordinate land at the moment based on the overall water supply available to the District. The board took that position at the last meeting when it determined rates and timing for the water year. Maradani also asked if he could obtain water from another property owner or water district, would the District assist in delivery. Tomlinson said that he has been in touch with neighboring districts and that no managers have available water at this point. Schuh said if some water becomes available of course the board would provide it for subordinate lands. He said being subordinate means you don’t necessarily get water every year, the last time being 2023.
With no other public comment, an additional agenda item was approved by unanimous vote. The agenda provided for consideration of recharge basin construction estimates. GM Tomlinson explained a proposal had been received from a firm to remove trees on two other properties that should be taken into account as well, requiring the agenda addition. After a brief discussion, it was decided that further consideration should be in closed session.
Great Expectations
The directors then convened as the board of the GSA. Resource Manager Welch opened by explaining that the staff of the State Board was recommending approval of the revised 
Chowchilla GSP. The full board is scheduled to consider this recommendation at its June 3rd meeting. If the State Board approves, it will allow the GSA to return to the jurisdiction of DWR, a desirable result. Welch asked for and received permission to attend this meeting along with John Davids of Davids Engineering, the firm that has produced the GSP and the revisions. According to all indications, Welch said, it appears very likely the revised GSP will be deemed adequate.
The Meeting
Resuming the District board meeting, the group heard from Austin Ewell, whose firm has been working to get federal support for the raising of Buchanan Dam and for completion of the Merced – Chowchilla Intertie. He said two Congress members are directly involved – Tom McClintock because the dam is actually in his district and Adam Gray because the
intertie is in his. They and their staff have visited the site and are in full support. Senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff are also supportive. The next step in the dam project is a feasibility study by the Army Corps of Engineers which has been approved but not funded.
Ewell said that while the Trump Administration is committed to more water for the Central Valley, the appointment of new leadership in the Bureau of Reclamation combined with the staff reductions – the western states are down by 25 percent – is generally making the funding process slower.
On the issue of support for recharge projects, one of the considerations might be for the District to apply for grant funding to help with feasibility studies allowing any resulting federal appropriations to be used for actual construction. Ewell gave several examples of that process and said his firm could be of assistance. When he was asked about how long this could take, he said the rule of 3 x 3 x 3 still applies… three years, three million dollars and three feet of paper generated!
Ewell concluded, saying that by summer with new leadership in place it likely will be possible to assess what projects might be funded. Showing the benefits of any projects is fundamental, whether dollars are to come from grants or appropriations… or both. He concluded at 2:35 p.m.
Financial
Office Manager April Garay delivered the treasurer’s report, showing receipts for April of $535,812.80, disbursements of $1,982,514.07 and an ending balance of $15,271,681.04. In response to a question, she said there are a few people who owe from last year, about $80,000 and that no, none of them are receiving this year’s water. Her report was approved along with the warrants list of bills amounting to $2,295,855.59.
Minutes were accepted with a clarifying phrase that requested forgiveness of late charges was approved. This month, another request for waiving late charges, this one from Raul Trujillo, was denied.
A water conveyance agreement was approved between the District and Renik Farms LLC for delivery of LeGrand Athlone Water District water amounting to 150 AF. The amount will be adjusted for 35 percent loss and the wheeling fee of $70 / AF will apply. This same process was approved last year as well.
A New WD
The board considered a draft letter to Madera LAFCO (Local Agency Formation Commission) which had asked for guidance for the request it had received to approve a new water district in the county. Madera ID, Chowchilla WD and Triangle T WD had been invited to suggest guidelines. The letter which was approved by Madera ID outlined considerations
including insuring that a new district had a plan for water, was open to neighboring members and would participate in the appropriate subbasin GSAs. The board discussed various aspects noting that as a water district, having new entities to deal with regarding GSAs was not particularly a good thing. But they were reluctant to appear to prevent growers from taking new approaches. The consideration of the text of the letter was tabled after this discussion.
Surplus
At earlier meetings, the board had approved the possible sale of surplus property – about 20 acres and a home – to a couple who had submitted the high bid. Subsequently, financing was not available, and the bid was withdrawn. The board acted to rescind the earlier approval and instead accept a bid of $535,000 from Michael Vander Dussen.
The declaration of surplus equipment was approved for a 2009 Ford F-150 pickup with over 180,000 miles and a cracked block. Also approved was the sale of a filter station and booster pump from farmland recently acquired for recharge.
An agenda item for consideration of bids for recharge construction were briefly discussed but the time arrived for a scheduled call with the District’s counsel, so the board moved to closed session at 3:15 p.m.
Coming out at 4:05 p.m., the board approved bids for recharge basin construction from Foida Land Leveling in Ceres, Calif. A project referred to as the Happy Boy Farms property was bid at $193,110.25 and for the Cornaggia property the bid approved was $267,541.80. Additionally, on the agenda item added, bids from G & F Ag Services in Ripon, Calif., were accepted to remove trees from the Avila Pond and Almond House acres totaling $63,280.
Chris Mayo, director of operations, gave his report describing various maintenance projects to prepare for the start of the water season. In the shop, ditch lights were installed on nine pickups and other maintenance was completed. His report included lake water levels at Millerton (429,146 AF) and Eastman (98,261 AF), both up from last month.
GM Tomlinson briefly confirmed that the Class 1 Friant allocation remains at 100 percent. With no reports from the directors, the meeting was adjourned at 4:23 p.m.
DISCLAIMER OF RESPONSIBILITY; Waterwrights strives to provide clients with the most complete, up-to-date, and accurate information available. Nevertheless, Waterwrights does not serve as a guarantor of the accuracy or completeness of the information provided, and specifically disclaims any and all responsibility for information that is not accurate, up-to-date, or complete. Waterwrights’ clients therefore rely on the accuracy, completeness and timeliness of information from Waterwrights entirely at their own risk. The opinions expressed in this report are those of the author and do not represent any advertisers or third parties.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2025 by WaterWrights.net
Chowchilla Water District – PO Box 905 – 327 So. Chowchilla Ave., Chowchilla, CA 93610 559/665-3747 website www.cwdwater.com
Staff: General Manager – Brandon Tomlinson; General Resource Manager – Douglas Welch
Board: Roger Schuh – President, Karun Samran – Vice President, Russell Harris, Nathan Ray and Vince Taylor
PROFILE: Formed in 1949, the Chowchilla Water District serves about 85,000 acres situated in southern Merced County and northern Madera County on the eastside of the San Joaquin Valley. The District serves about 85,000 acres in southern Merced and northern Madera Counties. It’s over 400 water users have an average farm size of about 162 acres. Buchanan Dam was constructed in 1975 and is operated and maintained by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The maximum capacity of the dam is 150,000 acre-feet and has a maximum conservation capacity of 140,000 acre-feet. The District also has appropriative water rights issued by the State Water Resources Control Board to divert water from the Chowchilla River. The Madera Canal supplies water from Friant Dam to the Chowchilla Water District. The District has contracted with the Bureau of Reclamation for 55,000 acre-feet of Class 1 Water and 160,000 acre-feet of Class 2 Water. With Madera ID, the District owns the Madera-Chowchilla Water & Power Authority which operates the Madera Canal and four hydroelectric power plants located on the Madera Canal.
The Chowchilla Subbasin’s DWR # is 5-022.06
