By Joel Hastings
President Roger Schuh called to order the meeting of the Chowchilla Water District board of directors at 1:32 p.m. on May 13 at the District offices in Chowchilla. He invited public comment and asked Zach Griffen of Water & Land Solutions and this reporter to introduce themselves. He explained to “us regulars” that he wants to make this part of the routine when there are others who attend. There were two minor tweaks to the agenda and then he convened the group as the board of the GSA.
DWR & Subsidence
Resource Manager Doug Welch said there would be a meeting with subbasin staff and DWR on Friday at 9 a.m. in Fresno. The topic will be DWR’s best management practices for the prevention of ongoing subsidence and a review of plans in the subbasin.
The Meeting
Back to the district board agenda, Business Manager April Ellison gave the treasurer’s report, citing the balances. The April 1 figure was $20,282,840.88 with receipts in April of $183,505.30, disbursements of $867,916.92 and a May 1 total of $19,598,429.26. Her report was approved without discussion as was the warrants list of bills totaling $1,108,688.21. General Manager Brandon Tomlinson said the budget was in order, early in the year and before the water season. Minutes of the meetings held April 8 and May 5 were also approved. In response to a question, he noted that with water flowing in the Madera Canal, the power station had begun generation. Chris Mayo gave his operations & maintenance report, citing lake levels, repairs to infrastructure and work in the shop as detailed on his page in the board packet.
Satellite ET
At a special meeting last week, the board had heard from Joel Kimmelshue who gave a detailed description of the services offered by his Land IQ firm which measures evapotranspiration for a number of irrigation districts in the Valley. At this meeting the board considered his scope of work proposal to provide services to the CWD. At 81 cents per agricultural acre, the proposal was for an annual total of $67,907 billed monthly. By paying now, Land IQ would go back to October 2025, the start of the water year, to calculate water use across the district. The next annual billing would be this fall in September, at the start of the 26-27 water year.
The board approved the proposal before the arrival of Director Russell Harris. But he was part of the discussion about appropriate strategy to inform district growers that the satellite would be tracking their water usage, both from use of district surface water and drilled ground water. This information will be necessary if and when the board imposes extraction fees and / or allocations. Welch asked the group when they would be considering these possibilities. Growers will be able to access the data for their own acreages for the additional expenditure by the district of about $50,000 at some point in the future. Schuh said he knows that he and other growers will want to compare results of their meters with the Land IQ totals.
When considering this expense, there was discussion of the contract with Austin Ewell who represents the district in front of the Army Corps and other government officials working on a possible plan to raise Buchanan Dam. It was agreed this would be a discussion for another day, to consider how a major project like this, ties in with the smaller, local recharge projects underway in the district.
Action Items
The agenda’s next item was consideration of a task order from Provost & Pritchard who have provided engineering services to the district for many years. They were proposing an increase in the ceiling from $25,000 to $50,000, although there are no specific plans for projects. They invoice for time and materials after getting approval in advance for any work. Director Vince Taylor asked why that kind of increase was warranted when recently not even $25,000 had been spent. Others agreed and a task order for $25,000 was approved “as a matter of principle.”
Water Delivery Policy
Next up was a review of the policies and procedures for water delivery this season. Taking up seven pages in the board packet, the rules remain essentially as they were last year. However, several changes are being considered. To deal with the challenge of growers who want water shut off during a weekend, but resumed on Monday, a possible rule would assess them as if water was delivered throughout the weekend. Directors asked if some incentive could be offered to encourage growers to continue to take weekend water.
The board is considering requiring property owners to identify any back flush lines on their acreages. A comment here was that new lines would need to be applied for and identified but not those already in existence. A final possibility is a rule stating that water users deemed by the board to be “habitual rule breakers” could be subject to fines up to a dollar amount equal to 12 hours of water use. GM Tomlinson said that staff would be reviewing these possibilities and would bring them back to the board.
The district’s credit policies remain from previous years.
Friant Spill Possible
On the key issue of timing, Tomlinson said that the Bureau has alerted Friant contractors that in seven to ten days, water may have to be spilled over the dam. This is an incentive to start water deliveries as soon as possible and the board agreed that orders will be taken at once. It takes about a week to charge the system so deliveries can begin next week. At this point, a nine-week season is anticipated.
What about the price? Tomlinson said a break-even budget calls for Class 1 water to be priced at $190 / AF. That didn’t go well with any of the directors and discussion centered on lower pricing that would require funds to be taken from reserves. Director Taylor proposed a price of $135 / AF which would require $3.1 million to be taken from reserves. There was no second for that motion. Vice President Karun Samran proposed $150 / AF which was seconded by Director Harris, requiring $2.4 million from reserves. The question was called with Samran, Harris and Director Nathan Ray voting in favor, Schuh voting no and Taylor abstaining. Schuh expressed his opinion that a price of $140 or so would be his preference, but the majority ruled.
Part of the consideration is the opportunity to bring in or sell 6000 AF of district water in the San Luis Reservoir. The consensus seemed to be to bring it into the district and make it available at $500 / AF to subordinate lands as was done last year. While there is a cost for wheeling this water, the margin would reduce the amount needed to be taken from reserves.
In his brief report, GM Tomlinson passed out a page that showed lake levels behind dams, snow and rain totals… which in black and white that while snow totals are way behind “normal,” total precipitation for the San Joaquin Valley is at 94 percent. He confirmed a special meeting will be held to make final decisions about the San Luis water.
With no reports from directors the meeting was adjourned at 3:11 p.m.
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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
