The Consolidated Irrigation District board meeting was called to order at 1:00pm on February 14, 2018 by President Larry Cruff. The meeting was held at CID’s Selma headquarters. Public comment was made open but no public comments were brought forth, so the meeting went straight into the action items. These included approvals of; the minutes from last month’s meeting, payroll approval, and financial statement approval.
Water Reports
The water report did not look good due to a meager January and February rainfall measurement. Currently, there is 10k a/f of storage available to CID. The head gates are releasing 100 cfs for habitat flow and FID is capturing about 50 cfs of that which is why CID is only seeing about 50 cfs at their switch. Most of the water is going to the Fowler switch.
A snow survey was completed and it is estimated there is only 15 percent snowpack up in the Sierra’s due to such low precipitation over the last couple months. There is talk that Lemoore will do a spring run in the canals but in order for CID to accomplish this there will have to be much more rainfall/snowpack. A spring run for CID does not look good at this point.
SGMA Update
Each GSA is working on getting their a/f responsibilities for the GSP. Provost & Pritchard is working with CID to develop draft numbers which will help them work with the surrounding GSA’s on their overdraft responsibility. Currently, for the Kings Sub-basin it looks like they will be responsible for around 201-220k a/f of overdraft. For CID specifically, it is estimated that 20-30k a/f of that total overdraft will belong to them; that is a manageable number and the board is confident that they will be able to work within those ranges. An MOU is drafted for dispute resolution between the cooperating GSA’s and a preferred mediator is being looked for.
Something to Note
The DWR has released recommendations for grant money and it looks like the Kings Sub-basin will receive $1.5 million for technical preparation and GSP planning.
Prop 218 Election
P&P was asked to prepare a feasibility report in order that CID can have realistic numbers to present to the voters. Discussion on whether to hire a PR firm or not to help with the promotion of the election went on for about 30 min. Eventually it was decided that more information was needed before a plan of action was chosen. What was agreed upon was that public education must be at the core of this prop 218 election. Most people don’t know enough about SGMA and that is at the core of this prop. Education will have to be the first thing that is done.
High Speed Rail Update
CID is working with the High Speed Rail (Flatiron) to possibly get some land which CID would be able to build a ponding basin with. Flatiron needs dirt and will purchase the land and deed it back to CID free of charge in order to use some of the permits which CID holds.
The meeting was adjourned.
Central Kings GSA
The Central Kings GSA was called to order at 2:15pm on February 14, 2018 by Cruff. A time for public comment was made available but no one came forth. The board approved the minutes from last month’s meeting and proceeded to the director’s report quickly thereafter. A court case which involved some land owners and the Kings County Water District was discussed but not much definite information was given. Kings County had apparently won the case. The dispute was about whether banked water was actually reaching the lower levels of the aquifer. The ruling was that water which was put into the ground could be pumped out as long as it did not exceed the amount of water put in. Water in this banking facility, somewhere in Kings County, is on a gradient so leaving it in the ground for longer than a year is not advised. This was brought up because some of the customers of CKGSA were on the losing side of this case and were not happy about it. The board must be aware of this.
Something to Note
There is a project in the SE corner of Kingsburg, a 200-lot subdivision of homes, which is in
Tulare County but will be getting water from Kingsburg and having Kingsburg manage their wastewater. This subdivision is not paying into the pool for water recharge and the board will need to assess their impact and responsibility. There will be some problems to work through and more information will be presented next month.
Valley native Alan Becker wrote this report.
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CONSOLIDATED IRRIGATION DISTRICT – 2255 Chandler St, Selma, CA 93662 Telephone; 559/896-1660
CID covers 145,000 acres mostly in South Central Fresno County. Surface water supplies: Kings River CID is its own GSA
General Manager – Phil Desatoff, Attorney – Doug Jensen, Water Master – Walt Frost, Controller – Margaret Macias
Board of Directors – President Larry Cruff, Thomas Benzler, Earl Hudson, Tony Lewis, Ray Moles
