By Don A. Wright
The Friant Water Authority board of directors met at the Bello Vita Event Venue in Visalia on Thursday, July 25, 2024. Chairman Jim Erickson called things to order at 10:15am or so. The FWA board meets in closed session before open session. There was nothing to report from the open session. Director Cliff Loffler led us in prayer, asking God for wisdom beyond just a canal full of water.
The Meeting
The first item was the consent calendar, a really handy invention someone came up with to approve a bunch of stuff all at once. This isn’t about hiding things from public scrutiny. Consent calendars are about items that are, as they say, routine in nature. Minutes, paying the bills and other matters that happen monthly or quarterly or ever how often meetings
take place. Anyone, board member, member of the public, anyone can pull an item from the consent calendar and it can be discussed. That happens often enough to not be unusual. But, getting a bunch of items passed as a group as opposed to wading through each one individually does help move a meeting along towards more detailed matters.
Action Items
Wilson Orvis, CFO gave the board an update on the FWA budget for fiscal year 2025. He went over a buttload of numbers and such and the board approved the new budget.
Ian Buck-Macleod, Water Resources Manager told the board about the conveyance agreement between FWA and the Banta Carbona Irrigation District. BCID sits on the San Joaquin River downstream of the Tuolumne River. BCID has facilities that allow it to pump water from the SJR. This water goes to the Delta Mendota Canal and is sent to the San Luis Reservoir. Friant gets rights to this water under the San Joaquin River Restoration Act. Buck-Macleod explained to the board there needs to be a fourth amendment to the conveyance agreement. The board agreed.
Friant Kern Canal Repairs
Janet Atkins of Stantec Engineering began her report on the FKC repairs by saying she didn’t have any photos because most of the work is finished. There is a very big issue with installing new pump stations, particularly in Saucelito and Teapot Dome IDs. COO Johnny Amaral explained that issue. He said, if I understood the plan should be in place by the end of the year.
Katie Duncan, engineer (smarter than any three people you could grab and duck-tape together) gave her report on water quality on the FKC. One of the concerns for the districts at the end of the canal is water quality, specifically salt. Few naturally occurring things can kill terrestrial vegetation like salty water.
Water Report
Buck-Macleod said the north of Delta storage is looking good. However, at the end of June there was an explosion at the Delta Mendota Canal/California Aqueduct intertie pumping plant. This intertie plant is necessary for the federal Jones Pumping Plant, located near Tracy on the Delta, to run at full capacity. An electrical relay didn’t trip properly and there was a mess. How does that impact Friant you may ask? I’ll tell you – this is how the San Luis Delta Mendota Division of the Central Valley Project gets its water through these canals impacted by the problem. The Exchange Contractors are part of this group and if they don’t get their water the US Bureau of Reclamation has in the past sent SJR water Friant would have used and sent it down the river to the west side.
Buck-Macleod went on to talk about the Friant water supply. The San Joaquin River watershed is looking pretty good but there has to be some mandatory levels in Lake Millerton. The US Bureau of Reclamation determines the allocations and at this time that is at 90 percent. We’ve had a relatively wet year so this should be 90-percent. There was a sixth Airborne Snow Observatory flight at the end of June and while there wasn’t much snow to look at the data gathered showed predictions are in line with actual conditions.
Gov’t Mischief
Mike Villines and Amaral gave updates on what is happening in Sacramento and Washington DC. Villines said the California legislature is on vacation and won’t be able to hurt anyone until next month. He said this year’s water bond doesn’t really help. It has morphed into a social/environmental justice bond based on competitive grants. He said if this bond passes they are trying to have a plan in place to get some of the benefits to go to real things. He said if you can, take a look to see who all doesn’t like this water bond. It’s a group ranging from north to south and the bond is being called the no-water bond.
Villines said this session has been good to kill the bad bills and he believes a good bill – Senator Anna Caballero’s bill to improve the California Water Plan – should pass. Director Edwin Camp asked if there is any hidden danger in Caballero’s bill. Villines said there isn’t anything earth shaking but it will help in some ways. FWA CEO Jason Phillips said he understands this bill won’t add a new program but rather update the current water code.
Amaral said there is nothing at all exciting taking place in DC, tongue in cheek. He said this portion of the election cycle is known as the “Silly Season” for a reason. He said Congress will take August off and go home to campaign. There will be a Friant delegation waiting to meet them in DC when they come back.
Amaral said he’ll be at the American Pistachio Conference tomorrow to speak on a panel (I’m moderating) with Congressman John Duarte, William Bourdeau Harris Farms, Lindsay Cederquist Maricopa Orchards and Dr. Steve Blumenshine CSU WATER. This will be at the Visalia Convention Center and the water panel will start at 10:45am.
O&M
Chris Hickernell, O&M Director gave his report saying the past couple of wet years exposed some needed flood control measures along the FKC. Some panels were replaced and gates refurbished. He said the system is moving a lot of water and they are able to keep things rolling. Unfortunately, there was some incident – non fatal I understand – that messed with the safety record. Sorry to hear that. Friant was on a roll for sure.
The Blueprint
Austin Ewell gave the board an update on what’s going on with the Water Blueprint for the San Joaquin Valley. He said the Southern California Water Coalition and others have signed on with the Blueprints’ position on the upcoming bond. The California Water Institute at Fresno State is now working with UC Merced to continue the water study. Good for them.
SLDMWA
Orvis told the board wonderful things that you regular readers already know. Phillips has been seated on the San Luis Delta Mendota Water Authority board and has a vote on
financial items. There was a physical copy of the Key Governance & Agreement document handed out and that is available to the public if you want to read through it.
Attorney Don Davis said there is a Delta Mendota Canal subsidence project going on. He said there were 25 Groundwater Sustainability Agencies and the Groundwater Sustainability Plan was, well “disjointed”. They have come back with a revised GSP that was prepared with help by Stantec. As noted above what happens on the DMC also impacts Friant. The DMC subsidence project will likely not be completed this decade and that should be an item included in the GSP.
Davis asked the GSAs what the source for some of the subsidence threshold marks was based upon. He said not to panic but it looks like back in 2020 the former GSP came up with a number that wasn’t completely verified and the USBR used that number in estimating the billion dollar DMC repair study. The GSAs have now quoted the USBR’s figure the Bureau got from them.
Let me be clear – this is a complex matter and Phillips emphasized Friant and SLDMWA are working well together. He and SLDMWA CEO Federico Barajas are engaged in planning committee work and things are moving along well.
CEO Report
Phillips made a brief comment about the thrill he had seeing Hulk Hogan on stage at the Republican Convention. He said this may be a glimpse into why the federal agencies are moving full steam ahead and ahead of schedule to get the biological opinions in place. They might be anticipating an administrative change in the wind.
Last month he avoided a meeting in Los Banos to go to Shaver Lake and speak with the Civil Leadership Council. This is a group working with folks seeking office and he got to explain to them how water flows in California and why that is important to national security.
On August 7th there will be a luncheon of the California Water Alliance in Fresno where Phillips and Allison Febbo, GM of Westlands Water District will be speaking.
Camp asked what’s new with the Delta tunnel. The comment period didn’t yield any protest from a single Central Valley Project contractor. Buck-Macleod said CEQA has been completed. He also said the Sites Reservoir is in line before for the tunnel problems are fixed.
Phillips added he agrees with Ewell and the Blueprint on the biological opinions. He said the Blueprint plays an important role in protecting farmers. Some of these things can’t be taken care of by water agencies. Now I have to agree with him. Water and irrigation
districts are also political subdivisions of the State of California and therefore dependent to some extent on the state’s desires. Farmers need to remember they must fight for themselves. Que the footage of the eagle soaring over the super imposed American flag while something by JP Souza plays. And with that the meeting adjourned at 11:30am. Go be good to yourselves and others.
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ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2023 by Don A. Wright
FRIANT WATER AUTHORITY
854 N. Harvard Ave., Lindsay, CA 93247, Office 559/562-6305 Email:information@friantwater.org www.friantwater.org
The Friant Water Authority is a Joint Powers Agreement with 15 districts to operate and maintain the Friant Division of the Central Valley Water Project. Water from the San Joaquin River is diverted at Friant Dam at Millerton Lake to the Madera/Chowchilla Canal to the north and the Friant/Kern Canal to the south. More than one million acres of mostly family farms and numerous communities get their surface supplies from the Friant Division.
Board: Chair Jim Erickson, Vice Chair Rick Borges
Staff: CEO Jason Phillips, COO Johnny Amaral, CFO Wilson Orvis, Water Resources Manager Ian Buck-Macleod, Engineer Katie Duncan, Superintendent Chris Hickernell and Attorney Don Davis.
