The Westlands Water District held its board of directors meeting Tuesday, January 18, 2022 at its Fresno headquarters. Chairman Ryan Ferguson called the meeting to order at 1:00pm on the scheduled dot. I wasn’t able to attend Westlands in person today. I like their meetings the more I am around meetings. In general Westlands gets the heavy lifting done in committee where there is expertise and interest in a subject. For board members to have an overall knowledge of the issues impacting a district is very important, but for them to really gain an understanding of specific topics like finance or personnel can be very helpful to a well-integrated board and can make for a healthier organization provided these powers are not used for the dark side. Of course if they were used for the dark side the
organization would stay healthy for long. And closer to home for me board meetings don’t run overly long from pouring over the minutia until your chair gets uncomfortable and you can’t pay attention and your eyes get heavyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
The Meeting
Ferguson started the meeting and General Manager Tom Birmingham said staff had recommendations to remove some items from the agenda and that was well enough. The minutes were approved and that got the housekeeping completed.
GM Report
General Manager Tom Birmingham asked Assistant GM Russ Freeman gave the water operations report saying carriage loss requests have been reduced from 10 percent to 20 percent of the cost if I understood correctly. Brimingham said the improved carriage loss condition will allow for more carryover at San Luis Reservoir which is the same as less lost water.
Director Daniel Errotabere asked why the carriage loss is less and Birmingham said staff has presented a case to the State Board to promote responsible curtailment orders. Some of these orders may have been contributing to a better water yield. Who knew? Way to go State Board.
Freeman continued saying there isn’t any anticipated loss since the district didn’t get an allocation from the Central Valley Project so that won’t put a cap on this. He also sees San Luis not filling so there shouldn’t be any threat of spilling and losing carryover. There was about 8,000 a/f of groundwater pumping in WWD during December.
Tom Boardman reported there is 1.5 million a/f at Lake Shasta. He said the dry, volcanic soil in that area sucked up much of the early December storm water. Just as the ground started saturating the rains stopped. But things are ready for the next storm. It does, however, look like there won’t be a critical year declared at Shasta which means the Exchange Contractors should get its allocation and that starts a chain event of relief sights throughout the CVP. I have heard Shasta is a rain fed reservoir. If that’s true then shouldn’t all our reservoirs have storage increased? Just perhaps the answer is more storage.
Boardman said Lake Folsom is doing much better than Shasta and the Jones Pumping Plant at the Delta has been running full bore for the past couple of weeks but Delta inflow is dropping. If the entire remaining January stays dry there could be pumping reductions very soon. There are no storms forecast for the next seven days but there are some encouraging signs beyond that. He said all the pumping at Jones has been going to SLR and that’s encouraging. Unfortunately, Boardman said not to be surprised if a zero allocation is announced in February. However, the year isn’t over so there’s reason to hope for at least a five percent or better allocation later in the season. As always what happens in Shasta impacts all of us.
Birmingham asked member of the public Erick Johnson for his comments. Johnson asked if the supplemental pool requests can be cancelled. Freeman said the district doesn’t usually cancel these requests unless there are other takers to make up the difference. He said the board can make that call but staff can’t do so. He said the district doesn’t want to be on the hook for over supply.
Shelly Cartwright gave a political update. A new federal Farm Services Director for California has been appointed. On the state side within the gov’s budget there is $750 million to fight drought with $30 million for recharge. The budget also includes $1.1 billion for climate fiddling.
On the public affairs side consultant to WWD Jessica Ng said her firm Mercury Public Affairs focus on media relations. She said there is a daily media monitoring program and they bring facts to inaccurate reporting. They’ve never contacted me so. . . Either I’m getting the word straight or they’ve never heard of me.
She said there was some inaccurate information about the contract conversions and even though there was some mess reported they got the reporter on board with some of the truth. She invited the board to engage the public affairs team to work on misinformation. She said they’ve been working to bring greater attention to water infrastructure to the Valley. She said they worked with state Senator Melissa Hurtado on the SB 559 efforts. One of the goals is to lift up Westlands as thought leaders. Birmingham was a speaker at the Sacramento Press Club, I think she said. Good for him. There were a lot of the hoity toity in attendance. She said they’re cultivating additional relationships.
Katie Lewis Patala, also of Mercury said there have been meetings galore with organizations from Duke University to the Rand Corporation. Rand is a think tank in SoCal that is working on the policy of using agriculture in the Central Valley to deal with that ol’ demon carbon. The Milkman Institute in Los Angeles is also working on a regional policy accelerator. Milken, not milkman. A big meeting will be later this spring and a report issued. Duke University had to bail due to budget restraints so that was an interactive opportunity lost but there is a Duke University internship for Westlands. Sounds like Mercury is doing its things and Westlands is benefitting.
John Lonergan spoke next on content creation and old media coverage. He said collaboration, conservation, science and service are the core messages. He said Mercury sifted through WWD’s outreach efforts and came up with six documents. He’s been working on a Westlands brand guide for public and internal use. I haven’t noticed it but it may not have been implemented yet.
Director William Bourdeau asked how much ducats to revamp the website and Cartwright said the estimate is $80,000 for outside consultants but some of that can be done internally. She asked if anyone sees media inaccuracy to please contact them. Birmingham said WWD invested in improved outreach last year and he said it is difficult to quantify everything but he believes Mercury is doing well.
Outside Reports
Not sure who reported this but they said the Family Farm Alliance director Dan Kappen is speaking at the Mid Pacific Conference tomorrow in Reno. It Bourdeau who reported. Freeman said the San Luis Delta Mendota WA has approved its O&M for 2023 and is considering the activities budget for 2023.
SGMA
WWD Engineer Kitty Campbell reported there will be a committee meeting to review feedback from the proposed rules and regulations and metering is coming along. She said the Groundwater Sustainability Plan updates are expected to be completed by April. She said DWR wants the appendixes included in the plan and not to be treated as appendixes.
Director Kevin Assemi asked what comes after the recharge pilot program? Campbell said an environmental review is planned along with a budget request. Attorney Jon Ruben said this is correct.
Campbell next gave a presentation on groundwater. She said the estimate is 600,000 a/f pumped this year. That’s up 20,000 a/f over last year because of nonprogram pumping.
Many charts and graphs were shown. One had more than 800 pumps that recovered more than one a/f. They were divided into above and below the Corcoran Clay layer. Some wells pump both above and below the layer. About 72 percent of the upper aquifer pumping takes place in the south. The below aquifer pumping was more evenly placed. There has been decreases in water levels on the westside of the district and increases on the eastside. However, conditions are still better than 2015. If I’m reading the maps correctly most of the subsidence is on the mid northwest boundaries. The conditions are improving at least a little. There are good locations for percolation ponds and the Corcoran Clay only underlies 10 percent of WWD.
Finance & Admin
Bourdeau said there was a F&A Committee meeting earlier and he turned it over to Bobbie Ormonde. She said funding for groundwater modeling needs to be extended as more modeling takes place. She said this is a $311,000 cost but funded by grant. The board approved updating the groundwater flow model.
Next there was talk about the Pleasant Valley WD using WWD to wheel some water to the Coalinga Canal and on to PVWD. COO Jose Gutierrez reported a contract is pretty close and he asked for the board to authorize minor changes pending review by Rueben and Birmingham. The board asked for a couple of clarifications and Ruben felt this is something that won’t throw anything off track, not much anyway to provide and the item was tabled. And the board paid its bills. Ormonde also gave the investment report and the board approved.
Earlier in the day the F&A Committee tied a young maiden to a railroad track and then denied waving a $14,000 penalty for a one day late payment from a grower named Walker. In a letter to the committee it was said the company was changing banks and gave some other reasons for the mix up. James Walker was present and appealed to the board to override the committee decision. He said WWD received the payment checks but the bank accounts were undergoing changes. He said he was out of town at the same time his
bookkeeper got sick and he had to shut down the office due to the itis and quarantine and such. As soon as he and his son got back they delivered a good check to the Westlands offices. He said in more than 40-years they have not been late, ever. Director Jim Anderson said he was sympathetic to this case and would like to give him a break. Ferguson said when F&A reviewed this they were not aware of the covid
situation and felt this would be a case to forgive the penalty. Director Todd Neves asked Ruben if waiving this would set a precedent and Ruben responded the board has the authority to waive, I believe he meant on a case by case. Assemi said the Walkers have played by the rules all this time and he wouldn’t want to see someone have to pay $14,000 for one day under the covid conditions. Birmingham said it is the board’s discretion and as long as the reasoning is consistent each time it’s up to the
board. The board voted unanimously to forgive that debt.
In addition to WWD, there is the Westlands Water District Financing Corporation. With Bourdeau now on the F&A Committee it is traditional to have the F&A committee, Birmingham and Ormonde to serve on this board. Errotabere used to serve on the F&A and the WWD Financing Corp and Bourdeau is filling that slot. The board approved that unanimously.
Things were winding down and there was no public comment, one of the last items. The board them went into closed session at 2:45pm and that was that. Go be good to each other.
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Westlands Water District
3130 N. Fresno Street, Fresno CA 93703 Phone:559/224-1523
Board: Ryan Ferguson -President, Frank Coelho Jr. – Vice President, Jim Anderson, William Bourdeau, Kevin Assemi, Ceil Howe III, Daniel Errotabere, Stan Nunn & Todd Neves.
Staff: Tom Birmingham-General Manager, Jon Rubin-Attorney, Jose Gutierrez-COO, Russ Freeman-Deputy GM Resources, , Shelly Cartwright-Associate GM Water Policy/ Public Affairs Representative, Kitty Campbell-Supervisor of Resources, Bobbie Ormonde-VP of Finance & Administrative Affairs
About: Without irrigation, farming in the Westlands area of California would be limited and ineffectual. The history of Westlands is one of continual adaptation, careful water stewardship and advanced technology. By maintaining a fierce commitment to sustainability, the Westlands’ comprehensive water supply system continues to adapt, educate, and surpass conservation goals. Throughout its history, Westlands Water District has demonstrated a lasting dedication to water conservation and recognized that the long-term survival of its farms depends on the effective management of California’s precious water resources. From www.wwd.ca.gov
