Mojave National Preserve Proposal Threatens Wildlife

ALERT: Under the guise of a comprehensive water management plan, the National Park Service is proposing the removal of critical water sources in the Mojave National Preserve, imposing a certain death sentence on desert wildlife. Comment on EIS now!

Water source near Hackberry Spring, Mojave National Preserve

Water Resources Management Plan for Mojave National Preserve

Mojave National Preserve proposes to develop a comprehensive, ecosystem-scale management plan for water throughout this 1.6-million acre unit of the national park system. Mojave National Preserve has natural, modified, and artificial sources of water throughout its lands. The NPS seeks to determine desired future conditions through a public scoping process with hunters groups, environmental organization, park visitors, and state and federal agencies. Future condition targets will be defined in accordance with existing laws, regulations, and NPS management policies. Park staff is working with the NPS Environmental Quality Division to develop a comprehensive approach to management of water resources in Mojave National Preserve.

October 22, 2012: A Preliminary Alternatives newsletter is available for review. Please send your comments in here or in writing, addressed to the Superintendent. We are accepting comments through November 20, 2012.

Contact Information
Stephanie Dubois, Superintendent
Attention: Water Resources Management Plan
Mojave National Preserve
2701 Barstow Road
Barstow, CA 92311

Pioneertown Awarded Grant Funds for Water Improvements

By Ashley Quintero
Cactus Thorns

SAN BERNARDINO, CA – The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors voted today to accept nearly $400,000 in Prop. 84 grant funds, taking another step forward in bringing clean water to Pioneertown.

In order to receive the funds, the board voted to give the Special Districts Department signature authority to receive the funds. Special Districts will work in conjunction with the State of California through the Division of Drinking Water and Environmental Management to improve the quality of water for residents. Following the Landers earthquake in 1992, the quality of water in the region degraded and became undrinkable.

Supervisor Derry and his staff have diligently attended to various matters of concern for Pioneertown residents and ensuring access to a stable and safe source of water has been a priority of his office.

“Though we are not at the finish line, we have reached a point in the process where we can see light at the other end of the tunnel,” said Supervisor Derry. “I am bullish on the future and long-term sustainability of Pioneertown.”

Water worries: The drying of the West

The Colorado River and the civilisation it waters are in crisis

Lake Mead's "bathtub ring" at Hoover Dam.

The Economist

STANDING on the Hoover Dam and looking upstream at Lake Mead, America’s largest reservoir, the visitor notices a wide, white band ringing the cliffs. Nicknamed “the bathtub ring”, this discolouration comes from minerals that were once deposited on the volcanic rock by the Colorado River and have become visible as its level has dropped. It is one sign of a water crisis that threatens America’s south-west.

Other reminders abound. Farther upstream there are dry docks, jutting out ominously into desert, where boats were once moored. In one finger of Lake Mead buildings that were abandoned in the 1930s, as the water of the newly dammed river rose and submerged them, have eerily begun reappearing, like a ghost town.

The main reason why Lake Mead, currently only 40% full, has been getting emptier is a decade-long drought. Whether this is a cyclical and normal event, or an early sign of climate change, is unclear. But even if the drought ends, most scientists think global warming will cause flows on the Colorado River to decrease by 10-30% in the next half century, says Douglas Kenney, the director of a water-policy programme at the University of Colorado Law School.

The other reason, says Mr Kenney, is the rapidly increasing demand for the river’s water. The Colorado provides much or most of the water for many cities and farms in seven states—Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and California—before it peters out in the sands of Mexico.

In the northern states, its water supports cattle empires. In its southern stretch, especially in California’s Imperial County, the river irrigates deserts to produce America’s winter vegetables. And all along the way, aqueducts branch off to supply cities from Salt Lake City and Denver to Phoenix and Los Angeles. The metropolis closest to Lake Mead, Las Vegas, gets 90% of its water from this one source.

That is why Las Vegas is a canary in the mine shaft, as Pat Mulroy, the boss of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, puts it. The Las Vegas valley gets its water through two long channels drilled through the rock. The first taps the lake at 1,050 feet (320 metres) above sea level, the second at 1,000 feet. Lake Mead’s water level is now near its record low, at 1,086 feet. Within a few years it could leave Las Vegas’s first intake, or even both, dry.

The threat to Sin City is a good example of the four dimensions—physical, legal, political and cultural—of water in the West. For the physical, the standard response is to summon the engineers. Ms Mulroy already has them digging a third intake at 890 feet. Given the weight of the water on top, this is fiendishly difficult and will not be ready until 2014. Ms Mulroy also wants to pipe groundwater from the rural and wetter northern counties of Nevada to Las Vegas, but that has caused a vicious row.

Another response is to call in the lawyers. This was the preferred approach a century ago, in the era of the “water wars”. Starting with the Colorado River Compact of 1922 and continuing with statutes, a treaty with Mexico and case law until the 1960s, a truce was achieved. Called the Law of the River, the resulting regime determines who along the river has what right to how much water.

At least, it does in theory. The problem is that the law took shape after two decades of record water flows, which became the basis for allocation. As a result it apportions more water than there is in the river. For decades that did not matter, since there were so few people. Then the cattle, fruit and people using the river multiplied.

The law’s seniority rules theoretically mean that, for example, the taps to Las Vegas would be shut completely before a single lettuce-grower in California’s Imperial County lost a drop. This “idiocy of who gets cut first and second”, as Ms Mulroy calls it, gives rise to the political dimension. These days, co-operation has supplemented, if not wholly replaced, the old rivalries among agricultural and urban users, and among the seven states. Nevada and Arizona, for example, have a water-banking partnership, whereby Arizona stores excess water in its aquifers so that Nevada could use it in a pinch. In California, the water utility of Los Angeles has bought water rights from farmers in Imperial County. But arguments persist.

The final dimension is the culture of the West. Does every middle-class house really need a lawn in a desert? Ms Mulroy has already started paying Las Vegans to rip out their turf and opt for desert landscaping, which can be chic. Her own husband put up a fight but lost. So out went that lawn, too, just as the low-flow toilets and taps came in.

Lucerne Valley may face repeat water crisis

Melven Ashley of Lucerne Valley works on installing a water pump on a 55-gallon barrel so that he can transport water back to his property near Cody Road in Lucerne Valley last summer.

KATHERINE ROSENBERG, LV Leader Editor
Victorville Daily Press

LUCERNE VALLEY — The community could face a repeat of the water crisis from August 2007, a county official warned during the last meeting of the Municipal Advisory Committee board meeting.

State officials once again have Lucerne Valley water purveyors and water haulers on their radar, said Michael Orme, District Director for 1st Disrict Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt, who covers Lucerne Valley.

“Every water hauler must be licensed or the state will come back,” Orme said. “Consider yourselves warned.”

The 300 locals who are using hauled water have had time to come into compliance, and have been offered hauling services from three local companies, and there is one local purveyor with a temporary license, though he said he has sold next to nothing.

Orme believes the state board has plans to return, because they were tipped off that many people in Lucerne Valley choose to ignore the licensing requirements, opting instead to use whoever provides service the cheapest.

One local resident asked Orme whether there was a way to ward off a potential sequel to last year.

“Solutions? Yes, go to a licensed provider,” Orme said.

No time frame has been given for when the state officials might return, but the point of Orme bringing the issue up at the MAC meeting was so that everyone has time to come into compliance.

Study: Lake Mead could dry up by 2021

USA TODAY
Recent drought's effects on Lake Mead can be seen by the white ring around the shore at Hoover Dam in 2006.
Laura Rauch, AP file photo

PHOENIX (AP) — Changes in climate and strong demand for Colorado River water could drain Lake Mead by 2021, triggering severe shortages across the region, scientists said in an unusually bleak water-supply outlook.

Scientists working at San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography said Tuesday the West's largest storage reservoir faces increasing threats from a combination of factors including human-induced climate change, growing populations and natural forces like drought and evaporation.

A dried up Lake Mead would be a disaster for Arizona and Nevada.

When water levels dropped below 1,000 feet in elevation, Nevada would lose access to all its river allocation. Arizona would lose much of the water that flows through the Central Arizona Project canal. Power production also would cease before the lake level reached bottom, researchers said.

There is a 50% chance Lake Mead will run dry by 2021 and a 10% chance it will run out of usable water by 2014, if the drought deepens and water use climbs, researchers said.

"We were stunned at the magnitude of the problem and how fast it was coming at us," said marine physicist Tim Barnett, who co-authored a paper examining the fate of Lake Mead. "Make no mistake, this water problem is not a scientific abstraction but rather one that will impact each and every one of us that live in the Southwest."

Lakes Mead and Powell help manage water resources for more than 25 million people in the seven states, including Arizona, that rely on the Colorado River for water and power.

The two huge reservoirs have been studied in recent years using numerous hydrology models, but none forecast a dry Lake Mead within 15 years.

"We did a lot of studies, and none of them ever made Lake Mead go dry, period, end of story. We looked 100 years out, and Lake Mead never went dry," said Larry Dozier, deputy general manager of the Central Arizona Project.

Dozier had not seen the Scripps study but worked closely on other models that have produced different results.

"We did what we called our worst case, and it just didn't happen," he said.

Currently, Lake Mead is half-full, as is Lake Powell.

Nevada Hearing Mulls Water to Las Vegas

By BRENDAN RILEY
Associated Press

CARSON CITY, Nev. - A hearing took place this week into plans to pump billions of gallons of water from three rural Nevada valleys to booming Las Vegas - with proponents saying state officials should ignore foes who contend the pumping will end the valleys' growth prospects.

Opponents of the plan by the Southern Nevada Water Authority compare it to a Los Angeles water grab that parched California's once-fertile Owens Valley in the early 1900s.

But Attorney Paul Taggart, representing SNWA which wants more than 11.3 billion gallons of groundwater a year from Delamar, Dry Lake and Cave valleys, said Monday some of the growth possibilities mentioned by opponents are "nothing more than speculation."

Taggart also said state Engineer Tracy Taylor, who must rule on the pumping plan, wouldn't be the first Nevada official to determine that water from an outlying valley would be best used as a resource for growing urban areas.

"The highest and best use of this water resource is in the Las Vegas Valley," Taggart said in opening arguments on the bid for the water, which is a key component of SNWA $2 billion-plus project to pipe water across the desert to Las Vegas.

Kay Brothers, SNWA's deputy general manager, outlined an elaborate system of monitoring wells to ensure the pumping doesn't cause environmental damage in the valleys.

The monitoring system resulted in the federal Interior Department and the Moapa Band of Paiute Indians dropping their opposition to the plan last month - but farmers, ranchers and others fear they'll lose their way of life in the remote area.

Critics argue that relevant information wasn't made public and that more planning and studies are needed. They also say growth potential in some areas would be sharply curtailed because of a lack of available groundwater for future development.

Simeon Herskovits, attorney for the Great Basin Water Network, said the plan should be rejected because there's not enough water in the valleys for exportation without harming existing water users and the environment.

Herskovitz represents a group of ranchers and farmers opposed to the project, as well as local irrigation companies, a water board, the Sierra Club, Nevada Cattlemen's Association and White Pine County which borders the county where the valleys are located.

The project is bcked by casino executives, developers, union representatives and others who point to water conservation efforts in the Las Vegas area and who warn of an economic downturn affecting the entire state unless the city has enough water to keep growing.

The valleys are all in central Lincoln County, which initially opposed the plan but reached an agreement with the water authority that states which groundwater basins can developed. The agreement also allows for use of the pipeline, for a price, by the county.

The agency, feeling the effects of a seven-year drought on the Colorado River from which it gets 90 percent of its water, hopes to begin delivering the rural groundwater to Las Vegas by 2015.

The water authority's eventual goal is to tap into enough water in rural Nevada to serve more than 230,000 homes, in addition to about 400,000 households already getting the agency's water in the Las Vegas area, one of the fastest growing regions in the nation.

Thirty years of outdoor writing

Commentary

By JIM MATTHEWS
Outdoor News Service
www.outdoornewsservice.com

To the best of my recollection, I’ve been doing this column since the latter 1970s, thirty-something years. I know there are some of you who’ve been reading nearly the whole time because when we bump into each other somewhere, you remind me of a column from years ago.

I know you’ve been reading a long time because you talk to me like we are old friends (or old enemies). How you can recognize me from the little photos that have run with the column for decades, I don’t have a clue, but you don’t have to tell me I look older than in those photos. I am older, but so are you.

You usually mention a column about my family or dogs, the personal ones. I think they hit close to home for you and resonate. Talking about the importance of family and marriage, and hunting and fishing, is increasingly the antithesis of everything that is politically correct.

But we know that the fundamental breakdown in American society today relates to the breakdown of the traditional family, about the inability of anyone to take responsibility, and the distance we’ve moved away from the land. It’s not complex at all, but there are whole agencies whose sole purpose is to cloud issues.

We desperately hope our children don’t make up the last generation that understands personal responsibility and the thrill of catching wild trout from a beaver pond on a fly rod. The two go hand-in-hand because there comes a point when you have to decide if you’re going to eat the trout or let it go. It’s like so many choices in life: simple but wrought with consequences on so many fronts. Frankly, I don’t know how I’ve gotten away with writing about it so long.

When this column first began, Southern California newspapers often had two or three pages devoted to traditional outdoor sports -- fishing and hunting. Some of the smaller daily newspapers are lucky to have that much space for an entire sports section today, thanks to newsprint and ink costs and corporate ownership that would rather squeeze more blood from the publishing turnip than actually serve, inform, and entertain readers. We are among the last generation of newspaper readers anyway. The demographics of those who read print versions are gray.

When I was a kid, Sunday morning meant an early trip to church, and then crepe-thin pancakes made by my dad, stacked up five or six deep, and slathered with peanut butter and syrup. It meant all of us sprawled all over the living room reading different sections of the Sunday newspaper, passing them around, and a day together.

Our house transformed from the bustling train station that it seemed every other day of the week into a lounging, luxury resort of reading, discussion, ideas, and games. The television was only allowed on for three things on Sunday, Dodgers’ baseball, that wonderful old American Sportsman show with Curt Gowdy, and The World of Disney. Sunday was what I imaged every day of a cruise would be like. The newspaper was the centerpiece.

Some things have changed a lot over the past 30 years. There are more political threats to hunting and fishing than ever before, and there is a growing contingent of politicians who believe guns are intrinsically evil and want to do away with them, but most of the outdoor things I like have not changed much.

Depending on the weather, more than anything else, I still get to miss my share of doves and upland birds every year. Public land hunting in California still ranks up there as some of the best in the nation when we have wet winters. Unless we put wind turbines on all our public lands, I don’t imagine this hunting will get much worse, either. Here’s the asterisk to that comment: The former superintendent of the Mojave Preserve, Mary Martin, probably did more in one year to reduce quail populations in our deserts by removing cattle water than all of the development in the desert has over the past 30 years. And her move was more damaging to those of us who hunt and watch wildlife because it was all on public land, where we all have access. We have to remain vigilant for these kinds of threats.

Deer populations are at the bottom of the barrel throughout Southern California because biologists still believe deer are at carrying capacity of the land. Maybe. But we can increase K, as they call it. But no one has any interest in management, so fire is the only positive influence we have on the herds. Things can only get better for deer, and they are right now -- but that has come at a huge cost in homes and human lives lost or disrupted. I blame the Forest Service and environmental groups that sue over every tree cut down in the woods. Both of them can’t tell good management from bad management, the forest from the trees, any longer. This long slippery road to the bottom was well underway when I first started writing about deer in the 1970s, and it doesn’t look like it will get better anytime soon. The “managers” are to the point they don’t even try to improve things. It’s a shame I find myself pulling for fires to burn up canyons where I know it will help the deer. That hasn’t changed.

I’ve watched bighorn sheep populations yo-yo up and down, but the long term trend has been upward thanks -- mostly -- to volunteers who keep fighting their way through the red tape to build new water sources in desert mountain ranges. Every new water source is like turning on a fountain the pours more sheep back into our deserts where they were extirpated by livestock diseases, drying up of springs through groundwater pumping, and development. But there are still some who want to shut off the sheep restoration by shutting down the water developments. I have less and less patience for those people.

We’re stupidly moving into a management program for ocean fisheries -- the marine reserve program that locks sport anglers out of vast areas of ocean -- that has proven a failure on land for birds and mammals. We still have vast “game reserves” all over the state under the guise of acting as pools of wildlife that will spill over and keep areas outside the reserve restocked with fish and game. They never have and never will work as envisioned. But no one has the political courage to say the experiment has failed and do away with them. You’d think this lesson should be applied to the marine reserves, which should only ban commercial exploitation of fisheries and allow recreational users. We can fish in national parks. Why shouldn’t we be able to fish in marine preserves? We can hunt on state and federal wildlife areas. Why not marine preserves? It’s the “lock out humans” mentality that is so pervasive today in management of public lands and resources. They forget: We belong here, too. We belong as much as the cougar or kangaroo rat or the vermillion rockfish or yellow-legged frog. We belong here more.

Today, I feel like a lone voice pointing out that simple fact. When I started doing this, there were a lot of us. Laughing and talking with an old editor friend of mine this week, he said we were dinosaurs. I corrected him: Dinosaurs are extinct. I told him I thought we were more like fire-belching dragons. My fear is that new fire-breathers won’t come along, that no one will believe in us much longer, and then we will simply disappear. Like dinosaurs.

Colorado River water deal is reached

Interior secretary: Agreement to share adversity. Shortage could be declared by 2010.

Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times
‘NO SIGN OF ENDING’: The Western drought has left Lake Powell, above, and Lake Mead, the Colorado River’s two mammoth reservoirs, half-empty. One study this year warned that global warming could thrust the Southwest into a permanent drought by 2050.

By Bettina Boxall and Ashley Powers, Staff Writers
Los Angeles Times

LAS VEGAS — The federal government Thursday ushered in a new era of shortage on the Colorado River, adopting a blueprint for how it will tighten the spigot on the West's most important water source.

The guidelines, more than two years in the making, come in the eighth year of the worst drought in the century-long historic record of the Colorado River, which supplies water to 25 million people and 1 million acres of farmland.

Federal water managers say a shortage could be declared as early as 2010, allowing the Department of the Interior to reduce water deliveries to Arizona and Nevada, two of the seven states that have sparred over the waterway for decades. California, which has the biggest water allocation and senior rights in the lower basin, would not be affected.

The drought has left Lake Powell and Lake Mead, the river's two mammoth reservoirs, half-empty, their receding shorelines marked by a wide band of bleached rocks that a decade ago were under water. Without some wet years, Lake Mead may never refill, federal hydrologists say.

"We have had good news and bad news," Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said in a speech before signing the document at the Colorado River Water Users Assn. meeting at Caesars Palace. The bad news, he said, is that the drought shows "no sign of ending."

Scientists also predict that climate change will worsen Western drought patterns and reduce Colorado River flows by increasing evaporation and decreasing snowfall. One study released this year warned that global warming could thrust the Southwest into a state of permanent drought by 2050.

"Runoff in five of the seven Colorado River basin states is projected to decline by more than 15% during the 21st century," Kempthorne said.

Against that backdrop, the basin states of Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona and California began negotiations in 2005 on a blueprint for water shortages.

Their plans formed the basis of the document signed by Kempthorne, who called it "an agreement to share adversity" and a landmark in the tangled history of Colorado River management.

The agreement avoided a nasty and prolonged legal battle among the seven states by tinkering with river law without changing the fundamentals of the 1922 compact that divided the Colorado's flow among them.

Although California's senior rights put it in the best position of the lower basin states, the agreement benefited the state by preventing "bloody legal fights in Congress or the courts," said Jeffrey Kightlinger, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.

The guidelines, which will be in effect for the next 19 years, contain three major elements:

* They set particular water-level elevations of Lake Mead as triggers for water cutbacks. The reductions will total less than 10% of the lower basin's allocation. Arizona agriculture will bear the brunt of the shortfall and Nevada a small portion of it.

"California is secure. Its entitlement is not impacted," said Bill Swan, a water rights lawyer for the Imperial Irrigation District, which gets three-fourths of the state's Colorado River allotment.

* Lake Powell, which holds water from the upper-basin states, and Lake Mead, which receives water from Powell, will be operated as one reservoir system. That is expected to make it easier to control Lake Mead's level, and thus the shortage triggers.

* States will be allowed to hold "conserved" water in Lake Mead from year to year, changing existing requirements that make them use or lose their annual allocations.

Water agencies could then pay irrigation districts to fallow farmland, keep the unused irrigation water stored in Lake Mead and draw on it later.

The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California will be able to store as much as 1.5 million acre-feet in Lake Mead, nearly double the capacity of its Diamond Valley Lake Reservoir in Riverside County. That is enough water to meet annual needs for about 3 million average households.

Nevada, which has the smallest water allotment in the lower basin, plans to hold water in Lake Mead from fallow farmland along the Virgin and Muddy rivers. The Southern Nevada Water Authority also will build a small reservoir, called Drop Two, near the Mexican border to capture flows ordered by American farmers who don't use the water when it rains. That measure would decrease flows to the Colorado River's ecologically important delta, potentially sparking an outcry from Mexico.

In return for financing the reservoir, Southern Nevada will get some of the captured water. The Metropolitan Water District and Arizona may also take part in the arrangement.

Las Vegas' exploding population and growing water needs have been a driving force behind the talks. Pat Mulroy, the powerful head of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, had threatened to go to court to get more water.

Michael Cohen, a senior research associate at the Pacific Institute, called the agreement a massive step forward.

But he wasn't prepared to say the states that relied on the Colorado River have fully acknowledged a drier future.

"None of the municipal agencies are saying, 'We need to reevaluate our urban plans, our growth plans, because there's only so much water,' " he said. "It's not clear that the states are saying, 'OK, we're going to now live in this era of limits.' "

Water supply shrinks

Flow from Northern California being cut drastically

The California Aqueduct brings water to arid Southern California from the Sacramento River Delta.
Copyright © Mark Hanauer

Shawbong Fok, Staff Writer
San Bernardino County Sun

The Inland Empire's water supplies from Northern California next year are going to be cut in half thanks to a drought as well as an endangered fish swimming in a delta near Sacramento that needs the water.

In the face of less water flowing locally, landscapers, golf courses and even citrus growers might get socked with higher water bills.

"We might hand water (with a hose) the dry spots," said Bill Henning, superintendent of Shandin Hills Golf Club in San Bernardino.

The water cuts are the result of some of the driest weather in years.

The Inland Empire's apportionment of water next year has been cut because of the drought hitting the state, according to the State Water Contractors, a nonprofit of 27 public agencies that buys water under contract from the California State Water Project.

San Bernardino Valley Municipal Water District, which serves about 600,000 residents in an area from Fontana to Yucaipa, is part of this water group.

In 2008, the water district is expected to get 58 percent less water than this year from the state, said Randy Van Gelder, water district general manager.

"I don't know if there'll be a raise in rates," said Joe Zoba, Yucaipa Valley Water District general manager. "Just because there's a shortage of water from the state doesn't mean there'll be an increase in water rates."

The California State Water Project includes reservoirs, lakes, storage tanks, canals, tunnels, pipelines and pumping and power plants that move and store water in the state.

Collectively, the State Water Contractors deliver water to more than 25 million residents in the state and to more than 750,000 acres of agricultural land.

The water delivery cuts, which are among the largest since 2003 in the Inland Empire, are attributed to a legal ruling that is trying to protect an endangered fish, called the smelt.

That fish needs the water in the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta where it lives. The delta is located at the western edge of the Central Valley by the confluence of the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers.

On Aug. 31, U.S. District Court Judge Oliver Wanger limited how much water could be delivered from the delta between December and June.

The State Water Contractors on Monday announced water cuts that will permit the statewide consortium to purchase only 25 percent of the requested water.

This will supply only about half of what's needed for the San Bernardino Valley Municipal Water District, officials said.

"We'll have to secure more water from Northern California," Van Gelder said.

Sixty percent to 70 percent of water from the State Water Contractors is used for landscapes, both commercial and residential.

The result of these cuts will be conservation measures, including everything from the showcasing of low water-retention plants and irrigation techniques to tests in San Bernardino parks on remote-controlled sprinklers that conserve water.

This isn't the first time a water shortage has hit Californians. Drought conditions in the early 1990s pushed water agencies to adopt conservation techniques.

"Conservation is a means to adapt to water changes," said Linda Fernandez, an environmental scientist at UC Riverside.

The Inland Empire is one of the nation's fastest-growing areas, resulting in more water needs than ever.

Already, San Bernardino County has some 2 million residents, hundreds of thousands of more people than a decade ago.

Not all water agencies in California will implement the same water-saving techniques.

"Each agency will respond differently depending on local conditions," said Bob Muir, spokesman for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which serves western San Bernardino Valley residents, as well as metropolitan Los Angeles and San Diego.

Lucerne Valley finds solution on water

RYAN ORR
Daily Press

LUCERNE VALLEY — Lucerne Valley residents avoided an overwhelming increase in hauled water fees by banding together to help a local well owner, San Bernardino County administrators decided today.

After hearing the announcement Tuesday night that water loads from the Midway Park well would increase from $1 to $167, residents decided to help a local man with testing and certification fees to access his well.

Max McNeeley had lost business because of the low prices offered at the county well and had planned on shutting his down.

Last night to avoid the increase at Midway Park, citizens began passing around a hat for donations to help McNeeley keep his well open.

Midway Park was set up as a temporary well after a sting operation in August that shut down unlicensed wells and water haulers and left many residents without water while temperatures were well over 100 degrees.

The county well was shut down as of Wednesday, but county agreed to stay open temporarily if McNeeley’s well ever became overwhelmed or had any problems, said Michael Orme, district director for Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt.

“It’s good to see the community come together to help one of their own,” Orme said.

County officials are working on a price for loads from Midway Park if it does have to reopen for temporary use.

Orme said it is around $50, far less than the original number because they won’t have to fully staff the well and make the necessary upgrades for full-time usage. The Board of Supervisors will still have to approve the price.

Water bills to triple in Lucerne Valley

County decides to end subsidy of water well


RYAN ORR
Daily Press



LUCERNE VALLEY — Lucerne Valley residents were slapped with an increased cost of water that will more than triple the average bill from $130 to $424 a month.

The increase was announced Tuesday night at the Lucerne Valley Community Center.

A sting operation in August by the California Highway Patrol and the state put water haulers, who were not properly licensed, out of business and shut down wells that didn’t pass health requirements.

Subsequently, residents were left without water, and the county Board of Supervisors declared a state of emergency.

The county opened a temporary well and offered water haulers service at just $1 per load — about 2,000 gallons.

The county could have stopped the service once the emergency was over, but due to a lack of other available water sources, kept filling up local water haulers.

Most water haulers were shut down in the original sting and are still operating under temporary permits until they can get their paperwork together.

Since the original emergency in August, the county has lost nearly $67,000 selling water at such a discount.

Before the sting, well owners charged water haulers anywhere from $15 to $30 per 2,000-gallon load, said Rhonda Moore of 1 Moore Water Service.

As a water hauler, she then sold it to a customer at $65. An average family of four uses two loads, or $130, of water a month.

The price is set to go from $1 to $167 a load, said Manuel Benitez, chief of special districts in the county.

The $167, which still has to go before the Board of Supervisors, is to cover operational costs of the well, which the county was hoping to close because it doesn’t have the infrastructure to accommodate water hauling, Benitez said.

The average hike to the water hauler would be $147 and assuming that they pass through the increase, a family of four that was paying $130 a month will now pay roughly $424 a month.
“That is completely outrageous,” Moore said. “It would put me out of business.”

Michael Orme, a representative for 1st District Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt, said that there are unlicensed water haulers who have again started services in Lucerne Valley. After Jan. 1, the state plans on going after those who have not met the necessary requirements.

“It’s really just a mess,” said Linda Gommel of Lucerne Valley. “Nothing has been solved.”

SoCal Farmers to Face Water Woes in 2009

By JACOB ADELMAN
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Officials of Southern California's major water wholesaler say deliveries to the region's agricultural customers will be cut by nearly a third next year and residents are likely to face rate hikes in 2009 because of a statewide shortage.

Utilities that serve residential customers and are supplied by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California can expect price hikes between 5 percent and 10 percent in 2009, district spokesman Bob Muir said Monday.

The rate increases would be needed to pay for additional water supplies from other sellers in the state and further investment in the water grid, he said.

The district provides water to nearly 18 million people in Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties. The district sells water at wholesale rates to local utilities, providing Southern California with half its supply. The rest comes from underground sources and other local supplies.

The district is also reducing by 30 percent deliveries to 12 agencies that buy water at discount pricing for agricultural customers, Muir said. Those cuts will take effect Jan. 1, he said.

Utilities that sell to agricultural users receive water at a discount under a program that makes them first to suffer cutbacks during shortages.

Farmer Al Stehly said the avocados he grows in northern San Diego County are entirely dependent on water provided by the district and that he will take a financial hit from the cuts.

"It's going to be tough and there will be some belt tightening, but we're going to get through this if it's only one year," he said. "But if it's permanent or it's more than 30 percent, it's going to be real tough to make a living."

The actions follow an August court decision limiting outflow from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to protect an endangered fish species. The federal ruling came in response to a 2005 lawsuit filed by the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The suit complained that the massive pumps used by the State Water Project and federal Central Valley Project were driving the threatened delta smelt to extinction.

Because of the lead-up to the ruling, farmers expected the cuts, said San Diego County Farm Bureau director Eric Larson. "We've seen this coming for quite some time," he said.

State officials address mounting water ‘crisis’

TATIANA PROPHET
Victorville Daily Press

James Quigg / Staff Photographer
Water flows through the California Aqueduct Tuesday. Several state officials are predicting a water crisis in California's future.

The Victor Valley’s future water supply is in danger — facing an onslaught by drought, global warming, aging infrastructure and a requirement to preserve a little fish called the Delta smelt.

The crisis has not yet percolated to the Victor Valley, but it puts at risk the water supply coming over the California Aqueduct. That water is a key component of the Mojave Water Agency’s plan to recharge the region.

“I’m extremely concerned ... about what could very quickly become a real crisis for this state,” said state Sen. Dave Cogdill, R-Modesto, who has proposed a $9 billion plan to address the weaknesses in the system.

Cogdill was speaking at a news conference broadcast by telephone. He was joined by Lester Snow, director of the Department of Water Resources.

Last year, snowpack was at its lowest level since 1988, Snow said. Because of the drought, levels in state reservoirs are down 40 percent from last year, he added.

“We combine that with the vagaries of climate change ... and know that the forecast is pretty clear, that our droughts are going to be much worse in the future,” Snow said, referring to the wide swings in future weather that global warming presents. “This could be the second year of a 10-year drought, or the highest flood flows we’ve seen in the state.”

On top of that, in August a federal judge imposed limits on water flow from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to protect the endangered Delta smelt, whose habitat lies in the area of the Delta’s massive pumps. The same judge, Fresno-based Oliver Wanger, is scheduled to hear a companion case today aimed at protecting salmon.

Locally, the Mojave Water Agency has stored Aqueduct water underground since 1991, for a total of 114,205 acre feet. An acre foot is said to supply a family of four for one year.

The amount of water pumped in the entire region was unavailable, but for perspective, the former Victor Valley Water District, now the Victorville Water District, pumped about 22,000 acre feet in 2005.

For two years, the MWA has been heralding its plan to recharge the Victor Valley’s sub-basin through its Regional Recharge and Recovery program — using Aqueduct water.

While the MWA is allotted 75,800 acre feet per year, it remains to be seen whether the state will be able to provide its court-mandated annual allotment.

Michael Stevens, spokesman for the MWA, said he could not comment on the future of the agency’s water entitlement. But he did acknowledge that the situation is a crisis.

“It could have a huge impact if these issues are not addressed,” he said, referring to drought and Delta problems. “We should not be in a panic, but don’t become complacent. Because the state is in a crisis, it could impact our situation if things continue the way they are.”

Snow and Cogdill encouraged the state’s investment in “regional self-sufficiency,” which involves local agencies pursuing ways to avert a crisis themselves.

Such measures include surface water storage, desalinization, conservation and reclaimed water.

“But these measures by themselves can’t solve our problem,” Cogdill said.

“We won’t be able to rely on the Sierra any longer, it appears,” he added. “We think it’s crucial that we move forward (on the bond proposal).”

In the meantime, officials from the retail districts to the state water agencies are pushing conservation above all.

For more information on the state’s water crisis, go to www.calwatercrisis.org

County to fund Pioneertown water improvements

On March 27, 2007, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors adopted the following resolution (Item 24 on the consent calendar) to seek a loan from the State of California to bring the Pioneertown water system into compliance with state water regulations. - Editor

FY 2006/07 SUBMITTAL OF LOAN APPLICATION PACKAGE AND DESIGNATION OF REPRESENTATIVE FOR SAFE DRINKING WATER STATE REVOLVING FUND (SDWSRF) LOAN PROGRAM, COUNTY SERVICE AREA 70, IMPROVEMENT ZONE W-4 (PIONEERTOWN)

RECOMMENDATION: Acting as the governing body of County Service Area 70, Improvement Zone W-4 (Pioneertown):

1. Adopt Resolution No. 07-______, authorizing submission of a loan application to the State of California, Department of Health Services (DHS) - the Safe Drinking Water State Revolving Fund (SDWSRF), in the amount of $1,460,480, for the purpose of funding the construction of water improvements that will bring the Pioneertown water system into compliance with the DHS requirements.

2. Authorize the Director of the Special Districts Department, or his designee, to apply for and execute all necessary documents, agreements and amendments for the purposes of securing these loan funds.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION: The Special Districts Department, Water and Sanitation Division manages, operates and maintains water facilities in County Service Area 70, Improvement Zone W-4 (CSA 70 W-4) that provide water service to the residents of this area.

The water system encompasses approximately 640 acres, serves 126-metered connections, includes 9 domestic water wells (6 of which are active), maintains 310,000 gallons of storage, and distributes water to its customers through 4.4 miles of distribution piping.

CSA 70 W-4 extracts water from a declining aquifer resulting in system deficiencies in both water quality and quantity. Currently, the water supply experiences contaminant levels near or above the maximum contaminant levels for uranium, arsenic and iron content. As the water level in the aquifer continues to decline, it is anticipated that water quality will also continue to degrade.

Customers in CSA 70 W-4 are notified annually that CSA 70 W-4 cannot consistently provide water that meets the DHS standards and are advised to use bottled water or treat their water for consumption.

The main goal of the SDWSRF loan program is to provide necessary financing for small water systems to make improvements that will bring the systems into compliance with the DHS requirements.

The proposed project to correct the system deficiencies includes an interconnection to the neighboring High Desert Water District (HDWD) for water supply, and HDWD has indicated informally that they consent to sell water to CSA 70 W-4.

Delivery of the water to CSA 70 W-4 requires the construction of approximately 3.5 miles of 8-inch diameter waterline and a booster station to get the HDWD water to CSA 70 W-4’s existing water storage reservoirs. The proposed off-site pipeline will connect to the existing CSA 70 W-4 water distribution system for delivery to customers and the storage reservoirs.

The cost to purchase water supply from the HDWD and the additional operations and maintenance costs for the new facilities will result in a substantial increase in user fees.

Approval of these recommendations will adopt a resolution authorizing the submission of a SDWSRF loan application to the DHS for the purpose of constructing water improvements that will bring the CSA 70 W-4 water system into compliance with DHS requirements, and authorize the Director of the Special Districts Department, or his designee, to apply for and execute all necessary documents, agreements and amendments for the purposes of securing these loan funds.

REVIEW BY OTHERS: This item has been reviewed by County Counsel (L. Thomas Krahelski, Deputy County Counsel, 387-5436 and Dawn M. Messer, Deputy County Counsel, 387-8900) on March 7, 2007; and by the County Administrative Office (Wayne Thies, Administrative Analyst, 387-5409) on March 16, 2007.

FINANCIAL IMPACT: The loan proposal requests $1,460,480 in funding through the SDWSRF loan program. If approved, it is anticipated that funding would be received toward the end of the current fiscal year and the budgetary provisions for the loan would be included within the 2007/08 CSA 70 W-4 budget. A loan covenant will be prepared for future Board approval, in conjunction with the acceptance of the loan, and will address the user rates to cover the debt service on the loan.

SUPERVISORIAL DISTRICT(S): Third

Drought, natural erosion taint supply

Water woes halt construction in tiny Pioneertown, which can't afford fixes

Eblstan Lim / The Press-Enterprise
Scott Pasby, 47, of Pioneertown, had to install an expensive water filtering system after his dogs got sick and his skin started cracking from high levels of arsenic in the water from the town's wells.


By JOAN OSTERWALDER
The Press-Enterprise [Riverside, CA]

Soon after Scott Pasby moved to Pioneertown, his skin became scaly and his dogs got sick.

He learned that the water in the High Desert outpost has high levels of arsenic, so he promptly installed a filter system.

"The dogs are fine, the skin doesn't crack anymore," said Pasby, 47, as he petted one of his four pooches.

Pioneertown is awash in problems with its water, which is not only polluted, but also in short supply. A virtual building freeze is keeping the remote water district too small to finance expensive fixes, such as building a 5.5-mile pipeline to import water. Attempts to get money through grants so far have failed.

"We're caught in this Catch-22," said Jack Dugan, 58, president of the Pioneertown Property Owners Association.

It all started in the late 1990s. The town's wells dropped as much as 200 feet and tests showed that naturally occurring arsenic, a carcinogen, was above the recommended health levels, said Bill Stone, water operations manager for the San Bernardino County Water and Sanitation Division, which oversees Pioneertown.

The deeper the wells sink, the more concentrated the arsenic appears to be.

Stone and residents suspect the culprits are a prolonged drought and the 1992 Landers earthquake, which may have shifted rocks and changed the water flow.

Officials stopped hooking up new customers to the water system -- making it almost impossible to construct new homes -- and began mandating that residents conserve water.

Arsenic, a metal, is created through erosion. Exposure to it has been linked to skin abnormalities and, in the long term, cancer of the lungs, bladder, skin, liver and kidneys, according to the state Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.

The state and federal limit for arsenic is 50 parts per billion. Two of Pioneertown's six wells exceed the maximum -- one has registered at more than twice the limit, Stone said.

Uranium also is a concern because its levels are borderline acceptable, he said.

The 110 households connected to the water system regularly receive letters that recommend using bottled water for cooking and drinking.

"Some of them are upset, and you can't blame them," Stone said.

Pasby is one of them. He said he wasn't told about the arsenic when he moved from Desert Hot Springs in 2002.

The artist still doesn't use his filtered water for everything. "If I boil Brussels sprouts, I use that," he said, pointing to the water cooler in his kitchen.

Not everyone in Pioneertown is so cautious. Jim McAlpine, 79, drinks the water straight from the tap because he says the arsenic concentration on the town's west side is low.

Come January, Pioneertown will have to get used to new standards for arsenic. Federal guidelines will set the level at 10 parts per billion, which the state is expected to follow or make even stricter, Stone said.

State and local regulatory agencies are taking a wait-and-see approach until the standards are official, said Joan Mulcare, program manager for the county Environmental Health Services Division.

"We'll have to do something," Mulcare said, adding that options could include hauling in water.

Water delivery is a lifeline for Jake and Carol Flowers. The couple had to find their own water source when they moved to Pioneertown five years ago. They installed two 4,000-gallon tanks for their home and their six horses.

"We've had quite a few times where we got down real low," Jake Flowers, 50, said. "You're scared to flush the toilet."

But he's optimistic that a pipeline will replace his tanks one day.

Previous efforts to find a solution frustrated officials. In 1997, a newly drilled well spouted little water and later contained high arsenic levels, Stone said. Drilling elsewhere in the area would not have produced enough water to replace the contaminated wells.

A treatment plant would be too costly and squander precious water in the process, he said.

Now officials are considering building the 5.5-mile pipeline from Landers to Pioneertown via the Yucca Valley area, said Lisa Manning, deputy chief of administration for the county Special Districts Department, which includes Pioneertown.

But the project's estimated $1.7 million cost would be too high to pass on to customers, she said. "Grant money is the only solution."

So far none has come through, but Pioneertown could know by year's end whether it qualifies for any new funding, Manning said. The pipeline would take about a year to construct, she said.

It may not be a cheap fix, said Bruce Davis, field representative to Supervisor Dennis Hansberger, whose district includes Pioneertown.

"It always gets down to the same thing, it's going to cost a lot of money for water in Pioneertown," Davis said.

Despite the quandary, residents appear not to have lost their sense of humor.

"There's a running joke in town," Pasby said, "'Everybody is a drunk because you can't drink the water.'"

WILDLIFE IN DESERT THREATENED

San Bernardino Sun

Goffs -- Where there is water in the desert, there is abundant wildlife. Shrikes are catching grasshoppers. You can hear the haunting calls of roadrunners. Coveys of Gambel's quail herd their young under palo verdes to avoid Cooper's hawks.

Where there is no water, the desert is stark. For miles and miles you will see only the animals that don't need water every day to survive the 100-plus degree heat that beats down here throughout the summer. There are only a few of those. Water is desert wildlife's life blood.

Since taking over the East Mojave, the National Park Service has removed more than 100 water sources scattered all over the vast preserve, creating a wildlife wasteland where wildlife once flourished. Most of the water removal has occurred over the past two years as ranchers who have sold their properties have been forced to remove windmills and stock tanks.

The elimination of the water sources was done -- many of us feel -- in direct violation of the preserve's own management plan that mandates that any removal of water be evaluated for its impacts before it is removed. That includes the cattle water that has been used by wildlife for more than 100 years in some cases.

Many of us feel -- after hours of meetings and discussions with preserve management staff -- that the rush to remove water from the preserve has become a vendetta against the hunter-conservation groups who have battled the removal every step of the way.

Hunter groups have argued that the cattle water and the facilities to maintain it should be preserved for two reasons: For its historical importance as part of the cultural history of the preserve, which the park is also supposed to protect, and the incredible value this water has for the majority of the preserve's wildlife.

With activist Cliff McDonald of Needles, I visited 11 windmills and water tanks that had been functioning one to two years ago in the eastern part of the preserve. They were all dry Tuesday and mostly devoid of wildlife.

At one set of windmills, one of the tanks still had some wet soil and perhaps a small puddle of water under a growth of tules. There were at least three large coveys of quail -- 100 to 150 birds -- around the tank. One of the coveys had a hen bird with six chicks. Those chicks were destined to die as the water dried up, and perhaps the adults, too. The nearest water was more than four miles away.

The mind-set that will write a death warrant for huge numbers of wildlife in its haste to "return the desert to its natural state," has to be questioned in its ethics and its reading of the preserve's management plan.

We also visited six small-game guzzlers (which some park staff say they would like to remove) and natural springs, which had plenty of water. The contrast between what we saw near the water and where there once was water was dramatic. The difference in wildlife was the difference between a full and an empty glass of water.

It looks like a park service goal is to kill native wildlife and destroy a major piece of human history of the preserve. Did they document the impact water removal would have on the preserve's wildlife? Were the windmills and water pipelines evaluated for their historical value?

We need a change in the management at the Mojave National Preserve, or even the National Park Service, if this is how wildlife and historical resources are going to be "protected" under this watch. The actions taken are wrong and wrong-headed, and it's time for a change.

Jim Matthews is a freelance writer. His column appears on Thursdays. Readers may write to him at 399 North D Street, San Bernardino, CA 92401, phone at (909) 887-3444 or fax to (909) 887-8180. or e-mail odwriter@earthlink.net

Conservation Program in Pioneertown

From County of San Bernardino Special Districts Web site:
http://www.specialdistricts.org/2/water/conservation/fp%20conservation.htm

The Low Desert Water District, CSA 70 W-4 also known as Pioneertown, has experienced water quantity problems throughout its history. The past few years have been symptomatic of the drought conditions that have been experienced across the County of San Bernardino and the Western United States. The severe drought has diminished the potable water supplies and continues to be a challenging situation for the Division and the customers of Pioneertown.

In August 1996, a drought situation occurred that reduced potable water supplies to dangerously low levels. During that event, the Division enacted the Stage III Drought/Emergency Condition Severe, enabled by an ordinance adopted by resolution 90-493 of the Board of Supervisors for the County of San Bernardino. This resolution and conservation ordinance 90-11 was communicated to the people living in Pioneertown by personal visits to each residence and business in the community. The resulting affect was a dramatic turnaround in the supply of potable water in the storage reservoirs that serve Pioneertown. When the situation was communicated to the people of Pioneertown they responded by reducing their water consumption by 25-30%.

During the summer of 2002, a similar set of events began to affect the potable water supply in Pioneertown. The Division recognized these events and drafted a conservation notice packet that included the ordinances 90-493 and 90-11, and a brochure with water saving tips. The notice explained the situation and the stage of the Drought/Emergency Condition, Stage III Severe, which again resulted in the customers reducing their water consumption and avoiding further actions by the Division.

In May of 2003, the Division again recognized trends that would indicate the affects of the drought and the effect it would have on Pioneertown. Another notice was developed, which included the 2 ordinances, 90-493 and 90-11, along with a Water Conservation Checklist adapted from the California Department of Water Resources Office of Water Conservation’s “The Water Conservation Checklist”. An analysis of the water consumption by the customers was performed and high users of water were identified. These high users included accounts that had exceeded their usage from the previous year’s billing period and accounts that are in the 95th percentile of consumption, which is between 25 and 33.45 hundred cubic feet (hcf).

The Division again went door-to-door handing out packets and answering questions in an effort to help the customers reduce their water consumption. The customers identified as high users were personally contacted, offered assistance in reducing their water consumption, and given a special message, which included a mandated reduction of 25-30% of their water consumption.