Valley Water Board Extends Irrigated Lands Program

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In 2006 the Central Valley Water Board adopted a conditional waiver of wastewater discharge requirements for farmers managing irrigated lands. The board is concerned that runoff of pesticides, fertilizer, and sediment from farming operations may be contributing to impairment of water quality in the valley. The purpose of the waiver was to require the farmers to form coalitions to collectively address this issue, rather than issuing individual permits to thousands of farmers. The coalitions were required to pay for a network of water quality monitoring stations and providing training to farmers regarding irrigation best management practices. This program does not apply to food processing wastewater land application sites that have existing waste discharge permits.

The Irrigated Lands Waiver Program has been very controversial. Environmental groups have claimed that the coalitions have not operated in a transparent manner, that pesticides have been detected routinely at some monitoring stations, and that the coalitions have been ineffective in implementing best management practices amongst all the membership. The environmentalists are advocating for a more stringent program focused on individual permits for each farm. This would be very expensive and time consuming to implement for both the farmers and the board.

The agricultural coalitions contend that they have made great progress over the last few years in terms of educating members and collecting monitoring data. The Water Board convened a working group in 2008 to address these concerns, evaluate several options, recommend the structure for a long-term irrigated lands program, and work with board staff to conduct the required environmental impact assessment. The stakeholder process was completed last year, but the board staff chose to present a new option that was a combination of several of the approved stakeholder proposals. Both the agricultural and environmental interests were greatly dismayed that some of their key concerns were ignored by board staff in the final recommendations.

In April of 2011 the board met to discuss the proposed changes and approve a new program that would replace the 2006 waiver. A number of legal, procedural, and technical issues were raised by growers about the proposal, but the board had limited time to respond because it was required to enact a new program, or extend the existing program, by June 2011. Since a number of key issues surrounding the proposed new program could not be resolved in a timely manner the board met on June 9, 2011, and approved extending the 2006 waiver program for two more years. During that time, board staff and a wide range of stakeholders will resume their efforts to develop a long-term program that will be submitted to the board for adoption in 2013. CLFP will be working with agricultural groups to monitor this process to ensure that onerous new requirements are not ultimately adopted. If you have any questions about this issue, contact Rob Neenan in the CLFP office.

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