ACID Water Users Will Discuss Proposed “Drought Protection Program” During December 19 Workshop
The proposal is the result of negotiations between federal water officials and the Sacramento River Settlement Contractors, a California water users group that includes local irrigators in Anderson and Cottonwood.
Tonight, December 19, at 6 pm, the Anderson Cottonwood Irrigation District (ACID) Board will hold a special workshop for land owners and water users.
The meeting will be an opportunity for the ACID Board to share important information about a proposed “Drought Protection Program” (DPP) that’s intended to reduce the impacts of severe drought on endangered fish species by altering how Shasta Lake Reservoir is managed.
ACID users currently receive irrigation water that’s diverted from the Sacramento River as per a more than 100 year old settlement agreement. The Drought Protection Protection Program (DPP) would enact a new “voluntary water conservation and acquisition program” over the next two decades. It’s being negotiated between the federal Bureau of Reclamation, which manages the Shasta Reservoir and Shasta Dam, and the Sacramento River Settlement Contractors (SRSC), a group of water districts that includes ACID.
An informational handout from the SRSC calls the DPP “a series of actions and investments that will lead to improved surface water reliability in recent years”. The proposal is a response, the SRSC says, to awareness of the need to avoid a repeat of the devastating drought that affected ACID users in 2022.
According to ACID’s press release yesterday, the proposed DPP agreement would reduce access to the water supply during dry years while also providing funding to improve drought resiliency infrastructure. More details will be discussed during the meeting tonight.
A variety of special speakers are participating in the workshop, including ACID’s attorney, Dustin Cooper, who will present the risks of the proposed plan; engineer Anne Williams (MBK Engineers), who will explain logistics of the plan as it relates to larger Central Valley operations; Daniel Ruiz, ACID’s current manager, and Thad Bettner, the Executive Director of the SRSC.
According to ACID management, the workshop is informational only and no action will be taken. It will be held at the VFW Hall in Anderson at 6 pm tonight, December 19. Learn more about the DPP here.
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I find it interesting and very extreme and one-sided for the goal of the DPP to say it is intended to reduce the impacts of severe drought on endangered FISH species by altering how Shasta Lake Reservoir is managed. Yes, the hug-a-tree environmentalists certainly care about fish, more than people, industry (ag, food for the nation) and jobs. Until Newsom is out, and a common sense conservative is in, he will continue to force wind turbines on the north state, extremely high taxes and regulations to meet UN agendas, and among many, many things, change 100 yr old ag contracts that are common sense and work so well.
Elizabeth: One important consideration is that the current legal parameters that affect ACID are already designed to protect endangered fish. Those legal documents are what resulted in the devastating drought in 2022. So this is already a kind of legal quagmire that ACID users have been, and must continue to, navigate. You can see our ACID coverage here: https://shastascout.org/?deep_dive=gateway-board
Elizabeth…Newsom finishing his 8 yr term will not have any affect on the way the Bureau of Reclamation, and other agencies, operate. The proposed DPP is something you can chime in on, but, only if you present common sense ideas. It’s easy to predict that the next Governor of CA could be a female, and Democrat.