MID keeps alive proposal to sell water to San Francisco

The idea of selling water to San Francisco stayed alive Tuesday at the Modesto Irrigation District board meeting, despite protests from people who want to keep it for farming or fish.

Directors voted 4-1 to have district staff complete negotiations on an initial sale of about 2,200 acre-feet of Tuolumne River water per year.

The detailed agreement, including the price and duration, is expected to return to the board for a final vote in several weeks.

San Francisco ultimately could buy as much as 25,000 acre-feet a year, about a seventh of what the MID delivers to its farmers.

Despite assurances that the sales would not leave farmers short of water, many of the 80 or so people in the boardroom objected.

"My gut feeling here today is that we really shouldn't be doing this," dairy farmer Edwin Genasci said.

Directors Nick Blom, Paul Warda, Glen Wild and Tom Van Groningen voted to continue the talks. Director Larry Byrd was opposed.

"I make a motion that we kill this deal and won't talk about it anymore," Byrd said. He did not get a second.

The board majority did say that the terms, which to this point have been confidential, will get plenty of public review before the final vote.

The MID expects to free up the water thanks to conservation projects on its canal system. San Francisco already diverts Tuolumne water for about 2.5 million customers in four Bay Area counties.

The additional income could allow the MID to pay for an estimated $110 million in upgrades to the system without a major rate increase for farmers, General Manager Allen Short said.

He added that the sales could ease the burden on the MID's electricity customers, notably the expected $25 million cost to renew the federal power license at Don Pedro Reservoir.

"We would be able to benefit both the irrigation side of the house and the urban community as well," Short said.

A staff report said the first sale could bring more than $1.5 million a year. That works out to at least $682 per acre-foot — 101 times what farmers paid last year — but San Francisco officials said this would be cheaper than desalinization or other alternatives.

Fruit grower Paul Van Konynenburg said he could accept rate increases to pay for the canal improvements if this meant keeping the water in the area.

"We all know that water is a valuable commodity to us as growers," he said. "It's our lifeblood."

Nut grower Jake Wenger said the district should have steadily improved the system over the years rather than proposing major work in the next decade.

"Bottom line, MID is hard up for money and they're looking for easy cash," he said, "but at what expense?"

Several people cited the very dry start to winter, which has prompted the MID to refill its canals for a couple of weeks.

"We're living a perfect example right now of what can happen, how quickly this thing can change," said Ron Peterson, vice president of the Stanislaus County Farm Bureau.

Some critics said they could accept water sales only if they are short term and sustain the San Joaquin Valley economy.

Environmentalists argue that any water conserved by the MID should be released into the lower river to aid its salmon population.

"We need to keep water local for agriculture and the Tuolumne River," said Patrick Koepele, deputy executive director of the Tuol-umne River Trust. "Wildlife, fish and other resources have been suffering lately in and along the river."

He also said San Francisco's water consumption has been dropping.

Farmers have opposed increased fishery flows. Some of them said Tuesday that the sale talks give the impression that the MID has a surplus of water that can be taken for this purpose.

At a separate meeting Tuesday, Stanislaus County supervisors decided to take a stand soon and forward their thoughts to the MID.

Supervisors did not show which way they're leaning on the issue, except for Terry Withrow, who called water a public asset and selling it out of the county "a dangerous precedent."

MID officials repeated their assurance that the sales would not involve the underlying water rights. They date to the 1880s and are some of the strongest in the state.

Van Groningen noted that parts of the system are showing their age, including a concrete flume that carries the main canal over Dry Creek.

"A seismic event could rupture the entire system in an instant," he said.

Bee staff writer Garth Stapley contributed to this report.

Bee staff writer John Holland can be reached at jholland@modbee.com or (209) 578-2385.