MID quietly moves meeting time for tricky water-sale vote

Did the Modesto Irrigation District pull a fast one by having board members treat the potentially controversial issue of selling water to outsiders without the usual scrutiny?

For as long as anyone can remember, the MID board has met at 9 a.m. almost every other Tuesday. This week, however, the open meeting was moved to 8 a.m., and the board’s discussion and vote were done and over with before several usual observers arrived at 9 a.m.

The start-time was changed to accommodate board members heading off to a statewide water conference in Monterey, giving them an earlier start. Asked to pinpoint who made the decision and when, district spokeswoman Melissa Williams said office staff and the board came to a “collective agreement.”

Complying with state law, MID last week posted Tuesday’s board agenda listing the 8 a.m. start-time. But the district made no effort to call anyone’s attention to the break with routine.

Those with specific interest in the water sale – including The Modesto Bee, the Latino Community Roundtable, the Tuolumne River Trust and an attorney representing some farmers – were dismayed to find that the action had concluded before all arrived.

“You should have called me,” Stacy Henderson, the attorney, told MID officials when she was permitted to speak – after the fact.

Marco Moreno said he was surprised as well. As chairman of the Latino Community Roundtable’s water and energy committee, he regularly attends MID board meetings, and like Henderson, had been particularly interested in the water sale.

Patrick Koepele, executive director of the Tuolumne River Trust, took a less generous view.

“It seemed as if they were kind of trying to push something through without people noticing,” Koepele said.

Discussed was the concept of declaring a water surplus after an unusually wet winter, and selling a share of Tuolumne River water to people who farm land that is nearby, but outside MID borders. The district is billing the idea as the “2017 groundwater replenishment program” under the theory that water sold to neighbors will keep them from pumping groundwater, and will further replenish the water table when the extra irrigation seeps down.

“If we consistently relax pumping, the aquifer is going to get higher and higher. It’s a win-win for everyone,” board member Larry Byrd said Tuesday.

What’s not to like about that?

Maybe nothing. But the proposal seemed half-baked, board member John Mensinger said at the meeting, a video of which was posted online several hours after.

“I’m feeling like I’m not sure what we’re voting for,” Mensinger told his fellow board members. “I’m a little nervous approving something when I don’t have it in writing in front of me.”

He joined with the others in unanimously declaring a water surplus this year. But Mensinger cast the only “no” vote to create the new replenishment program. He said it’s possible he’ll rethink his vote when a fleshed-out version comes back to the board, perhaps as early as May 23, along with a cost-of-service analysis suggesting whether the board’s decision Tuesday – to charge $50 per acre-foot of surplus water – is an appropriate price.

Mensinger did not say what he thought was lacking. But Koepele had no trouble pinpointing questions, such as whether MID plans to study how the new program might affect the environment.

“Our interest is, what exactly are they proposing to do?” Koepele said. “What are the details? What does this mean for the water supply? For the river?

“We’re not necessarily opposed to doing groundwater recharge; it could be a good thing,” he continued. “But we don’t see any numbers, any science.”

On Thursday, Williams said MID’s legal department will decide whether environmental analysis is necessary.

At the meeting, nothing was said about whether buyers will be required to flood irrigate, the best method for allowing water to seep down. Microdrip lines and sprinklers typically wet only about the top three feet of soil, with little or no benefit to the aquifer.

“What condition is the groundwater basin in currently?” Koepele said. “What areas are we going to recharge? Are they impervious soils? Are they actually going to recharge groundwater, or is this just another way to get water to farmers outside the district boundary? And will they end up planting more crops and creating a more hardened demand? None of that is going to be in a cost analysis, but would be part of a CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) analysis, and that didn’t come up once” at the meeting, which Koepele also viewed online later.

“I also wonder how farmers in the district are feeling about this,” he continued, again questioning the weird 8 a.m. start-time.

People will get another chance to ask questions and comment before the board takes a final vote, Henderson said.

It’s not unusual for the MID board to meet at 8 a.m. in closed session to discuss confidential matters, followed by regular open session – at 9 a.m., as usual.

This story was originally published May 11, 2017 at 6:04 PM with the headline "MID quietly moves meeting time for tricky water-sale vote."