TID will rehab small reservoir

A small, abandoned reservoir near Hilmar will go back to work in a project that conserves water for the Turlock Irrigation District.

The board voted 4-0 Tuesday for the $2.16million project, which will capture water that now spills into the Merced River when the Highline Canal has unexpectedly high flows. TID Director Rob Santos was absent.

TID will fix up the reservoir, formerly part of a treatment plant for the Hilmar County Water District, which serves the town of Hilmar. It will hold water for use in Laterals 7 and 8, near the south end of TID’s service area.

Construction is scheduled to start Dec.1 and finish before the start of the 2015 irrigation season, spokesman Calvin Curtin said.

The Turlock district staff projects water savings of 2,550 acre-feet a year, and as much as 9,000 with a future expansion. Both are tiny percentages of the nearly 360,000 acre-feet that TID delivers in an average year, but it is guarding against recurring drought.

The district, which gets its water from the Tuolumne River and wells, also faces a long-term reduction in the river supply because of state and federal efforts to protect fish.

TID had looked at such a project in 1998 but determined it was not worth pursuing, said a report to the board from associate civil engineer Matt Hazen. The drought and recent state legislation on river flows changed that.

“The current research and survey of the existing facility have shown that with various modifications to the interior, it could be operated as a cost-effective regulating reservoir for the adjacent canals,” Hazen wrote.

The board in June gave initial approval for the project and directed the staff to negotiate the purchase price for the reservoir site. It ended up being $663,000 in the resolution approved Tuesday.

The project is one of several within TID that aim to provide greater control over a canal system that has mostly operated by gravity over the past century.

The Modesto Irrigation District, which also taps the Tuolumne, is considering small reservoirs of its own. The Oakdale and South San Joaquin irrigation districts on the Stanislaus River have done similar projects.

This story was originally published October 21, 2014 at 11:56 AM with the headline "TID will rehab small reservoir."