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Agriculture will be able to keep conditional waivers for water discharges under a program adopted by members of the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board Friday. But the program still needs to be completely worked out, and fine-tuning will continue throughout the rest of the year. After two days of public hearings, the board angered environmental groups that have said they will sue to press for more stringent regulation of water leaving irrigated lands. Agriculture didn't get everything it asked for either. Under the current proposal, farmers who join a new coalition for water monitoring will need to identify themselves, a point that agricultural groups said growers did not feel comfortable with. Whether farmers will tax themselves to pay for a monitoring program will be addressed when the rules come up for review again in January. William Croyle, an engineer for the regional board, said the board currently has a staff of six and some sort of funding will need to be secured to run the water monitoring. "It doesn't have to come from fees," Croyle said. "It could come from special legislation," or even water bonds. The regional board will also review proposals pushed by environmental groups to regulate water discharges under a Waste Discharge Regulation program. Bill Jennings of Delta Keeper said the "environmental community is outraged." "The board's action today was a slap in the face," he said. Jennings said agriculture should be treated like other industries that discharge water. They should have to identify themselves, notify the state when they plan to discharge and pay for monitoring programs, he said. "This leaves us no alternative but to file a (California Environmental Quality Act) lawsuit." The ruling applies to the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys and the Tulare area. Other regions, such as Imperial in Southern California and coastal areas, are watching the developments closely. Generally, people who discharge water are required to have a permit. However, 20 years ago agriculture was given a waiver from these requirements. Those rules expired in January. The board of the water quality agency was poised to grant another waiver, but only if farmers joined a watershed group and began monitoring. Agricultural groups got together to find a way to create a plan that farmers could live with rather than wait to see what the board came up with. The Northern California Water Association met with the board staff many times and built a coalition of water users, resource conservation districts and others. They presented a monitoring plan to the regional board. The plan called for first monitoring known areas of pollution and if a problem was noted, they would talk with landowners to fix the problem. If problems stopped, monitoring could cease. Three other areas in Central California did similar networking, forming their own coalitions. At the public hearing Thursday, agricultural commissioners from several counties including Butte, and Assemblyman Doug LaMalfa, urged the board to vote for the waiver packages devised by farmers. Ag groups at the public hearing urged the board not to require individual identification of growers in the watersheds. Farmers are independent and water coalitions did not want to be viewed as "cops," said David Corey of the San Joaquin water contractors. He said growers could be identified later in the process if problems with water discharges occurred. But the board voted to require that the coalitions provide lists of individual growers who want to be included in a group waiver. Environmentalists voiced their frustration over waivers. Jonathon Kaplan of the Natural Resources Defense Council said there are many ag-related pollutants. "Ag has been operating under a waiver since 1982 and the water situation has not improved," he said. Mike Lozeau of Earth Justice urged the board to cover ag under waste discharge requirements. Staff had never been asked to come up with a plan to show the board, and they should at least consider the idea, Lozeau said. Croyle said the plan is to do that and look at it in a future meeting. "Pollution is theft," said Jennings. "Pollution is not free. Someone always pays." David Beckman of the Natural Resource Defense Council scolded the board. "I think you should be deeply troubled by the process you are administering," he said. "Your duty in the code is to the public interest, not to agricultural interests." Tim Johnson, president of the California Rice Commission, also asked that the rice industry be given different consideration because it already has a water monitoring system that has been in place for 13 years. Croyle,
of the regional board, said that will be considered in the future as well. |
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