Kings County Farm Bureau to hold educational groundwater sessions
- Editor’s note: Monserrat Solis covers Kings County water issues for SJV Water through the California Local News Fellowship initiative.
The Kings County Farm Bureau is holding two informational events for residents to learn more about its lawsuit against the state involving the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA).
Information will cover the suit’s current status and its potential effect on the community, according to the farm bureau’s Facebook page.
The first meeting will be held Wednesday, April 9 at Lemoore College, 555 College Ave, in conference room 719 at 3 p.m.
The second event will be held April 30 at St. John’s Hall, 8324 8 ½ Ave at 9 a.m.
“We found that there are a lot of people that still are unaware of what SGMA is and truly how it impacts them,” Terra Brusseau, consultant for the Farm Bureau and founder of the Central Valley Group, said. “Our focus initially is to just let people know about SGMA.”
The Central Valley Group is a consulting firm that provides public relations, communications and fund raising services.
The Kings County Farm Bureau sued the state Water Resources Control Board in 2024 after the board placed the Tulare Lake subbasin, which covers most of Kings County, on probation for failing to come up with a groundwater plan to protect domestic wells and stop severe subsidence, among other issues.
The Farm Bureau claimed the probationary findings and sanctions violated SGMA and the state’s constitution.
Passed in 2014, SGMA aims to bring severely overpumped aquifers back into balance by 2040 by regulating groundwater pumping through local control. The law required local agencies to form groundwater sustainability agencies (GSA) to craft water plans to reverse damage caused by overpumping.
Under probation, farmers in the Tulare Lake subbasin would have to meter and register wells at an annual cost of $300 per well and pay an extra $20 per acre foot pumped.
A Kings County judge issued a preliminary injunction against the state sanctions, citing numerous issues with how the Water Board applied the law.
The state appealed the injunction. Meanwhile, local groundwater agencies are instituting their own well registration and monitoring programs.
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