New(ish) Kern groundwater authority gets underway

A somewhat new groundwater authority held its first meeting Monday with a mandate to represent Kern County lands not covered by existing water districts.

The so-called “non-districted lands” within the Kern subbasin (the San Joaquin Valley portion of Kern) had sort of been previously represented by the Kern Groundwater Authority KGA.

But the KGA has been disintegrating over the past two years as member water districts left to form their own groundwater sustainability agencies. The KGA held its final meeting on May 22 and has since morphed into the Kern Non-Districted Lands Authority (KNDLA).

The eventual goal is for owners of non-districted lands to represent their own interests under the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act via the KNDLA and – more importantly – pay their own fees for studies, consultants, legal representation, etc. Water districts in the KGA had been footing those bills over the past 10 years.

There is one organization that has formed on the east side of the subbasin, the Eastside Water Management Area, to represent non-districted lands (also known as “white areas” because they are left blank on color-coded water district maps). It has about 36,000 acres in its boundaries and plans to become a full-fledged water district and groundwater agency in the next few years, said spokesman Taylor Blakslee

But the acreage under Eastside Water Management Area authority fluctuates as landowners have opted in and then out again over the years, Blakslee said.

Growers and grazers in non-districted lands don’t pay land assessment fees that are used by water districts to import water, build recharge basins and canals to move water to farmlands. Many don’t want to pay those assessments or don’t need to, as cattleman Nathan Carver pointed out.

He attended the KNDLA meeting on Monday and spoke with SJV Water later.

“I noticed the one thing they kept saying was that white areas are going to have to pony up, that they’re going to have to pay for all this,” Carver said. “We don’t want to be part of it. I don’t buy water and don’t want to be assessed fees. I have to work just to pay my taxes.

“The only thing this KNDLA can do for me, hopefully, is protect me from state government taking things over.”

He referred to potential state action if the Kern subbasin’s new groundwater plan doesn’t pass muster. The region is slated to go before the state Water Resources Control Board in January 2025 for possible consideration of probationary status, the first step toward state control of groundwater pumping.

All areas, including non-district lands in subbasin, must be covered by an entity and a plan to bring aquifers into balance, meaning more water isn’t taken out than goes back in, by 2040.

The specter of state control has been a driving force among growers and water managers to come up with an acceptable groundwater plan.

Monday’s first meeting of the KNDLA was a bit awkward without an executive director, budget or even board members in a room packed with water district representatives keen on launching the new organization.

Eventually, three officers were appointed and two ad hoc committees were established to close out the financial obligations of the old KGA and create a budget and sort out administrative details of the new KNDLA.

The official meeting time for KNDLA was set as 2 p.m. on the fourth Monday of the month in the Kern County Water Agency Board room. The chair is Barry Watts, who serves on the Rosedale-Rio Bravo Water Storage District board, vice chair is Royce Fast, a Kern County Water Agency board member, and treasurer is Andrew Hart, a Kern-Tulare Water District board members.

Seats on KNDLA will initially be held mostly by water district folks but the board has two slots for representatives from non-districted lands. Several landowners were nominated Monday, but the board decided to write up a formal nomination and voting process and do some outreach so others who are interested can come forward. That will likely take several months to complete, though specific dates weren’t announced.

Carver suggested the two non-districted lands representatives should provide perspectives from the east and west sides of the county as they are hydrologically different, and be from a grazing and farming background. Lands used for grazing require far less water than farmland does, he said.

“The other thing I want to know about the nominees is their resume,” Carver said. “When they put food on their table, was that produced in the non-districted areas? In other words, I want them to have skin in this game. I want it to mean something to them personally.”