IDWR to send agents to ensure compliance with curtailment order

DANIEL V. RAMIREZ

dramirez@postregister.com

The Idaho Department of Water Resources will send department agents on Monday to validate water user compliance amid ongoing issues over the curtailment order, according to an IDWR press release.

Since May 30, Department of Water Resources Director Matthew Weaver has issued a curtailment order after finding six groundwater districts not in compliance with existing mitigation plans. Two of the six are North Snake and Magic Valley. Nine GWDs who have complied are protected from the curtailment, but four have not.

The remaining four are Bingham, Bonneville- Jefferson, Carey Valley and Jefferson- Clark.

Department agents are sent to ensure individual users’ compliance. Those found not complying may have their diversions closed and locked or be subject to civil penalties.

However, Rep. Stephanie Mickelsen, R-Dist. 32-A and the chair of the Idaho Groundwater Appropriators, said those GWDs not complying aren’t doing it out of malice but because the goalposts have been moved.

She said there had been misinformation that the GWD was unwilling to comply with the mitigation plan, but that’s not true.

“We’ve been willing to comply, but the goalpost keeps changing on us,” Mickelsen said.

From the start, she said, the IDWR provided two plans, 2009 and 2016, for GWDs to provide mitigation to keep pumps going. Following the 2009 plan, she said they were found not compliant and had to shift over to the 2016 plan.

The 2009 plan allows farmers to provide water to cover their impact on the aquifers, not their proportionate share.

Mickelsen said the 2016 plan was based on irrigators’ average diversion, and then they were required to reduce that diversion.

She said the problem became apparent in 2021. In a hot and dry year, the Surface Water Coalition had irrigators reduce their diversion every year within that same year. This meant a 13% reduction, which growers and GWD used to shoot up to a 40% reduction.

Mickelsen said the hope for that plan was to provide a bunch of mitigation and recharge of the water to hit a goal, but it didn’t.

“That’s why the ‘16 agreement became so intolerable to a bunch of water districts because it did not have things in it that we felt had been agreed to,” Mickelsen said.

TJ Budge, attorney for the Idaho Groundwater Appropriators, said GWD has used mitigation, worked on reducing their use of groundwater they’ve pumped, and converted farmlands from groundwater to surface water since 2016.

“It’s not that they’re unwilling to conserve or that they’re not willing to mitigate. They’ve been providing mitigation, and they’ve offered to provide storage waters mitigation this year. It’s just that the Department of Water Resources is not accepting their proposals,” Budge said.

Mickelsen said many of the GWDs filed individual mitigation plans in December and January but the IDWR did not act on them. Budge added that all of the districts offered to mitigate with storage this spring, and later, some, but not all, offered mitigation through storage.

“They waited ‘til now, when everybody has already put all their crops in the field, has invested all this money, the banks are backing everybody’s operating lines, and now suddenly you’re going to come shut off people (water),” Mickelsen said.

Budge said the wells the IDWR is telling irrigators to shut off aren’t located near the Snake River, and shutting them off will not provide any meaningful benefit to the Surface Water Coalition.

Budge said a reason for the curtailment is due to a member of the Surface Water Coalition, Twin Falls Canal Co., predicting a water shortfall of 74,100 acre-feet.

“The department said we’re going to shut off 1.5 million acre-feet of groundwater use that is drying up about 700,000 acres unless the groundwater districts comply with a mitigation plan,” Budge said.

On May 31, Mickelsen spoke about the Milner dam spilling over 644,000 acre-feet, and the IDWR is losing that resource due to a lack of a management plan.

“We’ve got to figure out how to get that water down in the aquifer and keep it behind dams, and we’re just not doing a very good job of that,” she said.

Recently, the Bonneville County Sheriff ’s Office warned residents of an increased inflow of mountain runoff water, which has resulted in increased water flows in the Snake River, causing concern about dangerous water conditions.

Mickelsen wondered how in a wet year — with flooding in Teton County, flooding on the Portneuf River and issues on the Teton Pass — the IDWR is willing to shut off 1.5 million acre-feet of farmland. She thinks there is an issue in the methodology they use to determine their models.

“We’re really at a fork in the road as far as water use in this state. We’re at a time when either we can follow the state down this path of economic disaster and a race to the bottom, or we can finally take the reins and manage this resource so that everybody can stay in business and we remain robust,” Mickelsen said.

Looking ahead, Mickelsen said there are two options: either a new mitigation plan will come about, or the Legislature will have to be involved due to the economic impact farmers are facing.

Budge said it will take state leaders to step up and provide leadership and guidance to the IDWR on how they want to manage this resource.

“Idaho has the ability to keep all of its farmland irrigated, but we need to invest in modern technology, drought resilience projects, and use our water more strategically and efficiently to keep all of our farmland in production. That’s not the course the Department of Water Resources is taking,” Budge said.