Christopher Valadez
The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board will be conducting a workshop on Tuesday, August 21 at 10 a.m. at the Southern California Edison, Energy Education Center in Tulare.
The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board will be conducting a workshop on Tuesday, August 21 at 10 a.m. at the Southern California Edison, Energy Education Center in Tulare.
This workshop is the only scheduled workshop for the pending waste discharge requirements for growers within the Tulare Lake Basin. The regulation would expand current surface-water quality requirements to include groundwater, and would apply to growers within the basin. The assumption is that every irrigator is a potential discharger; therefore, falls under the Irrigated Lands Program (Surface & Groundwater).
Staff reports indicate that costs to growers and coalition groups could be as high as $159 per acre. Implementation of the waste discharge requirements would create additional burdens on growers and third-party groups. For instance, in some cases growers will be required to pay for the preparation or certification of nutrient management budgets, certification of sediment and erosion control plans where the potential to discharge sediments to surface waters of the state exists, and civil-engineer design of new or modified construction of on-farm ponds and tail-water recovery systems. Membership costs to farmers in the third-party groups will increase significantly to cover the costs of new monitoring wells, costs of groundwater monitoring, nutrient-use reporting, outreach and education, and other required activities.
League staff will be in attendance at the meeting. Your attendance is also encouraged, as your comments are important in an effort to inform the Board of ongoing implementation of current on-farm nutrient practices and improvements/efficiencies gained in nutrient management. A coalition of water-management districts and agricultural associations, including the League, are working together to communicate to the Board that the new program will create burdens upon growers and third-party water quality coalition groups absent clear water quality goals, and in some cases, the anticipated costs will be unsustainable for growers.
For growers planning to attend, you can find talking points available below. Please click the link to download. For more information on the event, please contact Christopher Valadez at the League’s office.