![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.krbecheklaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/water3-300x208.jpg\" "\\"fresno")
<\/a>As Mr. Carter notes, the soils in the area \u201cinclude a host of salts, trace elements like selenium, arsenic and boron, and heavy metals, which created an alkali desert on the West Side over eons.\u201d<\/p>\nTo further complicate matters, natural drainage is precluded because \u201cseveral layers of virtually impermeable, thick subterranean clays run below the topsoil and impede the downward percolation of applied irrigation water.\u201d<\/p>\n
Growers had known since before World War II that adequate drainage was needed.\u00a0 Westlands created the Kesterson reservoir in Merced County to hold the runoff, but the waste water created grave pollution problems and harm to wildlife.<\/p>\n
Mr. Carter states that, \u201cAn estimated 100,000 acres in the Westlands have already gone out of production in the last few years because they salted up for lack of drainage.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis includes land covered by a $140 million 2002 Interior Department settlement of a lawsuit against Reclamation and Westlands filed by nineteen old-guard Westlands families who saw 32,400 acres of their farmland ruined by lack of drainage.\u00a0 That controversial settlement included $70 million for just four prominent farming families.\u201d<\/p>\n
Westlands\u2019 \u201cSolution\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\nNotes Carter, \u201cBecause of the enormous cost of completing a federal drainage canal, Westlands has suggested to the government it would take over resolution of the drainage crisis in exchange for debt forgiveness, a guaranteed water supply, and takeover of some federal project plumbing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Westlands is seeking:<\/p>\n
\n- A water-delivery contract in perpetuity<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\n- Transfer from the federal government to Westlands of title to all pumping and diversion facilities along the San Luis Canal, the Mendota Pool, the Pleasant Valley Pumping Plant, and distribution and drainage-collector systems<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\n- Subsidized electricity for any drainage-treatment options requiring electrical power<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
No Disclosure by Westlands <\/strong><\/p>\nWestlands acts like a governmental agency, and indeed, has the power of condemnation, which is an essential power reserved to sovereign entities.<\/p>\n
But Westlands operates without public disclosure.\u00a0 As Carter notes, \u201cIn 1982, the Reclamation Reform Act was passed, eliminating the residency requirement for farms, [and] increasing the acreage limitation to 960 acres.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the land ownership limitation established by Congress \u2013 only 960 acres per farmer is eligible for subsidized water.<\/p>\n
There has never been enforcement of this requirement, nor any disclosure by Westlands.\u00a0 As Mr. Carter points out, \u201cThe actual number of “farms” or “farmers” in Westlands is in much dispute, and Westlands has never provided a publicly available list of all of its “farmers,” “farms,” or “water users”<\/strong>; neither has it confirmed whether the “farmers” are people actually involved in farming or merely have their names listed on land deeds or as part of family trusts.\u201d<\/p>\nIt\u2019s shocking that Westlands could suggest that it would acquire large portions of the Central Valley Project for irrigation, yet not make basic disclosures so the public could determine whether it was operating lawfully.<\/p>\n
Carter\u2019s Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n\u201cMost Westlands growers live far from the bleak and industrialized farmlands of the district; many reside in an exclusive enclave of mansions in north Fresno, in the zip code 93711, which receives more federal farm subsidy money than any other zip code in America.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe subsidized factory farm economy, it seems, doesn’t have much of a trickle down effect for the families and communities of workers who bring in the harvest.\u00a0 In fact, it appears as though this system has helped to foster a culture of unsustainable farming practices, caused large scale environmental degradation, and has created a massive socioeconomic rift between land owners and their primarily Latino workforce.<\/p>\n
\u201cIndeed, one cannot help but see two different agricultural worlds among the Eastern and Western flanks of the San Joaquin Valley.\u00a0 The East Side, where the original irrigation colonies began 130 years ago, is full of orchards and vineyards and farmhouses every quarter of a mile and small towns every few miles.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the Westlands, with a single giant farm sometimes reaching tens of thousands of acres, one can drive for many miles down Interstate 5 through cotton and row-crop fields without ever seeing a farmhouse or the all-but-invisible farm-worker communities. It is a stark contrast indeed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lloyd G. Carter, Reaping Riches in a Wretched Region: Subsidized Industrial Farming and its Link to Perpetual Poverty<\/strong>, in 3 Golden Gate U. Envtl. L.J.<\/em> (2009) page 5.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Journalist and attorney Lloyd Carter questions whether the benefits of subsidized water outweigh the social costs.\u00a0 The undisputable fact is that the west side of Fresno County is one of the poorest regions in all of America.\u00a0 Does current water policy help or does it simply compound the misery? The Cost for West Side Agriculture […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","category-law-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fresnolawyerblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.krbecheklaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/Water.jpg\" "\\"Fresno")
<\/a>According to Mr. Carter, \u201cThe value of Westlands’ federal water subsidy was calculated at $110 million a year in 2002.\u201d<\/p>\n