Owens Valley Water Pact Accepted by L.A. Council

Los Angeles formally accepted a deal with Inyo County on Wednesday that settles decades of legal wrangling over water in Owens Valley, the lightly populated desert basin 250 miles north, where farms thrived before the city bought up the land and water rights.

After 70 years of sometimes violent rivalry and seven years of negotiations, Los Angeles agreed to join Inyo County in the first complete environmental study of the Owens Valley since the city came looking for a dependable water supply.

Los Angeles will also stop pumping ground water from any well if the pumping is judged by a technical advisory group to be harming vegetation. As long as the panel observes no environmental damage, the city will be able to keep taking more water. In return, both Los Angeles and Inyo County agreed to drop pending lawsuits.

The Los Angeles City Council voted 11 to 1 to accept the pact and send it to Mayor Tom Bradley, who said at a morning press conference that he will sign it. The pact was approved in August by the Inyo County Board of Supervisors. Final approval is still needed by an Inyo County Superior Court judge.

This was the second major event in Los Angeles water annals this month. The Legislature earlier passed a bill that could provide Los Angeles with state money to buy water to replace what it now takes from streams that feed Mono Lake, the shrinking saline lake about 50 miles north of the Owens Valley in the eastern Sierra Nevada.

In scope, the pact approved Wednesday involves only ground water pumped into the Los Angeles Aqueduct from beneath Owens Valley. Most of the nearly 480,000 acre-feet of water sent south to Los Angeles every year is not ground water but surface flow taken from the Owens River and smaller streams.

But ground water is a sensitive subject in the Owens Valley. Ranchers say their wells have been depleted by city pumps, and residents blame the pumps for lowering the water table and killing trees in the valley.

Water Rights Purchased

The rivalry between Los Angeles and Inyo County, one of the largest but also most sparely populated counties in the nation, began after officials of the urban giant quietly dispatched agents into the valley in the early 1900s to purchase water rights. Once the water rights were in hand, the city disclosed its plans for a gravity-fed aqueduct across the desert to the San Fernando Valley.

In 1970, the city opened a second aqueduct and began to increase its export of water, mostly with ground water. The main supply of surface water--the Owens River--was already tapped out, causing the former saline Owens Lake to become the state’s largest dry lake.

Inyo County voters passed a ground water law in 1980 that slapped new restrictions on Los Angeles. But the city challenged the law in court, and both Los Angeles and Inyo County have pressed legal threats against each other ever since.

‘Better Than a Lawsuit’

Bradley hailed the pact Wednesday at a City Hall press conference before the council vote.

“We believe that this ground water management plan is an idea that will resolve the many long years of bickering that has taken place between the Inyo County people and the Department of Water and Power,” the mayor said. “I believe that negotiation once again is far better than a lawsuit.”

Councilwoman Joan Milke Flores called the pact “a historic agreement” that ends the long rivalry. “The key concept in the agreement is the environmental monitoring program,” she said. “If any adverse impacts are noted, the department will suspend drilling activities in that area and rotate to other areas.”

Environmental conditions will be judged by what the agreement calls a “technical group” appointed jointly by Los Angeles and Inyo officials. The group, expected to be made up of scientists and engineers, will also ensure that the city does not pump more ground water than is recharged by snowmelt and rain, the agreement says.

Although the pact was approved by the Inyo County Board of Supervisors on Aug. 15, strong feelings among opponents may still hamper the agreement.

Inyo supervisors had opted not to vote on an earlier version this spring because of vocal protests, and the final version they approved did not appear any more popular. But the supervisors said it was the best deal they could get from Los Angeles.

After that vote, a group of ranchers and property owners said they will try to recall the entire Inyo County Board of Supervisors next year.

“The people of Inyo County did not approve the agreement. They are rather strongly opposed to it,” Sydell Braverman, an Owens Valley resident, advised the City Council on Wednesday. “This is an instance where our supervisors absolutely ignored . . . all of the will of the people.”

Ferocious Dust Storms

Others complained about the DWP’s hold on nearly all of the land in the valley, and the transformation of the former Owens Lake into a dry bed where winds whip up ferocious dust storms that blow as far as Orange County.

“They have totally dried us up (to) where we are a dustbowl there today,” said Robbye Carrasco of Long Pine. “Our water is becoming muddy, full of alkali. It is stinkin’ in our houses.”

Donald W. Odell, a Lone Pine lawyer, said he plans to file a lawsuit challenging the pact on the ground that the city and Inyo County lack the authority to enter into such an agreement. That power rests with the state, he said.

“We will file a lawsuit,” Odell said. “They haven’t seen anything yet.”