Locals feeling optimistic about new long-term water mitigation plan after decade-long dispute
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IDAHO FALLS — Farmers across eastern Idaho are feeling optimistic after a new long-term water mitigation plan was approved last week.
Gov. Brad Little approved the 2024 Stipulated Mitigation Plan last Thursday after months of negotiations between surface water users in Magic Valley and groundwater users in eastern Idaho.
The new agreement resolves a dispute that’s been litigated since 2015. TJ Budge, an attorney who represents Idaho Ground Water Appropriators, the umbrella organization for nine groundwater districts in eastern Idaho, tells EastIdahoNews.com he’s pleased with the new plan.
“It fixes all the problems of the old agreement,” Budge says. “It’s more pragmatic from a farmer’s standpoint, and it’s going to do a better job of keeping farmland in production and mitigating injury to senior water users. It took a lot of effort and negotiation and I’m appreciative of all the work that went into it.”
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Under Idaho law, surface water users have senior water rights and groundwater users are required to have a plan for recharging the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer during times of shortages.
Under the new plan, surface water users will retain senior water rights, as outlined in Idaho’s prior appropriation doctrine. Groundwater users will also conserve a minimum of 205,000-acre-feet of water annually. Both these points were part of the original 2015 agreement.
Groundwater users will receive safe harbor during the term of the plan — which is now being issued in four-year increments — as long as they are compliant with the mitigation agreement.
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A major point of contention in this discussion is the threat of water curtailment in eastern Idaho. In 2023, the Idaho Department of Water Resources determined there was a shortage of 75,200-acre-feet of water in the aquifer and threatened to shut it off for 900 junior groundwater rights users for being non-compliant with a state-approved mitigation plan.
The department projected a similar shortage this summer. This time, it was a shortage of 74,100-acre-feet of water for the Twin Falls Canal Company and it impacted 6,400 junior groundwater users.
Everything came to a head in May when the IDWR issued a curtailment order that would’ve impacted 500,000 acres throughout the state, including four counties in eastern Idaho.
The department later reversed course when the Surface Water Coalition and Ground Water Appropriators reached a temporary solution to get through the growing season.
Though safe harbor for groundwater users was a stipulation in the original agreement, Budge says it was based on the premise that aquifer levels were increasing. The Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer has been in decline for decades and this new plan acknowledges that.
“Under the old plan, groundwater users were required to deliver 50,000-acre-feet of water every year, whether the surface water users needed it or not. Under the new plan, the juniors only deliver storage water when the seniors need it, but it can be up to 75,000-acre-feet,” Budge explains.
The new plan is effective, as of Jan. 1, 2024. It will renew automatically for another four years in 2027, barring any issues brought up by either party. That means it will not be a contentious debate every year.
“The parties discussed having a longer term. The problem is no one has a crystal ball about the weather cycle and there needed to be off ramps in case it’s not working,” says Budge.
Historically, the department determines an average annual shortfall over a five year period. Kirt Schwieder, a board member with the Bonneville-Jefferson Ground Water District, says a four-year term balances out the weather cycle averages from year to year and makes it easier for farmers to make up any shortages.
“I’m going to have a wet year where it’s going to be easy to meet the shortage and I’m going to have a dry year where it’s going to be hard to meet it,” Schwieder says. “Everybody felt comfortable being able to make up the average in four years.”
Farmers react
Schwieder farms about 4,000 acres in eastern Idaho. Of that, about 3,000 acres uses groundwater pumped out of the aquifer. He says the new plan is much better than the previous agreement for both parties. He’s optimistic about the future.
“This really is a better plan that’s going to take us in the right direction,” Schwieder says. “Results take time to measure and it’s going to take time to see how the aquifer is performing and to see if we can keep the entire supply of surface and groundwater viable.”
Andrew Mickelsen, who manages the Mickelsen Family farm throughout Bonneville, Jefferson and Clark counties, expresses a similar sentiment. But he hopes to “continue the conversation and find additional ways to protect and improve the aquifer.”
“This new water agreement was not what we had hoped for, but provides some stability for farmers in southeast Idaho for the time being,” Mickelsen says. “As we continue to work together, we can find ways to make all of Idaho agriculture successful, vibrant and sustainable.”
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Earlier this year, the Idaho Water Resources Board and others celebrated the completion of the Enterprize Canal pipeline, which diverts water from the Snake River to more than 200 farmers who irrigate 5,436 acres in the Ririe area.
The pipeline drains into a new Snake River recharge basin, which sits on an 8-acre site on 55th East northeast of Idaho Falls and can hold up to 15,000-acre-feet of water.
Schwieder says the Bonneville-Jefferson Ground Water District is working with the IDWR on similar recharge projects in the future, including the South Fork recharge project. It encompasses about 70 acres off U.S. Highway 26 between Ririe and Idaho Falls.
There is also a proposal for a pipeline complex that would extend along West 65th North near Osgood. Numerous others are in the works across the state.
Schwieder wants the metaphorical bus to continue to roll over the next four years and he’s urging the public to get behind solutions that will keep the bus rolling in the right direction.
“Our forefathers came to this valley, grubbed off the sagebrush and spread the waters of the Snake River. They created what we currently have as our Eastern Snake River Plain watershed system. We are standing on their shoulders. It is now our turn to continue their legacy and build a … system for the future,” says Schwieder.