Inyo County, L.A. Agree to Seek Extension of Water Talks

A tentative agreement to extend for 16 months a 4-year-old truce between Inyo County and the City of Los Angeles over the pumping of ground water south from the Owens Valley was announced Thursday.

Sierra runoff from Inyo County is the source of about 80% of Los Angeles city water. It is piped south from reservoirs and natural underground storage in the Owens Valley.

The city and Inyo County have been negotiating for years over division of the water. An extension of a court-ordered Feb. 28, 1989, deadline for a permanent water allocation plan was sought after negotiators from both jurisdictions realized several months ago that they are far from agreement, Department of Water and Power officials said.

Terms of Tentative Pact

Under the tentative agreement for the extension, costly new irrigation systems to beautify about 150 acres of Inyo County meadowlands would be installed by the city. In addition, Inyo County would swap 56 acres of largely undevelopable canyon land north of Bishop to the DWP for six acres of city-owned property near Independence for a new jail facility. DWP Northern District engineer Duane Buchholz said the canyon land would provide watershed.

The extension agreement also calls for Los Angeles to pay up to $545,000 to help cover Inyo County’s share of federal vegetation and ground water studies. If the county and city agree on a permanent management plan by next year, the extension accord also requires the city to pay Inyo County’s $505,000 share of an environmental impact study that must accompany the plan.

The DWP also agreed to study whether it makes sense for Inyo County to take over DWP operations that supply water to about 2,500 residents in four towns, Independence, Big Pine, Lone Pine and Law.

Working to Resolve 1971 Suit

Since 1984, Inyo County and Los Angeles negotiators have been working to resolve a 1971 lawsuit challenging DWP’s importation of ground water from the Owens Valley through its aqueduct system. The legal challenge was an outgrowth over a fight that has been raging between city officials and Owens Valley residents since the turn of the century.

Since the truce was called, the two sides have been studying ways--both together and separately--to allocate the water permanently between Inyo County and Los Angeles.

Last October, negotiators from both jurisdictions met and realized that they lacked enough information to prepare either a permanent plan or launch an environmental study, said Dennis Williams, DWP assistant engineer in charge of the aqueduct. Key ingredients to that research are yet-to-be-completed vegetation and ground water studies of the area being conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey, he added.

The truce arrived at in 1984 called for concessions on both sides while a permanent agreement is being hashed out. In the interim, the DWP agreed to divert some water into the dry bed of the Owens River for fishing purposes and to negotiate annually the amount of water that can be pumped into the aqueduct.

Those terms will be extended if the truce agreement is ratified by the Inyo County Board of Supervisors, the city’s Board of Water Commissioners, the Los Angeles City Council and, ultimately, the courts. The City Council was briefed on the terms of the accord earlier this week. DWP officials expressed optimism that the courts will accede to the deadline extension due to Inyo County’s agreement to it.