Goleta Initiates Plan to Import Canadian Water

With its back to the wall and the fate of a $52-million agricultural industry at stake, the Goleta Water District selected a company Friday to ship Canadian water to this thirsty Santa Barbara County coastal community by supertanker, the first time such a drastic action has been taken in the United States.

But contract negotiations with the firm that was chosen and a complicated permit process still stand between Goleta and the costly water from British Columbia.

“We are committed to moving ahead with this,” said Katy Crawford, president of the water district board. “The main thing that would stop us is the permitting process, which is horrific. . . . But it has to happen within the next year, because a year from May, our reservoir, Lake Cachuma, will be dry.”

If Lake Cachuma runs dry and no new water is available, several board members said, there would be enough water for urban use, but agriculture would have to be cut off. The result would mean $52 million in lost crop value and 750 to 800 lost jobs.

Faced with its reservoir running dry, Goleta chose what many consider to be an outlandish remedy. Other options, such as joining Santa Barbara in constructing a desalination plant, are in the works but will not get the district enough water in time.

Under normal circumstances, the water district uses 16,000 acre-feet of water each year. Today, its 70,000 residents are scraping by with 10,000. Mandatory rationing has been in place for nearly two years. Desperate avocado growers have begun cutting down trees because of the drought. So in Goleta, Canadian water is not considered exotic, but necessary.

“Exotic is something that occurs when you have a variety of alternatives, and you have the resources to exercise your fancy,” said Patrick Mylod, one of five district directors. “Basically, if tankering doesn’t work, our agricultural industry is out of business for at least two years.”

The district plans to ship an estimated 7,500 acre-feet of water a year from the wilds of British Columbia, an area that averages more than 150 inches of rainfall each year, compared with Goleta’s 6 inches in 1990.

Ships loaded with Canadian water would dock at an as yet unspecified spot near Goleta and unload into a pipeline that would take the water to the district’s treatment plant. There it would be distributed via normal channels.

Of the water shipped, 5,000 acre-feet would go to Goleta and the rest to Montecito, which lies south of Santa Barbara. An acre-foot of water, about 326,000 gallons, is enough to supply a family of five for about 18 months. The project, which could run up to seven years, will cost more than $22.5 million annually.

Higher costs would be passed onto local water users, but the amount and duration of the rate increases have not been decided.

The tankering decision was made in the last eight minutes of a vociferous, six-hour meeting, a public gathering lasting so long that one water board director excused himself only to return with hamburgers and french fries for the board and district staff.

At 12:05 Friday morning, two hours after the meeting was scheduled to end, the water district board chose Sun Belt Water Inc. of Santa Barbara to ship the water. It was the final step in a six-month decision-making process. The board cemented its resolve behind a decision that could more than double its costs.

But while the vote to negotiate a tankering contract with Sun Belt was unanimous, the district’s five board members are seriously split about what kind of tankering project they want, what sort of costs should be endured and what environmental safeguards must be met.

“If it rains in two or three or four years--or tomorrow--we won’t look so smart,” said board member Dave Bearman. “Those cheering us when the boat docks . . . may be booing us when their rates stay high for a very long time.”

Sun Belt Water Chief Executive Jack B. Lindsay contends that he can start shipping water within 10 months, half a year before water from the Santa Barbara desalination plant will be available.

However, before the shipping can begin, the process would have to comply with environmental regulations both for the removal of the water in Canada and the piping of it into Santa Barbara County. The permits must be approved by numerous agencies in both countries.

Goleta hopes to sign the contract by March 25, so the permitting process can begin.

Western Canada Water of Vancouver, British Columbia, was one of the three losers in the tankering derby. The company distributes Canadian Glacier water, the Southland’s No. 2 non-sparkling bottled water.

Although bulk water is tankered to parched areas in the Caribbean and was shipped to U.S. troops serving in the Persian Gulf War, water has never been shipped by tanker into the United States, said William Annett, chairman of Western Canada Water.

Alan Jones, a spokesman for the state Drought Project, said tankering was suggested during the 1977 drought. Cost was the major reason the idea died.

“I don’t know of anyone ever doing it,” Jones said. “I don’t know if it was a serious proposal in 1977 or something that just flew in. But it’s quicker than building a desalination plant, that’s for sure.”

The costs of tankered water are startlingly high, even compared to the fees already paid by agricultural and urban users in Goleta. Farmers pay about $300 per acre-foot for their water, compared to the $30 to $90 their Central Valley counterparts pay. Households pay about $1,400 per acre-foot. In contrast, tankered water will cost between $2,300 and $4,000 per acre-foot.

“It’s still the lesser of two evils,” Mylod said. “The purpose for reviewing the tankering is to save our agricultural industry.”

Paul Nielsen, manager of Groen Rose Co., a greenhouse and nursery, said that the farmers who cultivate the area’s 3,000 acres of avocados, lemons and nursery crops need water as soon as possible to remain in business.

“Some of the growers in this area have taken chain saws to avocado trees, partly because of the lack of water and partly because of the freeze,” said Nielsen, who served on an advisory committee to choose the shipping company. “We don’t know now if there’s enough water to bring the trees back into production.”

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