Owens Valley Water History

Those property owners (circa 1907-1914) who forced the city to purchase their land and water rights in the Owens Valley are as much if not more to blame for the condition in the Owens Valley as are Los Angeles or the Department of Water and Power. Though the DWP and the city of Los Angeles are neither perfect nor blameless with respect to the current conditions in the Owens Valley, your Nov. 12 editorial (“Glimpse of a Rainbow”) completely ignores the historical context of water export from the Owens Valley.

The city’s original water export plans focused solely on “surplus spring runoff,” only that portion of the spring runoff that was not firm (guaranteed to property owners adjacent to the river). These same property owners had a plan in the works for this same “surplus spring runoff.” They would capture it for later on, on their own farmland. When the city’s water bureau, under William Mulholland, acquired key land parcels and provided funds required for construction (a bond issue), the Owens Valley property owners had no way of capturing or storing the surplus spring runoff. But it was the right to use the spring runoff that they were to use in battling the city.

When the aqueduct was finished and the city began diversion at the Alabama Gates, the Owens Valley property owners diverted all of the water in the Owens River onto their lands. Los Angeles and Mulholland’s response was to purchase the lands and water rights of these Owens Valley property owners. With money in hand, most left the Owens Valley for greener pastures. Los Angeles ended up with rights to roughly five times as much water as it had originally intended to export from the Owens Valley, an enormous unanticipated debt for additional land and water rights purchases and a need to pay off that debt.

The editorial ignores equally important implications for water users in Southern California, particularly San Diego’s effort to secure a water source that cannot be impacted by punishing Los Angeles. Will you ever examine San Francisco’s use of national park land for capture and storage of its water supply? At least Los Angeles purchased the land and water rights it is using.

NORM HANSON

Encino