Babbitt Will Resume Effort to Mediate Water Dispute

Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt has decided to resume attempts to mediate a bitter dispute between the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and two agricultural irrigation districts, water officials said Friday.

The conflict is seen by many as a threat to the state’s water future.

In mid-February, Babbitt withdrew from negotiations involving the MWD, the Coachella Valley Water District and the Imperial Irrigation District out of exasperation at what he viewed as an unreasonable eleventh-hour request by the MWD that water be taken from the water-rich agricultural areas and shifted to thirsty urban regions.

But now Babbitt has accepted a request from the agencies to send his mediator, lawyer David Hayes, to an all-day negotiating session April 8 at MWD headquarters in Los Angeles. MWD official Gilbert Ivey said he expects the session to be the first of several in coming weeks.

The dispute centers on how much water the two agricultural agencies should receive from the Colorado River. The MWD insists that the farmers in the Imperial Valley are wasting enormous amounts of water through inefficient irrigation and that Babbitt has done nothing to stop the practice.

Two weeks ago, MWD Chairman Phillip J. Pace told the Urban Water Institute that the Imperial district “is out of step with a new water use ethic in California that is essential to solving our state’s water problems.”

On the other hand, state Sen. David Kelley (R-Palm Desert) has accused the MWD of “a series of provocative actions that threaten to ignite a decades-long water war.”

If the three agencies’ negotiations fail to produce an agreement on water allocation and related money matters, a water deal between the Imperial district and the San Diego County water agency could be blocked.

That, in turn, could make it impossible for California to reduce water use as demanded by Babbitt.

Babbitt has told the state to cut its dependence on the Colorado River or face a reduction in its yearly take from that waterway.