Courts and Police

‘What are we going to do with all this land?’
FROM STAFF AND AP REPORTS|
--See Image(s) Below--

Published on: February 14, 2006

A federal judge has ruled against environmentalists and Mexican agricultural interests trying to block a U.S. plan to rebuild a leaky stretch of the All American Canal west of Yuma.

U.S. District Judge Philip Pro dismissed seven of the eight counts in the lawsuit filed in July by two California environmental groups and an economic development council in Mexicali, Baja Calif. The groups claimed that water seeping into the ground north of the border but serving people in Mexico cannot be seized by the United States.

Officials for California’s Imperial Irrigation District estimate that 67,000 acre-feet of seepage a year could be prevented by rebuilding 23 miles of the canal west of Pilot Knob.

But for Mexican farmer Trinidad Vargas Guillen, that seepage was used to irrigate his farmland for over 70 years, he said.

Guillen owns 240 acres of farmland 10 miles west of Los Algodones, Baja Calif. He is one of a number farmers along the border who irrigate their farmland using 10 wells that tap into underground aquifers in Mexico.

Those aquifers are fed by the canal seepage, Guillen said. "If they put cement into that canal, no more water will come from that well," he said, pointing to the well in front of his home along Mexican Highway 2. "What are we going to do with all this land?" he asked.

The seeping water that is saved will be diverted to supply about 130,000 households in San Diego.

"It’s still pending. We’re not sure what the judge is going to do with the last count," said Bob Schettler, IID communications specialist. "But we are going forward. The project has been engineered, and it is going out to bid."

In an order issued Thursday, Pro rejected all but one of the lawsuit’s environmental claims and ruled that Mexican farmers had no standing in the American court.

René Acuña, the Mexicali council’s executive director, said the group will continue to fight the plan.

‘‘It is very disappointing that the judge believes the U.S. can steal our water without due process simply because we are
Mexicans,’’ Acuña said in a statement.

Other plaintiffs are Azusa, Calif.-based Citizens United for Resources and the Environment and Desert Citizens Against Pollution, of Rosamond, Calif.

Schettler didn’t know how the installation of the lining would affect Mexico. He said there was talk about creating a turnout that would divert water to Mexico, but he did not know if that would happen. "I really don’t know what other effects there might be," he said.

The All American Canal was authorized in 1928 and completed in 1942 to supply Colorado River water to the Imperial Valley, where it is used to irrigate more than 700 square miles of cropland.

Southern Nevada Water Authority chief Pat Mulroy has called the exchange between the Imperial Irrigation District and San Diego ‘‘the linchpin’’ to California’s effort to live within its Colorado River allotment.

The $135 million All American Canal project, which was authorized by Congress in 1988, is slated to go out for bid Feb. 22. Construction is scheduled to begin later this year and wrap up in 2008.

Out on his farm, Guillen looked out into the lettuce fields where hundreds of workers cut and packed the product that has been growing here for three generations. He employs about 600 workers now, he said.

Guillen’s grandparents received this land in the 1930s when President Lazaro Cardenas’ redistributed millions of acres of land to peasants as part of his agrarian reform program. But Guillen said this land may soon no longer have what is the single most important commodity to maintain his crops — water.

It appears U.S. urban interests will win another lawsuit giving them rights to the invaluable resource, he said

"It may be too late," he said.

Mexican farmer Trinidada Vargas Guillen's agricultural land is irrigated with water tapped from underground aquifers, which in turn are fed by seepage coming from the All American Canal. If the United States lines the canal with concrete, h

© Copyright 2006 YumaSun.com