Also serving the communities of De Luz, Rainbow, Camp Pendleton, Pala and Pauma

CWA awards $850,000 to FPUD for conjunctive use study

The Fallbrook Public Utility District and Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton will receive $850,000 from the San Diego County Water Authority to evaluate a joint conjunctive use project between FPUD and Camp Pendleton in the Lower Santa Margarita Basin.

The County Water Authority board voted June 28 to authorize the CWA general manager to enter into funding agreements with five member agencies, some of whom are serving as the lead agencies and partnering with other water agencies, to fund five projects to facilitate studies and investigation of new local water supply opportunities.

The FPUD/Camp Pendleton project would divert existing surface water flows in the Santa Margarita River to the basin for storage, recovery, and treatment of up to 6,500 acre-feet per year for use in the FPUD service area. FPUD is the lead agency on the contract with the CWA.

“That funding will help us finish the environmental and the feasibility study on the conjunctive use project, and we look forward to completing the study with positive results and get authorization this year from Congress and hopefully appropriations soon after,” said FPUD general manager Keith Lewinger.

The authorization legislation is currently H.R. 29, introduced by Representative Darrell Issa. H.R. 29 allows the U.S. Secretary of the Interior to authorize construction of the project after FPUD and the Department of the Navy have entered into contracts to repay equitable and appropriate portions to the United States, state Bureau of Reclamation permits have been issued for FPUD and the Department of the Navy, FPUD waives any prior claims of water rights in excess of the agreed amount, and the Secretary of the Interior determines that the project has economic, environmental, and engineering feasibility. The agreement would allocate 60 percent of the project’s yield to the Department of the Navy and 40 percent to FPUD, although if the Navy does not have an immediate need for the entirety of their portion temporary contracts for the sale and delivery of the excess water may be executed and FPUD would have the first right to any excess water. H.R. 29 also authorizes appropriations of $60 million, which is the current estimated construction cost, and also authorizes money which may be required to operate and maintain the project.

Lewinger is also FPUD’s representative on the CWA board, although he abstained from the vote on the funding due to the potential conflict of interest. The representatives from the Otay, Padre Dam, South Bay, and Yuima water districts also abstained, as did the National City representative and the City of San Diego representative who serves on the city’s staff. The vote was otherwise unanimous among the CWA board members.

The Local Investigations and Studies Assistance (LISA) program was established by the CWA board in January and provided up to $750,000 per project per agency on an equal match cost share basis (because two agencies were involved, the FPUD/Camp Pendleton project was eligible for up to $1.5 million). The program and implementing principles were established by the CWA board January 25, a request for proposals for the first funding cycle was released on March 1 and generated five proposals by the April 20 deadline, and the CWA board approved a set of performance criteria on May 24.

The LISA program is intended to support the CWA’s Urban Water Management Plan, and in July 2006 board direction to CWA staff initiated the process which created the Local Investigations and Studies Assistance program. The overall program goal is to fund local groundwater, desalination, and recycling studies and investigations which could lead to new local water supply or increased dry-year supplies. The CWA’s Urban Water Management Plan relies on member agencies to develop an additional 47,000 annual acre-feet of local groundwater and recycled water production between 2005 and 2020.

The CWA is investigating regional seawater desalination programs, but some member agencies are contemplating desalination programs on a smaller scale. In addition to seawater desalination, these smaller-scale programs also include treatment of brackish groundwater. Groundwater conjunctive use projects, which utilize surface water for storage in a groundwater basin, are eligible for the LISA program, and other potential local supplies include recycling and non-conjunctive use groundwater.

In July 2006 the CWA board directed staff to meet with member agency general managers to determine the level of need to develop a new grant funding program which would focus on the early conceptual development of new local supplies. The meeting with the general managers was held in August 2006, and the general managers identified a need for “seed money” to initiate the projects and also recommended a ten percent set-aside from SB 1765 funds provided by the state for groundwater conjunctive use projects.

CWA staff then proceeded to work with a Local Projects Ad Hoc Committee, which included representatives from FPUD and Camp Pendleton, to develop recommendations for the structure and implementation of the new program. The committee had meetings in November, December, and early January. CWA staff and committee members jointly developed recommendations for a program and implementing principles.

The restrictions on SB 1765 projects currently limit the program application to groundwater conjunctive use projects, but the two-year CWA budget was approved in a separate June 28 action and allocated $2 million over the next two fiscal years for non-conjunctive use projects.

Although the CWA had set aside ten percent of the SB 1765 funding for LISA projects, the five proposals submitted totaled $3.75 million in requests and the available funding with a ten-percent set-aside equated to $3.1 million. Increasing the set-aside percentage to 12.3 percent allowed all five projects to be funded. (The remainder of the SB 1765 funding will be used for conjunctive use projects bringing water to San Diego County.) A proposal review panel determined that all five proposals represented value to the region and should receive full funding.

“It’s a good thing. It’s going to be a great project for Camp Pendleton, for Fallbrook, and for the region,” said Daniel Lizzul, who is Camp Pendleton’s representative on the CWA board.

Lizzul, who is currently the director of the Office of Water Resources at Camp Pendleton and once served as the special counsel for water rights at Camp Pendleton, also noted that the

conjunctive use agreement between FPUD and Camp Pendleton settles a decades-old lawsuit. “It’s been a long time coming,” he said.

The LISA funding also provided $250,000 to the Yuima Municipal Water District, which will partner with the San Luis Rey Indian Water Authority on a study of the Pala and Pauma Basins for storage of Yuima’s excess winter importation capacity and the tribal imported water entitlement. While only CWA member agencies are eligible for funding, a member agency can apply to sponsor another local agency, although all contracts and funding obligations will be between the CWA and the sponsoring agency.

The member agency funding match will be primarily external, or consultant and third-party costs, but may include some specialized in-kind costs of agency staff. However, the CWA will only reimburse external costs.

Eligible studies and investigations under the LISA grant program include early project development activities such as feasibility studies and subsequent project development up to and including preparation of environmental impact documents for the full-scale project. Detailed design, construction, and operation activities are not eligible for LISA funding.

 

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