Idaho Farmers Being Denied Water Access?

The single largest curtailment of water in Idaho’s history is being debated right now and it could have devastating ramifications for the state.

Half a million acres of farmland could be affected by the water curtailment.

“A water shutoff order on literally a half million acres of farmland. — A lot of these farmers, and this impacts about 6,400 water users,” says Idaho farmer, Trevor Belknap.

“Property like this [farmland] will become worthless. Without water, the land doesn’t have any value here,” he says.

This order is seen as intensely unjust seeing as so many farmers have already invested in crops that are in the ground.

Belknap operates a fifth generation family farm in the Snake River Valley of Eastern Idaho.‌ He says his family farm, along with many others, will go out of business if the curtailment goes through.

According to Belknap, if the ag economy in eastern Idaho fails, which it surely will if this containment order is in place, it can remain in place, we’ll dry up and blow away just like it did back in the dust bowl of the 30s.

“Banks will fail. Equipment dealers, car dealers, gas stations, grocery stores, all rely on the ag economy that’s here in eastern Idaho. The children in our schools, how many of them belong to families who work in some form of ag industry in eastern Idaho?”

“So why now?” says Belknap.

“Why after we’ve planted our crops … they pull a curtailment order to say, you must cease pumping water. The cost is huge. An acre of potatoes costs upward of $4,000 an acre to grow. How will that ever be recovered?”

“What will the counties do for roads and bridges, police departments, ambulances, hospitals that rely on tax the tax base. Property like this will become worthless.”

“Without water, the land doesn’t have any value here.”

Brian Murdock, another farmer from Eastern Idaho, went on The Bottom Line to warn about the devastating impact this government order could have on Americans.

…”the Idaho Department of Water Resources has issued this curtailment of 500,000 acres. And to help put that in perspective, that’s basically 781 square miles of farm ground that is being taken out of production,” Murdock stated.

Murdock added:

“And, of course, the worst problem is this is happening during a very plentiful water year. We have the reservoirs [that] are completely full, and when I mean full, they’re dang near breaking. The rivers are running as high as they possibly can. Just trying to keep those dams from breaking.”

The order is the single largest curtailment of water in Idaho’s history, according to the Idaho Groundwater Appropriators.

The group warned that there could be hundreds of millions of dollars in economic losses whilst simultaneously negatively impacting hundreds of acres of farmland.

As for Murdock, he is facing $3 million dollars in losses and is one of the smaller farmers who grows and sells potatoes to fast food chain restaurants.

At present, there is a curtailment order in place for junior groundwater users across Idaho, and this is, in part, why those in Eastern Idaho are fighting for a deal that would allow farmers to make it through this growing season.

At a public meeting held last week, Skyler Johns, the water district attorney, discussed that there is a one-year offer on the table that would help prevent a curtailment in resources and would lean upon a mitigation agreement from 2015.

Johns says:

“The director (of the Idaho Department of Water Resources) issued an order requiring additional pumping reduction obligations. He moved it from 240,000 to 252,000-acre-feet. The Surface Water Coalition was willing to move it back to 240,000.”

Despite a coalition coming together to back amending or replacing the 2015 agreement, water districts can void it through litigation if they don’t agree.

Considerable concerns remain amongst the state’s farmers, however, especially after state water officials have come onto farmer’s properties to place red tags on their water pumps, informing them that “This diversion has been curtailed until further notice.”

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