During the last Truckee-Carson Irrigation District Board of Directors meeting, board members deliberated making a recommendation to the Bureau of Reclamation regarding the filing of a Record of Decision by the Bureau on the Truckee Canal XM EIS.
The proposed action identified in the EIS requires the district to line 12.77 miles of the Truckee Canal near Fernley, 5.99 miles would address embankment risk and 6.69 miles addresses hydrologic risk. TCID has been mandated to line the canal to protect the Fernley community after a $18 million settlement of a lawsuit brought by homeowners when a section of the Truckee Canal collapsed during a flood event in 2008, damaging 580 homes in Fernley.
In addition to lining portions of the canal, TCID will have to replace check structures and the Hazen Gage, replace radial gates in the Bango Check structure, automate those gates, and armor three natural flow locations to protect the Canal from storm events. These maintenance steps will also allow TCID to better provide for the long-term operation of the canal serving the water rights holders in the Newlands Project.
During the EIS process, interested stakeholders had the chance to comment and weigh in on the project.
Ironically the Bureau project that is designed to protect the Fernley community from potential floods, has been opposed by the City of Fernley. Fernley representatives say lining the canal will damage the aquifer that provides domestic water supplies. While the City of Fernley generally supports lining the sides of the canal, they are opposed to lining the bottom of canal which would prevent the recharge of the aquifer that provides the water supply for domestic wells throughout the Fernley community.
Rusty Jardine, general manager of the district said the district has been put in a strange position by the Bureau which is waiting for direction from TCID before signing the ROD. “The task put us in the position that determinative of whether or not the Record of Decision is issued is essentially up to us and that is not the way that ought to be cast. My request is we inform the regional director that we have done everything we could do to assist Fernley in the presentation of their concerns and now we believe the regional director should exercise his discretion and issue the Record of Decision.”
Board chairman, Eric Olsen asked, “verbally, we are just going to tell him ‘the ball is in your court?’”
Jardine asked the board for a motion to provide written direction on behalf of TCID to the regional director.
Martinez agreed the letter is needed. “What that does is give TCID’s recommendation to move forward on this and becomes part of the administrative record demonstrating you assisted Fernley with the additional meeting with one of the undersecretaries and you want to move forward with it because of the risk and the needs of the water users in the project which you represent.”
Olsen opposed writing the letter saying “If we do nothing what’s going to happen, it’s just going to sit on the director’s desk, he’s not going to sign it? It has us in a position we really shouldn’t be, everyone knows we want that canal safe, we need the canal, and now when they have the thorny little issue come up they want us to help them through it, and we aren’t going to turn our back on constituents of our irrigation district.”
Lester deBraga said “my question, Rusty says Fernley is not looking for anything from us, what’s Davy’s concern? He wanted me to bring up Fernley’s concerns.”
The Fernley representative to the TCID Board, Davy Stix, was absent from the meeting.
“We’re fixing this so Fernley doesn’t get flooded,” said Vice-President Bob Oakden. “Like Rusty said, we’ve done everything we can help Fernley with.”
In addition to the opposition by the City of Fernley, the Pyramid Lake Tribe also has also voiced concerns. “Not everyone supports continuing diversions through the Truckee Canal,” said Martinez. “We are looking at this from a 50-year standpoint not just a few years.”
According to Jardine, “All of this is twofold, we want to make the canal safe, but we also have to maintain the ability to satisfy the demand by our water right holders for the water to which they have a right and this alternative best fulfills those mission goals,” said Jardine.
The Board agreed to approve the XM EIS and will send a letter to the bureau to that effect.
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