Ordinarily, a Beverly Hills billionaire, a Sacramento attorney, and an Oakdale farmer wouldn’t have much in common, but politics, water, and money are the ties that bind Stewart Resnick, Tim O’Laughlin, and John Brichetto to Congressman Jeff Denham. Brichetto is the only one of the three who lives in Denham’s district (CA-10), but as one of the largest independent landowners within the Oakdale Irrigation District (OID), Brichetto provides the loudest […]
Oakdale Irrigation District water sales
Valley Water, Valley Politics: A Fact Pattern
An acre foot of water is the amount of water that it takes to occupy an acre of land at one foot deep. It’s generally assumed that a family of four in a water-rich region will use about one acre foot of water per year; two families can use the same amount if conserving water carefully. Just the facts: Because it provides water to district farmers at well below the […]
Oakdale Water Sale Illegal, says Attorney
“It will probably be some shady deal again.” Oakdale Irrigation District (OID) water attorney Tim O’Laughlin is fond of reminding people he’s one of the best water attorneys in the west. During a recent OID Board meeting, he told Director Linda Santos that he’s also an expert on the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). It was a bold statement from a man who just last year not only lost OID’s […]
More Court Time for the Water District?
Tuesday morning, by a 3-2 vote, the Oakdale Irrigation District Board of Directors (OID) approved a proposal to sell $10 million of surplus water outside the district. As usual, the two directors against the proposal were Gail Altieri and Linda Santos, who have the singular distinction of having been sued by their own board, not long after both were elected by overwhelming margins in 2015. Tuesday’s meeting featured the usual […]
Judge Calls Water District’s Bluff: “It is not even close.”
At one point during the conflict between the Oakdale Irrigation District (OID) and the Oakdale Groundwater Alliance (OGA), Judge Roger Beauchesne scolded OID attorneys for their use of ad hominem tactics, reminding them that personal attacks are usually attempts to hide weak arguments. But it turns out personal attacks were all OID attorneys could offer when the district’s fallowing program was challenged under the authority of the California Environmental Quality […]
Stench Rises over OID Recall
Over the last few years, the Oakdale Irrigation District (OID) has conducted a secret water sale, failed to re-district according to state law, sold water by abandoning its water rights, annexed out-of-the-region buyers into the district at bargain rates while rejecting offers from local farmers to pay more for OID water, lost a water sale because it failed to observe requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act, barred newly elected […]
More Legal Woes for the Irrigation District
For more than ten years, the Oakdale Irrigation District (OID) has relied on water sales to balance its books. Over the decade prior to 2014, OID water sales brought in well over thirty million dollars. The bonanza enabled the district to sell water to its customers for well under the cost of delivery. When OID annexed Trinitas Partners into the district in 2013, the terms of the contract were ballyhooed […]
Irrigation District Monetizes Public Water
By a 3 to 2 margin, the Oakdale Irrigation District (OID) Board of Directors voted in the third week of March to sell surplus public water outside the boundaries of the district. At the time, nearby urban residents were still under a state order to reduce water use by 36 percent below 2013 usage. Ironically, OID can sell water to outsiders while local residents are still subject to draconian rationing. Supposedly, […]
Valley Water: 2015
The biggest local water story in 2015 was the ongoing attempt by the Oakdale Irrigation District (OID) to sell water outside the region. The saga began almost exactly a year ago when Oakdale farmer Louis Brichetto quashed an OID water sale by pointing out the district had failed to follow proper protocols for the California Environmental Quality Act prior to the sale. From that point forward, OID found itself embroiled […]
CEQA Gauntlet Tossed at OID Board Meeting
Tuesday’s meeting of the Oakdale Irrigation District’s Board of Directors was only predictable until attorney Howard Wilkins strode to the public speaker’s podium. Prior to that, the presence of new directors Gail Altieri and Linda Santos had already resulted in several 3 to 2 votes on issues ranging from staff salary increases to appropriate recognition for outgoing board members Al Bairos and Frank Clark. No one was surprised at the […]