Growers “dug about 2,500 wells in the San Joaquin Valley last year alone, the highest number on record,” says the Sacramento Bee, describing “a kind of groundwater arms race” to offset the greatly curtailed amounts of irrigation water from state and federal water projects. As the agricultural wells go deeper, an estimated 30 percent of communities in Tulare County “have had problems with failing wells.”
The 2,500 wells drilled in the valley during 2015 are five times the annual average for the previous 30 years, says a Bee analysis of state and local data. Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law two years ago to limit groundwater pumping beginning in 2020. In the meantime, farmers say the only practical way to survive the drought is to drill wells.
“It’s a business. I make no apologies for trying to stay in business and being successful,” wine grape grower Wayne Western Jr. told the Bee. Western has relied on well water almost exclusively for three years.
Attempts to limit drilling or groundwater pumping meet icy resistance. Ralph Gutierrez, manager of the utility district in Woodville, Tulare County, told the Bee that at the same time he was citing residents for watering their lawns, he counted 60 new agricultural wells. Farmers need water, he said, and the towns housing their employees need water too. “So, you know, I don’t know what the answer is, but we’ve got to find a happy medium somewhere, because we can’t exist without the other.”