Local Water Rights War Rages On As Agencies Deny Tribe's Claim

Two Coachella Valley water agencies dispute the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians' claim to local water rights in newly filed legal responses to the tribe's lawsuit against them.

The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Riverside in May, asks the federal court to declare the tribe's rights to valley groundwater and prevent the Desert Water Agency and Coachella Valley Water District from overdrawing and "degrading" the local water supply.

The suit seeks a legal ruling on the tribe's "prior and paramount reserved right to sufficient water underlying the Coachella Valley."

In responses filed Monday, both agencies denied the tribe's "aboriginal rights to the surface water and groundwater resources" in the valley. The agencies asked the tribe to drop the suit last month.

Both agencies argue in their legal responses that the tribe doesn't have a reserved right to groundwater, water quality or water imported from the Colorado River, which is used to replenish local groundwater. The Coachella Valley Water District's response says it was formed almost 100 years ago "to protect the water resources of the region," and the Desert Water Agency contends that both agencies have the right to the groundwater under state law.

Agua Caliente Chairman Jeff L. Grubbe responded that "what was true when we filed the lawsuit remains true today."

"We are asking the federal court to declare our senior water rights so we can be proactive in partnership with Coachella Valley residents and prevent the Desert Water Agency and the Coachella Valley Water District from continuing to overdraft the aquifer and degrade the quality of existing groundwater," he said in a prepared statement.

"What is most astonishing is the water agencies continue to deny there is any issue with the water," he said. "Independent investigations and their own documents attest to the fact that the local water is being depleted and polluted."

Since 1973, the agencies have used Colorado River water exchanged for State Water Project water to replenish groundwater in the Whitewater River sub- basin of the Upper Coachella Valley Groundwater. And since 2002, they have used river water exchanged for water project water to replenish groundwater in the Mission Creek sub-basin of the Upper Coachella Valley Groundwater Basin. Both agencies said their water meets federal and state quality requirements.

The suit seeks to stop the two water agencies from "injuring the tribe and its members by overdrafting the Upper Whitewater and Garnet Hill sub-basins of the Coachella Valley Groundwater Basin aquifer and degrading the groundwater quality."

"Since at least the 1990s, the Agua Caliente and others have aggressively urged the CVWD and DWA to take action to end the mismanagement, overdrafting and polluting of the aquifer underlying the Coachella Valley," Grubbe alleged in an earlier statement. "The tribe has patiently attempted to work with CVWD and DWA to address these longstanding concerns, but to no avail."

The water agencies said in a joint statement last month that they worked with the tribe in the past on some of the issues raised in the lawsuit, and asked the tribe to work with them through the Integrated Regional Water Management Plan, a group of agencies and organizations that manages water in the region.

No hearings have been scheduled in the case, according to court records.

—City News Service.