STATE, FEDS REACH WATER DEAL PLAN MERGES AQUEDUCTS, PUMPING SYSTEMS.

Byline: Staff and Wire Services

More water would flow to Southern California under a plan that would alter the way Northern California water flows south through a vast system of state and federal pumps, aqueducts and reservoirs, officials said Friday.

The draft proposal, hammered out last month over days of closed-door meetings in Napa, frees up additional water for the south by merging the operations of the State Water Project and the federal Central Valley Project. A public hearing and environmental review are planned before the proposal becomes final.

The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, the biggest State Water Project contractor, stands to gain an additional 250,000 acre-feet of water from the system each year, said Tim Quinn, an MWD vice president who attended the meetings. That's enough water for half a million households.

Southern California's water wholesaler would be able to purchase more through the water market by paying farmers to conserve and be able to capture more Northern California water during wet years and store that supply in its reservoirs. That extra storage could bring in an extra 100,000 acre-feet during wet years, Quinn said.

``This is water that is taken when there is truly minimal impact to the fisheries,'' he said.

The proposal, which is now being discussed with environmental groups and fisheries regulators, would secure a significant supply for the MWD and its 18 million customers in Southern California, Quinn said.

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has relied on the MWD for more than half of its water supply because of several dry years in the Owens Valley, where Los Angeles gets most of its water.

``The supply issue is one we want to look well into the future and make sure we have the right resources and are preserving as much as we can,'' said Randy Howard, DWP director of corporate communications.

Environmentalists said the MWD was looking to the north as a relief valve to make up its losses from the Colorado River. The agency lost some of its river supply when the Interior Department cut the amount of water the state can draw from the Colorado this year by 15 percent.

``MWD is looking at a big hole in that aqueduct they have kept full,'' said Tom Graff, a lawyer with Environmental Defense. ``Realistically, in the long or short run, the only way they could make up that shortfall is to look north.''

Long-standing political differences between the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and state Department of Water Resources prevented the two agencies from operating their systems more efficiently. The state has bigger pumps, but lacks storage; the federal government has plenty of storage, but fewer pumps.

Under the proposal, the federal government would store state project water in its reservoirs. The state would ship some federal water south through its pumps, said Jeff McCracken, a Bureau of Reclamation spokesman.

Environmentalists and others were upset that they were kept out of the talks, which involved only officials with the Bureau of Reclamation, Department of Water Resources, the MWD and other big water agencies.

Participants were quick to say, however, that the meetings were not secret.

``The notion that there's back-room, cigar-filled-room stuff going on here is pretty preposterous,'' Quinn said.

The Bureau of Reclamation met Friday with representatives of the Hoopa Valley Tribe, which was concerned that its rights to the Trinity River in Northern California would be put in jeopardy by the Napa proposal. Bureau officials assured them their rights would be protected, said Michael Orcutt, director of the Hoopa Fisheries Department.

The plan hinges on the Army Corps of Engineers approving a permit to send 27 percent more water through the state's Harvey O. Banks Pumping Plant near Stockton. In addition, an agreement must be approved to commit some Northern California water agencies to reducing their supplies to help the Sacramento Delta.