A bitter 15-year legal battle over water costs came to an end Monday, with leaders of the San Diego County Water Authority and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California signing an agreement establishing the price that will be paid for delivering supplies.
Managers and board members of the two agencies said that the dispute persisted for years because of inflexible positions, but that negotiations over the last year made possible a comprehensive agreement. They said ending the legal fight will enable greater collaboration among the agencies to improve their finances and move water where it’s needed.
MWD Board Chair Adán Ortega Jr. said the litigation had for too long complicated the relationship between his agency, which delivers water for 19 million people, and the San Diego County Water Authority, which is a member of MWD and supplies water for 3.3 million people.
“That era of conflict has finally come to an end and we can forge ahead, building a relationship based instead on cooperation and shared goals,” said Ortega, who attended the signing of the settlement in San Diego.
Nick Serrano, chair of the San Diego County Water Authority’s board, said the reasons why the dispute went on for years were complex but “a lot of it had to do with past personalities and the leadership of both agencies.”
Serrano said former Water Authority board chair Mel Katz had helped lay the groundwork for a deal. And Serrano said since he became chair in October, he has prioritized ending “the era of litigation that has plagued our two agencies for far too long.”
The dispute was largely about the price the Water Authority pays MWD for an exchange of water. The San Diego agency has secured certain supplies of Colorado River water through deals in which it buys conserved water from the Imperial Irrigation District and obtains conserved water from projects that lined the All-American and Coachella canals with concrete to prevent losses.
These supplies total up to 277,700 acre-feet a year. (An acre-foot is 325,851 gallons, enough to supply about three typical households for a year.)
The agencies said MWD obtains this water at the Colorado River and delivers it to San Diego. Starting in 2010, the Water Authority challenged the price MWD charged, and that led to years of arguments in court and legal judgments in favor of both sides.
Under the legal settlement, the Water Authority will now pay a fixed price to MWD for delivering these supplies, starting at $671 per acre-foot in 2026, with annual adjustments for inflation. This will be instead of paying MWD’s rates, which was a key point of disagreement.
The Water Authority also will now be able to sell these supplies to MWD or other member agencies in Southern California.
“It means greater fiscal certainty for our two agencies. It means new opportunities to move water to communities that need it most,” Serrano said.
He said by working together in this way, the agencies will have greater flexibility to meet future challenges together, whether related to drought, infrastructure investment or efforts to address chronic shortages along the Colorado River.
“Instead of endlessly fighting yesterday’s battles, we are finally going to work side by side to build tomorrow’s solutions,” Serrano said, adding that it will also mean stabilizing water rates for people in San Diego County.
Deven Upadhyay, MWD’s general manager, said the greater flexibility the settlement brings will benefit the entire region.
“The fact that we’re here is a testament to what is possible when people set aside the past, set aside our egos, set aside our own demands and focus instead on the greater good. That’s not an easy thing to do,” Upadhyay said.
Some of those at the signing ceremony, he said, “probably thought that this day would never come.”
He said with these disputes settled, the agreement also brings MWD “a greater level of certainty to our budgeting and planning.”
This story originally appeared on LA Times
