The Bulletin recently published a misleading story titled “East Bend farmers eagerly await more water as piping project ramps up”.  Real benefits will come from Arnold Irrigation District piping its main canal, but meaningfully increasing the amount of water available to AID patrons is not one of them.

Irrigators have water rights that specify how much water they can legally use on specific acreage.  In times of water shortages they may get less than their full water allotment, but in times of plenty they cannot use more.  Further, 98% of the water conserved from piping will be kept in the river, it will not be delivered to AID patrons.

All piping projects must be approved by the US Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service who issues an Environmental Assessment.  EAs for projects in Oregon can be found at www.watershedplans.org.  AID’s EA states that 11,083 acre-feet (32.5 cfs) of water will be conserved by piping AID’s 11.9 mile main canal.  10,862 AF of this, 98% of it, will be kept in the Upper Deschutes River and passed on to North Unit Irrigation District during irrigation season.  As stated in the EA, benefits to agriculture will primarily be experienced by NUID irrigators who suffer from being the most junior water right holders.  It is also important to remember that conserved water is only kept instream in the Upper Deschutes, providing no benefit to the Middle or Lower Deschutes. 

The primary benefits to AID irrigators will be the availability of pressurized water if they choose to pipe their lateral canals and upgrade their on-farm delivery systems.  This could eliminate the need to maintain irrigation ponds and pumps.  It may also allow them to better manage the timing of their water usage.  Nevertheless, the amount of available water is determined by their water right, seniority, and drought conditions.  AID may experience some operational cost savings which could potentially be passed on to district patrons.

The Bulletin article also failed to provide important context.  Per the EA, AID is a small district of 646 patrons immediately south of Bend.  It covers 4,384 acres but only 1,475 acres have water rights.  This means that on average an irrigator has water for only 2.3 acres.  There is variability in acreage, some rights are smaller and some larger, but the EA also indicates that there is relatively little economically viable agriculture.

28% of AID irrigators use their water for lawns and gardens, 36% have grass (pasture), and 36% grow alfalfa or hay.  There is no indication of how many of these farms are cash flow positive, but if AID mirrors USDA statistics for the rest of Deschutes County, it is under 11%.

Without a doubt, water right holders can use their water in accordance with existing water law.  It is legal to use water to have a big lawn, to have a pasture for your horse, as well as to grow crops.  But the $34,899,000 cost of this long overdue infrastructure upgrade is being overwhelmingly borne by taxpayers.

To be fair, AID’s piping project is small compared to the many other projects in Central Oregon, but it is representative of the over $2B of investment that will be required to pipe all the main canals.  We are facing a national debt crisis.  Equally divided, every taxpayer is on the hook for over $265,000 in debt repayment, a number that is constantly rising.  As recently reported in the Wall Street Journal, the interest payment alone on our debt is now larger than our defense budget.

Central Oregon irrigators have a moral and legal obligation to modernize their archaic water delivery systems and help restore the ecological function of at least part of the Deschutes River.  Canal piping is a required part of the solution.  There are choices that have been made regarding how to pay for that, however, choices that shift the cost to the rest of us.  Other paths can be taken, ones that protect real agriculture and allow hobbies to continue, but only if we demand fundamental change.