Westlands Water Dist. v. U.S.
| Decision Date | 31 July 2003 |
| Docket Number | No. 01-16987.,01-16987. |
| Citation | 337 F.3d 1092 |
| Parties | WESTLANDS WATER DISTRICT; San Benito Water District, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. UNITED STATES of America; Department of Interior; Bureau of Reclamation, United States Department of Interior; Kirk C. Rodgers, Acting Regional Director; Gale A. Norton, Secretary of the Interior, Defendants-Appellees, San Joaquin River Exchange Contractors Water Authority; Friant Power Authority; Friant Water Users Authority; Chowchilla Water District; Madera Irrigation, Defendant-Intervenors-Appellees, v. Roger K. Patterson, Regional Director of Mid Pacific Region; Bruce Babbitt, Secretary of the Interior; Lester Snow, Acting Regional Director, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
William T. Chisum and Daniel J. O'Hanlon, Kronick, Moskovitz, Tiedemann & Girard, and Thomas W. Birmingham for plaintiffs-appellants Westlands Water District and San Benito Water District.
Todd Aagaard for defendant-appellee United States of America.
Maria A. Iizuka for defendants-appellees Bureau of Reclamation, Department of the Interior, and Secretary of the Interior.
Michael V. Sexton, Minasian, Spruance, Baber, Meith, Soares, & Sexton, for defendant-intervenors San Joaquin River Exchange Contractors Water Authority and Friant Power Authority.
Gregory K. Wilkinson, Best, Best, & Krieger, for defendant-intervenor Friant Water Users Authority.
Michael A. Campos, Washburn, Briscoe, & McCarthy, for defendant-intervenor, Madera Irrigation District.
Denslow Green, Green, Green & Rigby, for defendant-intervenor, Chowchilla Water District.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California; Oliver W. Wanger, District Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. CV-94-05217-OWW(LON).
Before B. FLETCHER, RAWLINSON, and CLIFTON, Circuit Judges.
This action arises out of water allocations during water year 1994 in the San Luis Unit of the Central Valley Project, a federal water management project. Plaintiffs-appellants Westlands Water District ("Westlands") and San Benito County Water District ("San Benito") appeal the district court's order granting summary judgment in favor of defendants and defendant-intervenors concerning the United States Department of the Interior Bureau of Reclamation's allocation of Central Valley Project water during periods of shortage. Plaintiffs-appellants allege that granting priority to a group of contractors intervenor-defendants San Joaquin River Exchange Contractors ("Exchange Contractors"), violated contracts between the water districts and the United States. Plaintiffs-Appellants seek injunctive and declaratory relief to prohibit distribution of water in contravention of their contracts. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.
The Central Valley Project ("CVP") is "the largest federal water management project in the United States." Central Delta Water Agency v. United States, 306 F.3d 938, 943 (9th Cir.2002). "[L]ocated in the Central Valley Basin of California, which is roughly 400 miles long by 120 miles wide, [it] includes the major watersheds of the Sacramento and San Joaquin river systems."1 Id. These two river valleys merge at the Sacramento San Joaquin Delta, where the waters mix and then flow through the Carquinez Strait into the San Francisco Bay, continuing to the Pacific Ocean. Id.; United States v. Gerlach Live Stock Co., 339 U.S. 725, 728, 70 S.Ct. 955, 94 L.Ed. 1231 (1950). The Sacramento River has almost twice as much water as the San Joaquin River but the Sacramento Valley has very little tillable soil, while about "three-fifths of the [San Joaquin] valley lies in the domain of the less affluent San Joaquin." Gerlach Live Stock, 339 U.S. at 728, 70 S.Ct. 955; see also Dugan v. Rank, 372 U.S. 609, 612, 83 S.Ct. 999, 10 L.Ed.2d 15 (1963). To alter this imbalance and to make water available to the San Joaquin Valley, the state of California embarked on re-engineering its natural water distribution through the authorization of the Central Valley Project ("CVP").2 United States took over administration of this project in 1935.3 Gerlach Live Stock, 339 U.S. at 728, 70 S.Ct. 955.
The CVP's purpose is to "improv[e] navigation, regulat[e] the flow of the San Joaquin River and the Sacramento River, control[] floods, provid[e] for storage and for the delivery of the stored waters thereof, for the reclamation of arid and semiarid lands and lands of Indian reservations, and other beneficial uses, and for the generation and sale of electric energy." Act of August 26, 1937, Pub.L. No. 75 392, 50 Stat. 844, 850. To accomplish the project's purposes, CVP's construction includes a series of many dams, reservoirs, hydro-power generating stations, canals, electrical transmission lines, and other infrastructure. Gerlach Live Stock, 339 U.S. at 733, 70 S.Ct. 955.
The United States Bureau of Reclamation ("Bureau"), a division of the Department of the Interior, operates the CVP. The California State Water Resources Control Board grants permits for water appropriation from the CVP. The Bureau appropriates water from various sources and delivers it to permit holders for beneficial uses. Central Delta Water, 306 F.3d at 943.
The San Luis Unit, one of the many water management units of the CVP, was authorized by the San Luis Act of 1960. Pub.L. No. 86-488, 74 Stat. 156 (June 3, 1960). The San Luis Unit, an integral part of the CVP, consists of the San Luis Dam and the San Luis Reservoir. The San Luis Reservoir was constructed to provide water to Merced, Fresno and King Counties, and is used to store surplus water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, for delivery to contractors such as Westlands and San Benito. The Tracy Pumping Plant pumps water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta into the Delta-Mendota Canal. The Delta-Mendota Canal, located south of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, channels water along the west side of the San Joaquin Valley for use in the San Luis Unit and Reservoir. Westlands Water Dist. v. Patterson, 864 F.Supp. 1536, 1539 (E.D.Cal.1994) (Westlands III).
Around 1939, the Bureau took over construction of a dam on the San Joaquin River that eventually created Lake Millerton and the Friant Unit of the Central Valley Project.4 See Gerlach Live Stock Co., 339 U.S. at 728-29, 70 S.Ct. 955; Westlands III, 864 F.Supp. at 1539. The Friant Unit impounds the waters of the San Joaquin River at a dam constructed at Friant, California, approximately sixty miles upstream from Mendota, diverting a major portion of the flow of the San Joaquin River both to storage in Millerton Lake and into the Friant-Kern and Madera Canals for delivery to local water users. Dugan, 372 U.S. at 612-13, 83 S.Ct. 999. The CVP also diverts water from the Sacramento River into the San Joaquin Valley to make additional water available for use in the San Joaquin Valley.
To fulfill the purposes of the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1937, the Secretary of the Interior was given the right to acquire water rights for the development of the CVP. Act of August 26, 1937, Pub.L. No. 75-392, 50 Stat. 844, 850. The Exchange Contractors5 hold both pre-1914 riparian and appropriative rights to the San Joaquin River. Cal. State Water Rights Bd. Dec. D-935, 80 (1959). The district court noted that the cooperation of the Exchange Contractors made possible the expansion of the CVP and the San Luis Unit. Westlands Water Dist. v. United States, 153 F.Supp.2d 1133, 1146-47 (E.D.Cal. 2001) (Westlands VI).6 To provide a reliable source of water for its proposed canals, the Bureau had to assure that the Exchange Contractors' pre-existing rights would be satisfied. Westlands III, 864 F.Supp. at 1539.
In 1939, the Exchange Contractors entered into two contracts with the United States: a Purchase Contract and an Exchange Contract. to the San Joaquin River, so long as they receive certain volumes of substitute water.7 Id.
Pursuant to the Exchange Contract, the exchange of water is a conditional permanent substitution of water supply. The United States has a right to use the Exchange Contractors' water rights "so long as, and only so long as, the United States does deliver to the Contracting Entities by means of the Project or otherwise substitute water in conformity with this contract." The Exchange Contract defines "substitute water" as "all water delivered... regardless of source." The contract further provides that "[i]t is anticipated that most if not all of the substitute water provided the [Exchange Contractors] hereunder will be delivered to them via the [] Delta-Mendota Canal."
Water allocation in any year is designated as a full year supply of 100 percent. In critical years, the water supply can be reduced by approximately twenty-five percent. If there exists a temporary interruption of waters from the Delta-Mendota Canal, the contract provides that the United States will deliver water stored in Millerton Lake behind the Friant Dam.
San Benito and Westlands purchase CVP water from the Bureau pursuant to water service contracts.
Westlands is a California water district located within Fresno and King Counties. In 1963, Westlands entered into a contract with the Bureau for water from the San Luis Unit of the CVP, which diverts water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta via the Delta-Mendota Canal. Westlands is the largest contractor...
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