Growing to Meet Our Needs

Decades after most existing portions of the State Water Project were built, the East Branch Extension, a 13-mile pipeline project to serve the Yucaipa Valley and the San Gorgonio Pass area in San Bernardino and Riverside counties, is now poised for construction.

The $77 million Phase I of this project will help meet the region's water needs for the next 40 years, reduce groundwater overdraft, and provide more flexibility for local water systems.

Completion of Phase I is scheduled for the year 2001, and will provide an annual supply of up to 8,650 acre-feet to the San Gorgonio Pass Water Agency. (Phase 2, which is now in early conceptual stages and won't be built until demand increases, will provide an additional 8,650 acre-feet annually.)

Cooperative Effort
DWR is teaming with two regional water agencies serving the area---San Gorgonio Pass Water Agency (SGPWA) and San Bernardino Valley Municipal Water District (SBVMWD)---to build the pipeline through Yucaipa, Calimesa and Cherry Valley. The area served is east of the cities of San Bernardino and Riverside and south of San Bernardino National Forest. The project includes three pumping plants and a reservoir in Crafton Hills.

The San Bernardino District and the Pass Agency will repay project costs in the form of principal and interest on State Water Project revenue bonds that DWR sells for the project. About 45 percent of costs are allocated to the district and 55 percent to the agency.

In 1960 California's voters approved financing of the State Water Project. Shortly after that November 1960 vote, the San Gorgonio Pass Water Agency was formed. In 1962, it entered into a contract with the State to deliver supplemental water. In shouldering that obligation, area residents have paid more than $40 million in taxes during the past four decades for the State Water Project . They will begin to see a fluid return on that longterm investment early next century when the project is scheduled to begin water deliveries.

Groundwater Benefit
A major benefit of the East Branch Extension, according to Steve Stockton, SGPWA general manager, is that SWP water will supplement groundwater supplies in the groundwater system. Water levels in the Beaumont Storage Basin have been dropping at about a foot a year since the 1920s.

Up to the late 1980s, the area's water supply was adequate. In 1987, the area's main groundwater basin went into overdraft. It has a current overdraft of about 25 percent more than the basin's safe yield. The East Branch Extension will correct this problem.

The project has been in an active planning status through most of the 1990s.

By 1998, major legal, financial and environmental hurdles were cleared, setting the stage for construction.

"This project has taken decades to near reality," says Jeff Patterson, Deputy Chief of DWR's Division of Engineering. "Once the construction bids are approved, we should be on a timely path to completion." A major contract was advertised in November 1998, with construction expected to begin in the spring of 1999.

Favorable Bond Rate
In November, 1998, DWR reported sale of $50 million in bonds to provide initial financing for project construction at a very advantageous interest rate---4.938 per cent.

"This is the lowest rate for State Water Project revenue bonds in over 30 years," said Chet Winn, DWR's Chief of Fiscal Services. "We wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to 'lock in' that low rate and fund most of the project's construction cost very economically."

The balance of the project costs will be financed, as needed, through sales of short-term commercial paper notes and SWP revenue bonds, said Winn.

With construction slated to finish in 2001, many vital preparatory steps were achieved for the project during the mid- and late-1990s.

To comply with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) on the project was required. In March, 1994, SGPWA prepared an EIR that addressed impacts of importing SWP water to its service area. Pursuant to a lawsuit, that EIR was amended in 1996 to specify that the project would be operated in a manner giving highest priority for use of imported water to correcting any annual average overdraft in the SGPWA service area.

In 1995, SGPWA asked DWR to consider implementing the preferred alternative described in the 1994 EIR as an extension of the East Branch of the California Aqueduct. After study, DWR agreed, adopted the SGPWA EIR and started preliminary engineering studies.

Design Improvements
In the course of these studies, DWR proposed several design improvements, to better meet engineering objectives and to reduce impacts to the local environment.

Revisions included adding a reservoir and modifying the project alignment. Since these changes could result in environmental impacts other than those described in the original SGPWA EIR, to comply with CEQA DWR prepared and circulated a Supplemental EIR (SEIR).

Begun in June 1997, the SEIR was completed and made final in March 1998. The redesigned project includes six major components that differ from the original design, among them two modified alignments, a reservoir, and three changed pump station layouts and locations.

As now planned, the East Branch Extension pipeline will consist of about 13 miles of buried pipe in three contract reaches, to convey water from the Crafton Hills Pump Station through Crafton Hills Reservoir and Cherry Valley Pump Station to the Noble Creek spreading grounds. The pipelines will be constructed of steel, and assembled as 36- and 54-inch diameter pipes.

Reach 1---from Mill Creek to Carter Street---will consist of about three miles of 54-inch diameter pipe. It will start near the proposed Crafton Hills Pumping Station at an elevation of 2,288 feet and rise to the Crafton Hills Reservoir at elevation 2,925. It will then drop from the reservoir outlet at elevation 2,880 feet, continuing to the Carter Street Valve Facility at elevation 2,792.

Reach 2 will stretch from Carter Street to Garden Air Creek, consisting of about 4.5 miles of 54-inch diameter pipe.

The final reach, from Garden Air Creek to Noble Creek, is approximately 5.5 miles long, with 3.5 miles of 54-inch diameter pipe and 1.9 miles of 36-inch diameter pipe, and includes the Cherry Valley Pump Station.

Construction Teamwork
DWR is working cooperatively with two regional water agencies on the project. SBVMWD and SGPWA have agreed to assign to DWR the right to use the San Bernardino agency's water conveyance pipeline facilities that include the Foothill Pipeline, Santa Ana River Crossing Pipeline, the Morton Canyon Connector, and the Greenspot Pipeline. The capacity rights transferred will become part of the SWP while SBVMWD will continue to use those pipelines for local deliveries.
The SGPWA has capacity rights in all of these pipelines.

The East Branch Extension provides California Aqueduct turnouts to SBVMWD and SGPWA. Those agencies will be responsible for local distribution facilities, such as spreading grounds and filtration plants.

Operation and Maintenance
In August, 1996, SBVMWD and SGPWA agreed to be the primary operators of the East Branch Extension. In 1998, the San Bernardino agency asked that DWR provide staff for project start-up. Joint operation would continue until DWR's Division of Operations and Maintenance approves turning operation over to the local agencies. The San Bernardino water entity has asked that DWR provide project maintenance.

Challenge on Financing
During 1997, a taxpayer group questioned whether the bond-based financing for the project was legal in light of the Proposition 13 limits on property tax use. DWR legal staff cited a major court decision holding that the taxes levied to fund a State Water Contractor's payments on its water supply contracts with DWR came within the exceptions to Prop. 13, which was enacted into law by a vote of the people in 1978.

No lawsuit has been filed challenging the financial arrangements.

Environmental Care
An extensive environmental mitigation plan has been developed by DWR to address environmental issues. Mitigation plans relate to the fact that the pipeline crosses habitat associated with two sensitive species---one plant, Plummer's mariposa lily, and one bird, the California gnatcatcher. (However, neither has actually been documented in the affected right of way.)

DWR will also avoid impacts to oak trees and will accomplish revegetation with suitable native species adapted to the region once construction has been completed. In developing DWR's environmental plan, DWR consulted with the Crafton Hills Conservancy, addressing ecological values in the project area.

DWR's environmental plans make an effort to align mitigation areas so they adjoin existing natural areas that are being preserved, according to Chuck Keene, Environmental Specialist IV in DWR's Southern District. This technique maximizes preserved wild habitat in the region.

Project environmental documentation also notes that the introduction of water into a previously dry area following construction of Crafton Hills Reservoir "would result in a positive effect for some wildlife species".

Map of the East Branch Extension, Phase I underway.