Posted on 06/11/2024 6:20:28 AM PDT by Red Badger
Idaho farmers are in danger of having their water shut off. The water shutoff order affects half a million acres of farmland and about 6,400 people who use the water. Without water, their farmland is worthless.
The state of Idaho has put a water curtailment order, which is basically a water shutoff order on literally a half million acres of farmland. Many farming this land have already invested in thousands of acres, thousands of dollars per acre, to grow potatoes. It’s too late for them to survive without water.
Why is the water being cut off?
Essentially, this curtailment represents a battle of wills between the Idaho Department of Water Resources and the groundwater districts in eastern Idaho.
Idaho’s waterways are owned by the State as a public trust resource. A water right is the right to divert the state’s public waters and put them to beneficial use. A water right is a “usufructuary right,” meaning a right to use, as opposed to a right to possess.
There isn’t enough water to go around, so senior water users say they want the junior water users (farmers) cut off because they haven’t stuck with the plan. Junior water users are in desperate straits, but senior water users have primary legal rights.
The problem arose because of a difference in how water usage is configured.
If the officials don’t come up with a solution almost immediately, the crops will die.
Farmer Connie Christenson told Local News 8 that unless there is an emergency end to the curtailment order, the water cut-off won’t just mean the end to their potato crop but potentially six generations of farming.
“We wouldn’t be able to take that kind of a hit and continue,” said Christensen. “I mean, maybe you can get a bank to carry you, but it would be crazy for the banks to carry us when we don’t know if we’re ever going to be able to irrigate again.”
The Governor’s office believes there will be an agreement.
Farmer Trevor Belknap explains at the beginning of the video. “I operate a family farm, a fifth-generation family farm in the Snake River Valley of eastern Idaho. I just wanted to visit with you for a minute about the impacts of the water curtailment order that’s been issued by Director Weaver from the Outer Department of Water Resources.
“The situation in which we find ourselves is about as bad as it gets. Not only will we be out of business, but many other businesses will be highly impacted, and you, as my friends and neighbors, will also be impacted because we’re so interconnected.
“If the agriculture economy in eastern Idaho fails, which it surely will if this containment order is in place, it can remain in place; we’ll dry up and blow away just like it did back in the dust bowl of the 30s.
“Banks will fail. Equipment dealers, car dealers, gas stations, and grocery stores all rely on the ag economy that’s here in eastern Idaho.
“The children in our schools, how many of them belong to families who work in some form of ag industry in eastern Idaho? It’s horrible. And we need to fix it. “And I would propose to you that it is not a water problem; it’s a management problem because we have water. Reservoirs are full. The mountains are covered in snow. The river’s been flowing well. So why now?
“Why, after we’ve planted our crops, we have crops in the ground that are already growing? Now, in the middle of June, they pull a curtailment order to say you must cease pumping water.
“The cost is huge. An acre of potatoes costs upward of $4,000 an acre to grow. “How will that ever be recovered? They will not grow without water. And what will that do to everyone else that’s reliant upon us in this area and the state of Idaho? “What will the counties do for roads and bridges, police departments, ambulances, hospitals that rely on tax the tax base. Property like this will become worthless. Without water, the land doesn’t have any value here.”
Watch:
VIDEOS AT LINK.............
Today it’s Idaho. Tomorrow it may be Iowa.................
Yeah, here it comes - $10 a pound potatoes. Then, you will be on your own to grow your own.
I think their plan, the democrats that is, is to starve us, the US
It rains in Iowa.
I smell obama.
Very good point. I live in Iowa. Most farmers have their own wells and I do not believe they have to purchase water rights because of the abundance of water.. That said, does anyone know if the State controls the aquifers? Can they stop water usage in Iowa?
The Governor needs to do a bunch of firings
“I smell obama.”
You bet! One of the first things he did when he became president was to shut off the water to the farmers in California.
The WEF, who is behind our globalists in the US Government, is calling for a ban on all home gardening of food because it is not regulated by the government.
They cut off all ways to get out of the maze.
Idaho politicians must be either very stupid or very venal to have let this happen.
Then it's a prison.................
Then it’s a wetland and needs protection from humans...................
For those in other states, the price of potatoes will go up and add to inflation.
Ah swell, a Great Potato Famine right here in the USA!
Revelations 6:5-7
5: And when the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!” Then I looked and saw a black horse, and its rider held in his hand a pair of scales.
6: Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, “Two pounds of wheat for a day’s wages, and six pounds of barley for a day’s wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!”
8: I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth
They can’t cut off all the ways. *cough*.
Under oblamma he also tried to call basically mud puddles “navigable waters” or some such title and tried to make them off limits tO farmers who tried to drain certain areas for farmland. Trump did away with th3 asinine rule
“”so senior water users say they want the junior water users (farmers)””
And SENIOR water users are WHO/WHAT?
The ski resorts and golf courses will still get all they want.
nb. This is why I declined an invitation to move to Idaho when I retired. They fight blood feuds over water, and the rich Californians always win. I chose Ohio, where water is a nuisance that farmers pay good money to get rid of so the crops won’t drown.
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