COACHELLA -- Coachella Valley Water District officials have informed state and federal lawmakers that the district is being forced into filing a lawsuit to protect the water rights of Coachella Valley. The suit was filed today, said Tom Levy, CVWD’s general manager, chief engineer.

The action became necessary following refusal today by Imperial Irrigation District negotiators to sign an agreement reached two weeks ago that would extend today’s deadline for filing a lawsuit over a proposed Colorado River transfer from IID to the San Diego County Water Authority. The failure to extend followed IID’s negotiators distribution last Friday night of a radically revised agreement which proposed to change a number of key terms which its negotiators had agreed to in Keystone, Colorado negotiations on Sept. 17.

With negotiations underway today in Los Angeles and with more scheduled, Levy said he questioned how IID’s team could negotiate in good faith when they have forced CVWD to file litigation on the transfer and are seeking changes to that which they have previously agreed.

According to Levy, who is in negotiations between the agencies at MWD today, the lawsuit may negatively affect the IID/San Diego water transfer and quantification negotiations that have been underway for more than a year. "CVWD and MWD both requested extension of the tolling agreement but, by its inaction, IID denied it," Levy said. "But despite litigation, we’re committed to continue to work for positive solutions."

"We had a major breakthrough in Keystone, Colorado meetings during mid-September and worked productively with IID and MWD to iron out major differences," he added. "It’s unfortunate now that IID is responsible for impacting the negotiations at this critical time."

In a Sept. 27 letter to IID, David Hayes, Deputy Secretary of the Department of the interior warned of inaction by saying "we will begin preparing to take action if the parties cannot reach a consensual resolution . . . there are no risk-free paths for Colorado River entitlement holders . . . failure to reach agreement will introduce all of the parties to risks that are orders of magnitude higher than the risks that the parties are now seeking to address."

Levy said that absent protection as provided by tolling agreements or similar documents, CVWD had no choice but to file litigation. "We did not wish to take this action. It will make negotiating an agreement far more difficult because of our raising the issues of IID’s waste of water and the violations by the IID/SDCWA transfer of CVWD’s federal contract rights," Levy said. "The litigation will make more difficult the ability of the parties to reach agreement within the time frame established by Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, Governor Davis and the Legislature," he added.

To remain within the statute of limitations demands, CVWD on September 22 filed a protest with the State Water Resources Control Board concerning the proposed transfer of Colorado River water from IID to San Diego County Water Authority.

Defendants in the suit filed today are Imperial Irrigation District, the United States of America, San Diego County Water Authority and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.

CVWD’s complaint seeks (1) declaratory and injunctive relief to stop waste and unreasonable use of water; (2) a judgement that IID has no right to transfer the water under federal reclamation contracts; (3) injunctive relief to prohibit transfer of water; (4) declaratory relief regarding water rights under federal reclamation contracts; (5) determination of invalidity of the IID-San Diego contract; and (6) a ruling that, in any event, IID and San Diego cannot go forward because they have not complied with the California environmental laws.