Weeks after North County residents voted to secede from the San Diego County Water Authority by a margin of 19 to 1 early last month, county water officials directed their lawyers to resolve a lawsuit challenging the divorce.
Now the two departing agencies — the Fallbrook Public Utilities District and the Rainbow Municipal Water District — have agreed to pay $25 million combined to the regional agency to end all litigation related to the long-running dispute.
“While the majority of SDCWA’s remaining 22-district membership remains opposed to detachment, they agree that this settlement makes the best of a bad situation,” said Mel Katz, the San Diego County Water Authority board chair.
“While we continue to believe the detachment award should have been higher, RMWD and FPUD are required to pay all costs, above the amount ordered by the Local Agency Formation Commission in addition to its entire exit fee up front,” he said.
Katz said the settlement means “there will be no immediate rate impacts for ratepayers.”
The vote early last month marked the culmination of a years-long effort by farmers and other residents of the Fallbrook and Rainbow communities to break away from the county water wholesaler.
They plan to join the Eastern Municipal Water District based in Riverside County, which they believe will provide water at a lower cost than the San Diego County authority charges.
Voters in each district approved the detachment measure by about 95 percent.
The Local Agency Formation Commission, the body of elected officials from across the region that manages jurisdictions of municipalities across San Diego County, voted in a split decision in July to allow the North County water districts to withdraw from the regional water agency.
County water officials filed a lawsuit challenging the vote later in the summer. They also tried to overturn the decision through state legislation saying the divorce would have to be put to voters across the region rather than limited to Fallbrook and Rainbow area residents.
The legislation, which was carried by Assemblymember Tasha Boerner, D-Encinitas, passed the state Legislature and was signed into law. It requires future detachments to be approved by all voters within broader water authority boundaries.
But because the legislation was not passed on an urgency basis, as first proposed, it goes into effect Jan. 1 — too late to affect the Rainbow and Fallbrook departures.
In announcing its lawsuit against the two North County water districts, the Eastern Municipal Water District and the Local Agency Formation Commission, the county water said it should be paid $140 million to cover costs of previously approved infrastructure projects.
The $25 million settlement reflects only a fraction of those expenses.
The San Diego County Water Authority was established in 1944 to provide a reliable water supply to the growing region. It now supplies wholesale water to more than 3 million residents of the remaining 22 cities, special districts and the military.
