The Skagit Valley Farm, a collection of farms operating across more than 3,000 acres in Skagit County, has agreed to pay $138,500 toward salmon restoration efforts in the region after illicit water use during last year’s drought.
In April, the farm received an “unprecedented” $267,000 penalty for violating water rights in 2021, when the farm irrigated 348 acres of vegetable crops without proper permits.
“Big water rights violations [like this] aren’t typical,” Jimmy Norris, Washington State Department of Ecology’s communications manager for the water resources program, told Cascadia Daily News in April. “Typically, what happens is when the program notices that there is unpermitted water use, they receive a technical assistance letter that tells them: what’s the violation, why they’re in violation, where it is. Most of the time, they work with us to come into compliance.”
Since the fine was announced, the farm has worked with the Department of Ecology to be compliant with water rights law, and has taken steps to “obtain new water rights, changed its existing water rights and halted non-permitted water use,” according to a news release announcing the settlement.
Last summer, one of the driest on record in Skagit County, investigators from the Department of Ecology visited the farm, where they identified more than 300 acres of potatoes, brassica and Brussels sprouts actively being irrigated or with damp soils, despite the lack of water rights attached to the parcels.
Water rights, the legal process through which access to water is guaranteed in the state, can be complicated and has been historically controversial. In Skagit, water rights are especially fraught, particularly in dry summer months.
“A water right is attached to a particular water source, and in this case, they did not have a water right,” Norris said in April.
The settlement is just over half of the original fine and will go toward salmon recovery efforts by the Skagit Fisheries Enhancement Group, tribes, local governments and conservation groups, according to the news release.
