East Columbia Irrigation District offers wfarm water update in Moses Lake

MOSES LAKE -- The East Columbia Basin Irrigation District is holding a public meeting today to update landowners about the project to bring Columbia River water is available to Columbia Basin farmers who pump from rapidly declining groundwater wells in the Odessa subarea.

In March, the state Department of Ecology provided the Bureau of Reclamation with a secondary use permit so the bureau can deliver 164,000 acre-feet of Columbia River water to 70,000 acres of Odessa Subarea farmland through the East Low Canal.

Another 10,000 acres will receive water, thanks to a contract the bureau and irrigation district president signed to deliver 30,000 acre-feet of water from Lake Roosevelt using the East Low Canal and the Weber Siphon.

To be eligible, the land must be within current boundaries of the Columbia Basin project, within the Reclamation service area and have been irrigated under state groundwater permits.

The meeting will be from 6 to 8 p.m. at Big Bend Community College in Moses Lake, at the ATEC Building, Masto Conference Center, Room 1870.

For more information contact Levi Johnson at ljohnson@ecbid.org or 509-488-9671 ext. 106.

This story was originally published June 26, 2014 at 10:09 PM with the headline "East Columbia Irrigation District offers wfarm water update in Moses Lake ."