Council hears presentation on AB 1413 and AB 1466 as residents press for transparency on groundwater adjudication

Michael McKinney, the city’s contracted lobbyist, and Kyle Burchard, legal counsel to the Indian Wells Valley Groundwater Authority (IWVGA), briefed the Ridgecrest City Council on the status and substance of Assembly Bills 1413 and 1466 during the council’s June 18 meeting.

The presentation outlined a legislative effort to reduce conflicts between the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) and comprehensive groundwater adjudication proceedings. McKinney said the bills would “create a mechanism to remove the conflict between the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act and the Comprehensive Adjudication Act,” and described how the legislation would require challenges to a Groundwater Sustainability Plan (GSP) to proceed by a validation action under Code of Civil Procedure section 1085 rather than by a de novo review inside an adjudication.

The bills’ backers say the change would provide certainty for public agencies implementing sustainability measures and limit the ability of a court in an adjudication to set a safe yield above a validated sustainable yield. McKinney told the council that AB 1413 and AB 1466 have passed policy and fiscal committees and the Assembly floor and were pending in the Senate at the time of the briefing.

Why it matters: proponents argue the bills reconcile conflicting statutory processes so GSAs can finance and implement sustainability projects…