Regional board outlines draft agricultural water‑quality order for Scott and Shasta watersheds

Eli Scott, senior environmental scientist with the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, told the Siskiyou County Board of Supervisors on Jan. 6 that the board is drafting an order to regulate discharges from commercial agriculture in the Scott and Shasta watersheds and to implement existing TMDLs (total maximum daily loads) under the Clean Water Act. The draft would move the program from voluntary waivers toward general Waste Discharge Requirements, require enrollment for certain operations and allow growers to enroll either individually or through coalitions.

Scott said the order arose from TMDLs and prior waivers adopted in the mid‑2000s and renewed in 2018 and 2023, and that staff want a program more consistent with statewide precedents and easier to implement at watershed scale. He listed proposed enrollment triggers including a minimum acreage threshold, operations within or adjacent to riparian zones or wetlands, membership in an irrigation district, and operations producing measurable tailwater discharges. He said coalitions can be registered to manage membership, collect fees, perform representative monitoring and report to the state board, taking some administrative burden off individual growers.

The presentation outlined specific conservation measures and prohibitions that would become permit conditions. Those include prohibiting tailwater discharge unless the water meets TMDL allocation and temperature standards (the draft would not allow discharges that raise receiving-water temperature more than 5°F or harm beneficial uses), limiting tillage within 35 feet of the watercourse, requiring farm evaluations and farm‑level management plans where water‑quality threats are identified, and in‑stream work plans for practices that otherwise would require separate permits.

Brenna Sullivan, a project lead, described how coalitions typically operate in other parts of California: many coalitions are formed by grower groups (farm bureaus, irrigation districts or resource conservation districts), they collect fees and manage monitoring and reporting, and growers who enroll through a coalition are often charged lower state fees. Scott and Sullivan said the state board sets fee schedules; staff have briefed the state fee branch and invited local growers into those conversations.

Supervisors and attendees pressed staff on several points during a lengthy Q&A. Questions included whether existing watershed monitoring (SIGMA) could be used to meet new representative monitoring requirements; how small or niche operators would be treated; whether coalitions could be formed by NGOs rather than growers; and how fee differences would affect small producers. Scott said coalitions can be formed by different entities but growers decide whether to join; he gave a fee example from the presentation indicating a coalition route could be roughly $38 per acre while enrolling individually could be on the order of $1.50 per acre for some fee components, noting those numbers come from state fee structures. Staff said they are discussing whether a different fee schedule for Siskiyou producers is feasible but cannot guarantee it.

Staff also said some elements are mandated by law and cannot be waived locally. For example, drinking‑water‑well testing for enrolled parcels is required by the state water code for wells providing drinking water to tenants and employees; the draft calls for annual nitrate testing for three years with potential reduced monitoring if levels fall below thresholds.

On schedule and outreach, Scott said the regional board convened tribal consultation, technical advisory groups and diverse stakeholder meetings in 2023–2025 and planned two town halls in early February (one in Fort Jones and one at Montague Community Center, both starting at 5:30 p.m.), farm tours in spring and summer, and a public‑comment period timed to avoid irrigation season. He said staff hoped to release draft materials for public comment in October 2026 with spring consideration for adoption, subject to timeline shifts.

Why it matters: the draft would change how agricultural discharges are managed in watersheds listed for sediment, temperature and biostimulatory conditions; it links permit conditions to the TMDLs for the Scott and Shasta and shifts many administrative tasks to coalitions if growers choose that path. Farmers raised concerns about costs, administrative burden, geographic differences from Central Valley agriculture, and how the program would treat legacy road and wildfire sediment sources.

Next steps: staff requested board and local stakeholder engagement at upcoming town halls and indicated additional public outreach and technical work on monitoring and representative wells before public comment and formal adoption steps.