Judge rules that tribe’s case against Coachella Valley water agencies will proceed

A federal judge lifted a stay on legal proceedings in the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians’ lawsuit against two local water agencies involving rights to Coachella Valley groundwater supplies.

U.S. District Court Judge Jesus Bernal ruled that legal proceedings should not be delayed, as questions regarding the tribe’s recently gained rights to the groundwater must be addressed without further delay.

Read: Local water agencies request Supreme Court intervention over water dispute with Tribe

The tribe sued the Desert Water Agency and the Coachella Valley Water District in 2013, claiming that the agencies degraded water quality by overdrafting the aquifer, which depleted natural water levels, and then offset the amounts drawn with lower-quality water from the Colorado River.

The agencies countered that the practice “has prevented groundwater levels from falling drastically, even as the valley has grown.”

In March, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court’s 2015 decision backing the tribe’s claim to the groundwater aquifer managed by the agencies. Both agencies announced the following month that they would appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Bernal ruled that the case should proceed while the high court weighs the appeal.

“Continuing the stay would prejudice the tribe and unfairly advantage the water agencies by permitting their ongoing disregard of the tribe’s rights,” Bernal wrote.

“The tribe has provided ample evidence of the water agencies’ overdrafting of the aquifer and impairment of the tribe’s crucial water resource,” his ruling states. “As such, the court is persuaded that further delay in quantifying the tribe’s water rights and the resulting continued degradation of such rights under these circumstances is unwarranted. The water agencies have not persuasively demonstrated how they would suffer any hardship as a result of lifting the stay, let alone hardship that could outweigh the harm to the tribe if its motion is denied.”

Tribal officials say the next phase of the lawsuit will determine whether there is a water quality component to the tribe’s water right, the standard for quantifying the tribe’s right and whether the tribe owns the pore space underlying the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation.

“We are pleased that Judge Bernal has agreed with our position to allow the next phase of the lawsuit to move forward,” Tribal Chairman Jeff L. Grubbe said. “The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit upheld Judge Bernal’s decision that the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians has a right to groundwater in the Coachella Valley — a right that the federal government set aside for the tribe when it established the Agua Caliente Reservation in the late 1870s. We believe it’s in everyone’s best interest to allow the lawsuit to move forward while the water districts try to appeal that decision to the Supreme Court.”