Thursday February 15, 2024
MendoFever.com —
Mendocino County 1st District Supervisor Glenn McGourty spoke before his colleagues at the February 6, 2024 Board meeting with a troubling development about the Potter Valley Project, the disputed water diversion infrastructure that keeps the Russian River flowing year-round. He reported that PG&E had seemingly disregarded Mendocino County water users in their rush to decommission meaning “if they wanted to, they could probably just shut the water off and that would be the end of the Potter Valley Diversion.”
In McGourty’s words: “Last week was a very big shock to us . . . in regards to water transfer from the Eel River. . . . We had the first meeting of the new JPA, the Eel-Russian Project Authority. This would be the group that would be taking over the diversion from PG&E and designing a new one that would move Eel River water and continue the flow of Eel River water to our region.”
On January 31, the Eel-Russian Project Authority, the JPA recently formed to negotiate with PG&E, held its first Board meeting in the Sonoma County Supervisors’ Chambers, and the mood was upbeat. The video of that meeting is available to view here. A $2 million grant received from the Bureau of Reclamation will cover the cost of studying the two design alternatives for the new diversion and the development to 60% design stage of whichever alternative is chosen.