Skip to content Skip to left sidebar Skip to footer

Annual Report Submitted to the State, First of Many on Kings Subbasin Groundwater Conditions

The North Fork Kings GSA together with the six other GSAs in the Kings Subbasin submitted the first Annual Report to the CA Department of Water Resources (DWR) on April 1, 2020. A requirement under the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), the Annual Report serves to inform and update both the State and stakeholders in the Kings Subbasin on groundwater conditions and sustainability progress. Thanks to favorable hydrology for the reporting period, Kings Subbasin groundwater conditions improved overall with storage increasing by 210,000 acre-feet Subbasin wide.

The report indicates groundwater extractions in the North Fork Kings GSA represent an estimated 17% of total 1.06 million acre-feet extractions in the Subbasin. Irrigation Districts and landowners alike in the North Fork Kings GSA took every opportunity to capitalize on available surplus surface water supplies, capturing Kings River water during flood releases to recharge in basins or use on farms, offsetting groundwater use. The Annual Report focuses on water year 2019 (Sept 2018 – Oct 2019), a hydrologic “wet year” seeing 134% of average diversions on the Kings River, the majority of surface water supply to the region.

The North Fork Kings GSA plans to expand its groundwater recharge capacity at both the landowner and agency level to take advantage of similar wet hydrology in future years. Partnering with landowners to implement on-farm recharge practices, constructing recharge basins, and expanding existing recharge facilities are all strategies outlined to achieve a sustainable groundwater supply. The combined efforts of the North Fork Kings GSA and six other cooperating Kings Subbasin GSAs will ultimately lead the region to long-term sustainability.

The data for the report was collected from the seven GSAs’ monitoring networks, groundwater extractions, surface water supply, total water use, and changes in groundwater storage. Combined surface and groundwater use in the Kings Subbasin across sectors including agriculture, urban, and managed recharge totaled 2.7 million are-feet for the period.

Considering this first report was prepared just months after the submission of the Groundwater Sustainability Plans (GSPs), the data does not stray from data already included in the seven Kings Subbasin GSAs’ GSPs. Although the Subbasin used the opportunity to include any additional data collected through the reporting period and established a template for future reports.

The North Fork Kings GSA adopted its GSP on December 18, 2019, marking the transition from the planning to implementation phase. Following the adoption of a Groundwater Sustainability Plan (GSP) SGMA requires GSAs to submit annual reports to DWR on April 1 every year as a tool to track and communicate GSP implementation progress.

There is no grading or scoring criteria on the Annual Report, and DWR expects this first report to be missing some information considering the short timeframe between GSP adoption and the report due date.

Translate »