Editor’s Note: Village legal counsel, Larry Guggino, confirmed to the News-Bulletin on Oct. 17, the amended Niagara agreement will not appear on the agenda for the village council meeting on Oct. 20 since the village is still waiting on a report from their water rights experts. In a draft agenda provided to the News-Bulletin last week, it reflected that the agreement would be discussed by council.
The village council agenda has been updated to reflect the change. According to state law, final agendas for public meetings can no longer be altered less than 72 hours prior to the meeting. It is unclear when the council will again consider the amended agreement with Niagara Bottling Co.
LOS LUNAS — The Los Lunas Village Council will again consider an amended agreement with Niagara Bottling Company to increase the amount of water the company is allowed to pump from village wells during its Oct. 20 meeting.
The agreement, if approved, would allow the company to pump up to 700 acre feet of water — or more than 228 million gallons — every year. This is more than double the 285 acre feet the company is currently allowed to pump through its previous agreement with the village.
Although the water is accessed through a well belonging to the village of Los Lunas, the aquifer the well is pumping from serves all of Valencia County and the city of Albuquerque, stretching from Socorro to Santa Fe.
At the council’s meeting on July 28, the agreement was indefinitely tabled at the request of village public works director Michael Jaramillo and village attorney Larry Guggino to allow more time for the agreement to be looked over by the village’s water rights expert.
During the Oct. 10 meeting of the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District Board of Directors, board president and Valencia County Director Stephanie Russo Baca reported on a recent meeting she and district CEO and Chief Engineer Jason Casuga had with representatives from Niagara Bottling.
Russo Baca said during the meeting she asked several questions, including how much water the bottling plant used a year. Representatives told her the facility used roughly 250 acre feet a year, about 8.15 million gallons.
“I asked if there was potentially help with on-farm efficiency programs to offset the use (of water) from the river,” Russo Baca said. “It’s not the district’s position that they need to, but … I felt (their pumping) was hydrologically connected to surface water.”
While not obligated to, the board president said such a gesture would help with district efficiencies.
“They have a substantial amount of money, which they didn’t want to talk about. That’s understandable,” she said.
Russo Baca said Niagara representatives told her they do support the community, to which she asked what the company specifically does to support the agricultural community.
“They are thinking about it, hopefully,” she said. “It was a cordial meeting.”
The vote on the Niagara agreement was tabled twice before the July 28 Los Lunas Village Council meeting, also to allow more time for it to be reviewed by both legal counsel and water consultants.
When the agreement with Niagara was first presented to the village at the end of June, a group of more than 75 protesters overflowed into the lobby outside of council chambers showed up in opposition to the agreement.
Valencia Water Watchers, a local non-partisan group which formed in January 2020 in opposition to Niagara’s original request to increase pumping to 650 acre feet per year, presented a petition with nearly 3,000 signatures asking the councilors to vote against the agreement.
Jaramillo said the amended agreement between Niagara and the village is to protect the municipality in case the company’s lease for water rights falls through.
Niagara secured additional water rights from PNM, which has been leasing out part of its water rights since beginning the retirement of the generating station in San Juan County. The San Juan generating station burned its last piece of coal in late September.
Jaramillo said the village would “without a doubt” be able to meet the increased water needs of the bottling plant since Los Lunas installed a new well — well No. 7 — used by both Niagara and the entirety of the Los Morros Business Park. The village also increased the pumping capabilities of well No. 3, which will help the village meet the company’s increased need for ground water.
The council will consider the agreement at its meeting at 6 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 20, in the village of Los Lunas council chambers.
Makayla Grijalva was born and raised in Las Cruces. She is a 2020 graduate of The University of New Mexico, where she studied multimedia journalism, political science and history.
Julia M. Dendinger began working at the VCNB in 2006. She covers Valencia County government, Belen Consolidated Schools and the village of Bosque Farms. She is a member of the Society of Professional Journalists Rio Grande chapter’s board of directors.
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April 19, 2024
