Source: sjvwater.org

Board members sue over alleged ‘water scheme’ in western Fresno County water basin

Fetched 2026-07-15 08:01 from sjvwater.org

Reading Summary (AI-generated)

Reading Summary: Pleasant Valley GSA Lawsuit

Key Facts

• Farmers filed suit July 2 alleging GSA board president Jimmy Anderson (owner of Wheat Land, largest landowner in Pleasant Valley) engineered a “captive water market” by installing relatives, employees, and business associates as a board quorum
• Anderson’s bloc allegedly equalized groundwater credit allocations across all land types—including his non-irrigated feedlot and low-water row crops—effectively redistributing credits away from high-use permanent crop growers (primarily pistachio orchards)
• Plaintiffs have already paid $200,000 this growing season buying water credits back from Anderson’s Wheat Land
• The 48,000-acre Pleasant Valley subbasin was placed under state Water Resources Control Board oversight in 2024 for lacking an adequate groundwater plan; a revised plan was submitted in April 2025
• A case management conference is set for Oct. 21 in Fresno County Superior Court; plaintiffs are also seeking basin adjudication

Who Is Affected

• Pleasant Valley GSA and its nine-member board (three of whom are plaintiffs)
• Pistachio and permanent crop growers in the western Fresno County subbasin (~32 landowners)
• California State Water Resources Control Board, which is weighing probation status for the subbasin
• Plaintiff businesses: Valley Nut Growers LP, NK Development, and Lovelace & Sons Farming

Policy/Legal Angle

• Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA): The subbasin’s failure to produce an adequate Groundwater Sustainability Plan triggered state intervention; probation designation with associated fees remains pending
• Groundwater adjudication: Plaintiffs seek court-determined pumping limits and water rights allocations—a process already underway in Indian Wells Valley, Cuyama, and Fox Canyon subbasins
• Core legal question: whether board governance decisions (equal per-acre allocations regardless of historical use) constitute an unlawful manipulation of a public water resource for private gain

Blog Angles

1. SGMA’s governance vulnerability: The Pleasant Valley case raises a pointed question—does SGMA create opportunities for large landowners to capture GSA boards and rewrite allocation rules to their advantage? How common is this pattern in other struggling basins?
2. Adjudication as a SGMA failsafe: With three other subbasins already in adjudication, is court intervention becoming a de facto remedy when GSA governance breaks down? What does that mean for SGMA’s promise of local control?
3. The $750/acre-foot fee: An anonymous grower letter flagged this proposed pumping fee alongside the lack of a basin-wide accounting platform—who set that number, and does the new GSA plan submitted in April actually meet state standards?

Full Text

Board members sue over alleged ‘water scheme’ in western Fresno County water basin

Farmers frustrated with recent actions by the Pleasant Valley Groundwater Sustainability Agency (GSA) board filed a lawsuit July 2 alleging the board president used his position to create a captive water market and are seeking an adjudication. An adjudication allows a court to determine how much water can be safely pumped from a basin and who has rights to how much of that pumped water.

The lawsuit alleges that farmer Jimmy Anderson leveraged his dominant acreage position to seize control of Pleasant Valley Water District and GSA, installing a quorum on the board composed of relatives, employees, business associates and partners.

And that he initiated a series of policies essentially giving himself a captive water market, according to the lawsuit.

“It’s getting serious,” said plaintiff Brad Gleason. “People who don’t buy credits from the president have trees that are dying. He can pick and choose who he sells water to, which adds insult to injury.”

When reached by phone, Anderson said he was not aware of the lawsuit and would “wait to hear about it at the next board meeting.”

That meeting is July 28 at Harris Ranch in Coalinga.

Anderson is the largest landowner in Pleasant Valley and identified in the lawsuit as the owner of Wheat Land.

According to the complaint, after Anderson was installed as president, the voting bloc demanded the resignation of the GSA’s general counsel and hired a new attorney along with a new treasurer, who plaintiffs claim is an employee of Wheat Land.

The voting bloc then passed pumping and groundwater credit policies favorable to Anderson’s vast land holdings, giving all acreage, from pasture to solar farms and pistachio orchards, an equal allocation despite their historical water use, according to the lawsuit.

Anderson owns a feedlot that isn’t irrigated. He also has land planted to pistachios and grows row crops such as garlic and wheat, which use less water than permanent crops such as pistachios, the dominant crop in Pleasant Valley.

That alleged “water scheme” shifted the balance of groundwater credits, giving Anderson an abundance and cutting supplies for others. that forced plaintiffs and other growers to buy water from Anderson, according to the lawsuit. Plaintiffs have already spent $200,000 this growing season buying water from Anderson’s Wheat Land, the suit states.

“This board is arranged in such a way that we can’t overcome the voting bloc,” Gleason said. “We’ve got to use the courts to help straighten this out, which is unfortunate because it’s not going to be cheap.”

The Pleasant Valley lawsuit was filed by partnerships run by three of the Pleasant Valley GSA board’s nine members.

Plaintiffs Valley Nut Growers LP, NK Development and Lovelace & Sons Farming are businesses operated by Brian Whelan, James Nichols and Joe Lovelace, respectively.

Whelan’s business partner is Gleason, Pleasant Valley’s former board president who was ousted in January by Anderson.

The lawsuit is the latest development in the 48,000-acre subbasin on the western edge of Fresno County. In 2024, oversight of the Pleasant Valley subbasin shifted to the state Water Resources Control Board for lacking an adequate groundwater plan.

As the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act’s (SGMA) enforcement arm, the Water Board is considering whether to place the subbasin on probation , which comes with fees and greater scrutiny.

A new groundwater plan was reworked under Anderson’s board and submitted to the state in April.

Last month, an anonymous grower circulated a letter to all 32 landowners, complaining about a proposed $750 an acre foot pumping fee and the lack of a regulated, basin-wide groundwater accounting platform.

Pleasant Valley GSA manager Sarah Woolf said the agency had not yet been served with the lawsuit, though she was aware of it.

“We’ll see where this gets us,” she said.

A case management conference is set for Oct. 21 in Fresno County Superior Court.

Other adjudications are ongoing in the eastern and western fringes of Kern County in the Indian Wells Valley and Cuyama subbasins as well as the Fox Canyon subbasin in Ventura County.