MIDDLETOWN – The Maha Guenoc Valley Mixed Use project public comment period will end on September 11. Some Butts Canyon neighbors of the project are concerned about predicted helicopter and seaplane flight paths. But the feeling among the rest of the community is split between those who eagerly await the influx of jobs and economic opportunities that will come with the 16,000- acre resort and those who want to preserve things as they are.
Linda Diehl-Darms has history in Middletown. Her father was one of the founders of the Middletown Merchants and served as President of the Middletown Lions Club. The St. Helena Bridge on Highway 29 near Butts Canyon Road was designated the Robert H. Weatherwax Memorial Bridge by the state legislature to honor him. She knows that change is going to come to her town. She would like to keep the “small town feel”, but knows that there will be development and growth.
The Maha Guenoc Valley Mixed Use Development project will be hidden behind hills miles from town for the most part. There will be increased traffic and congestion, especially along Butts Canyon Road, and there are those who are opposed to the project. But Linda sees the construction of a high-end resort in harmony with the land as a less impactful way to usher in the inevitable change. She hopes the revenue from the project will give much needed funding for infrastructure from filling potholes to helping the school district. But she is concerned about water.
The project proposes to pump water from an off-site well on a parcel of land Maha purchased at the corner of Highway 29 and Butts Canyon Road. The well has a capacity of over 1,000 gallons per minute, more than all of the wells cited in the Environmental Impact Report (EIR) on the Guenoc development site. They propose to use it as a backup water source piping it miles up Butts Canyon to Detert Reservoir. In response to community concerns, Maha proposes to have an engineer monitoring their well impact and limiting effects on groundwater supplies to a 300-foot cone of influence from the well head. Maha states that this will reduce their potential impact on Middletown’s water supplies and neighboring wells to “less than significant”.
Todd Fiora, Callayomi County Water District General Manager, has concerns about the draw on water resources. The 1,600-acre Bar X Ranch west of Highway 29 was recently purchased to establish an 80-acre cannabis grow. He predicts that it will pull 20 million gallons per year on top of the 52 million gallons used by some 500 Middletown customers. At 1,000 gallons per minute, the proposed well has a capacity of 1.44 million gallons per day. Even if the well is “rested” 50 percent of the year the draw could be around 260 million gallons per year. Fiora is reassured by the 300-foot cone of influence, but feels it should be monitored in perpetuity and not just during the first 10 years. He also cautions about the impact of all the monitoring wells that will need to be drilled and their potential interaction with groundwater flows.
Diehl-Darms thinks that lowered ground water levels could activate the plume of contaminants of concern (COC’s) from a Geothermal, Inc dumpsite now owned and monitored by PG&E a few miles from the well head. In response to public comment, the Maha project noted that the 300-foot cone of influence means that they will not affect the groundwater levels at the waste site. Diehl-Darms would feel better about the project if they maintained monitoring in perpetuity rather than limiting it to the first 10 years of the project.
Both Fiora and Diehl-Darms referenced land collapses in the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys due to lowered water tables. They want to make sure that the long-term effects of the development on the Middletown water supply are under control.
