MWD’s Groundwater Sustainability Plan Approved by the State

The Montecito Association Land Use Committee (LUC) May meeting was held at the Montecito Library community room and on Zoom. The meeting was called to order by LUC Chair, Dorinne Lee Johnson. 

Attendees were the LUC members; MA Executive Director Houghton Hyatt; General Manager Montecito Water District (MWD) Nick Turner,and his team – Groundwater Specialist Nick Kunstek, Assistant Manager Adam Kanold, and Public Information Officer Laura Camp; GM Montecito Sanitation District John Weigold; Montecito Planning Commission Jack Overall; MAAdmin Janet Casey;and Sara Tyberg.

Johnson introduced Turner to present his update on the MWD’s Groundwater Sustainability Plan (GSP) for Montecito. Turner introduced Kunstek and Camp. 

Cogent Points by Turner:

– The Montecito Groundwater Basin (MGB) is located in the MWD and coincides with geology established by Dept. of Water Resources (DWR). 

– The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) was enacted by the California State legislation in 2014 to provide for long-term groundwater sustainability and require all basins designated as medium and high priority to develop a GSP.

– Purpose of the MWD is to develop and implement its own GS plans by 2043, so MWD would have LOCAL [emphasis by Turner] control, not State control or intervention.

– MWD recognizes the importance of groundwater for public and private wells, critical supply during dry periods, misuse, and long-term impacts on the water basin.

– The California DWR recognized the MWD as the single-agency GSA for the Montecito Groundwater Basin late 2018.

– MWD made a GSP which was adopted by the GSA May 2023.

– The MWD GDP was approved by the DWR February 2025.

– 2025 through 2043 – in order to sustain groundwater in Montecito, the MWD will identify and monitor key risk factors – groundwater depletion, quality, and seawater intrusion; pursue grant funding, update the basin numerical model, comply with local well registry, and establish rebates for stakeholders via programs.

– Key is that the Montecito groundwater basin is presently in reasonably good health based on current conditions.

– MWD has a high tech monitoring system and voluntary metering program to track usage to finetune our model, and monitors the flow of creeks and wells in Montecito to fill in data gaps in the plan.

– Going forward the focus is to implement MWD GSP, and annually report on it with evaluations every five years through 2043.

– MWD Rebate Program: Rebates are offered up to $3,000 per property with eligible projects like establishing a Rain Garden where property owners capture runoff and promote infiltration into the Basin; and conversion of appropriate areas of a property to Permeable Surface materials that allow infiltration of water into the ground

– Montecito Union School received a rebate and a Certificate of Recognition for its Nature Lab.

– To date MWD has given six to eight rebates to local well owners.

– The Well Registry Project for Montecito property owners. There are 700 well owners to date with a 50% response rate, and the project has completed over 50 site visits. With this project MWD can connect with property owners and advise and educate. MWD has a wells stakeholder list to help them communicate.

– Seawater Intrusion Monitoring Project is important in Montecito. The program establishes the wells existing along the shoreline and monitors them for any intrusion, tracks any trends, uses lab analysis quarterly, and adds private monitoring of wells in specific locations, specifically in Biltmore and Toro Canyon areas, to become a part of this program.

– Rainfall impacts groundwater and well owners.

– Overall, the Montecito Basin continues to recharge due to the heavy rainfall in the last few years.

– GSA is one component in groundwater collaboration. Additional roles are played by County Planning and Environmental Health organization, and California Coastal Commission.

– Camp emphasized that it is profound that Montecito has local control of the plan, whereas other districts in California have not received approval and will be regulated by the state and local authorities.

Johnson opened it up to questions, which resulted in the following data points from Turner and his team:

– Main sources for groundwater are primarily rainfall and streamflow, and secondarily from upper portions of the mountains. Majority of water we have in the basin stays in the basin, due to our geology.

– There have been active wells in Montecito since 1960 and some predate that. They created a registry program to find out where they are and sent out requests to those parcel owners. There may be only 400 active wells out of the 700 wells we have assessed in the area via scientific methods.

– For the basin there is a rubric for its score: well density. The Montecito water basin is less than 10 square miles and estimated total volume use of groundwater, factors of
population use. 

– Seawater rise as an influence on the basin is not an issue. What drives seawater intrusion is extractions of water from the basin, so it is important to maintain the groundwater at a level that keeps the seawater out.  

411: Contact MWD at 805-324-4207 or email staff@montecitogsa.com