Friday, January 15, 2021
CapitalPress.com 7
Feds complete title transfers to S. Idaho irrigation districts
the facilities are locally owned.
“With the title transfer, it’s
going to improve efficiencies and
eliminate an additional layer of
administration,” he said.
A&B still contracts with Rec-
lamation for water, but now the
district can make decisions about
day-to-day system operations. It
previously needed the agency’s
approval, which Temple said could
take up to several months.
“For example, a water user
comes in and wants to make a
facility change like moving a small
canal from the center of a field to
the edge,” he said. “The district
can potentially respond and OK
that within a day.”
Both districts operate and main-
tain part of Reclamation’s Mini-
doka Project, which supplies irri-
gation water from five Snake River
reservoirs in southeastern and
south-central Idaho.
The Minidoka Irrigation Dis-
trict, in Minidoka and Cassia coun-
ties, is taking ownership of facili-
By BRAD CARLSON
Capital Press
The Minidoka and A&B irriga-
tion districts now own their con-
veyance infrastructure and land
following a Jan. 8 title transfer by
the U.S. Department of the Interior.
The U.S. Bureau of Reclama-
tion recouped construction costs
through decades of payments by
customers of the southern Idaho
districts.
The 2019 John D. Dingell
Jr. Conservation, Management
and Recreation Act sped up the
title-transfer process for eligible
projects.
Minidoka Irrigation District
Manager Dan Davidson said the
district now plans to work with
groundwater users who want to do
“soft conversions,” which convert
groundwater withdrawals to sur-
face irrigation.
“We’ve got a few of them on
schedule to take some irrigation
water next season,” he said.
Minidoka Irrigation District
A&B Irrigation District
Dan Davidson of Minidoka Irri-
gation District at a main check
structure. The district has taken
ownership of the infrastructure
and land.
Dan Temple, manager of the
A&B Irrigation District. The
ownership of infrastructure will
allow the district to be more ef-
ficient.
The conversions will aid East-
ern Snake Plain Aquifer recovery
by reducing groundwater with-
drawals while providing a long-
term financial benefit to the dis-
trict, Davidson said. Groundwater
users must reduce withdrawals
under a 2015 settlement with a
coalition of surface-water users.
“Then we want to look into
some possible recharge locations
and start recharging water for the
aquifer,” he said. The Idaho Depart-
ment of Water Resources oversees
the ESPA recharge operation.
A&B Irrigation District General
Manager Dan Temple said deci-
sions can be made faster now that
ties and about 403 acres in support
of the Project’s Gravity Division,
Reclamation said. The district irri-
gates 77,214 acres through canals,
laterals, pipelines and drainage
systems. It has operated and main-
tained the facilities since 1916.
A&B, based near Rupert, is
taking ownership of its facili-
ties and about 1,020 acres in sup-
port of the Project’s North Side
Pumping Division. It irrigates
82,600 acres. It has been operat-
ing and maintaining its facilities
since 1966.
Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, said in
a Reclamation release that Idaho
farmers and ranchers “have long
struggled under overly prescrip-
tive regulations dictating water use
as they work to feed the country.”
Rep. Russ Fulcher, R-Idaho,
said residents “understand their
resource and infrastructure needs,
and deserve this responsibil-
ity. I always believe local con-
trol and ownership leads to better
management.”
DEA seeks dismissal of hemp lawsuit
Longtime WSU soil, oilseed expert retires
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
The U.S. Drug Enforce-
ment Agency is asking a
federal judge to dismiss
a lawsuit that accuses the
agency of exceeding its
authority with new regula-
tions on hemp products.
The DEA claims the
Hemp Industries Associa-
tion’s complaint follows the
wrong procedural path for
challenging the regulations,
which may limit the amount
of psychoactive THC in
hemp extracts.
The agency recently
scored a legal victory in
the case after U.S. Dis-
trict Judge James Boasberg
refused to order the DEA
to clarify the meaning of
the rules, which the hemp
industry argues have threat-
ened its survival.
Hemp stopped being reg-
ulated as a controlled sub-
stance under the 2018 Farm
Bill, while marijuana, the
mind-altering form of can-
nabis, remains illegal under
federal law.
Cannabis must contain
less than 0.3% THC to be
considered hemp, but the
DEA has also applied that
threshold to concentrated
substances derived from the
crop.
The Hemp Industries
Association argues that
extracting cannabidiol, or
CBD, from hemp necessarily
results in interim substances
with more than 0.3% THC,
though they’re ultimately
diluted below that threshold
in consumer products.
In recent years, CBD
extracts have become a
major reason that farm-
ers have planted the crop,
as they’re touted for hav-
ing anti-inflammatory ben-
efits and other healthful
properties.
According to the Hemp
Industries Association, the
DEA’s regulations would
criminalize CBD extracts
during the manufactur-
Bill Pan was sold the first
time he saw the rolling hills
of the Palouse.
He said he was excited to
work in a region “with some
of the most productive soils
and cropping systems.”
The longtime Washington
State University soil and oil-
seed researcher and professor
retired Dec. 31 after 36 years.
“It just felt right,” he said,
noting he’d gotten his vari-
ous research, programs and
the many students and young
faculty members he’d men-
tored to a point where he felt
comfortable stepping aside.
Pan started out research-
ing ways to improve root
development and nutrient use
in dryland wheat systems,
then branched into irrigated
potato systems.
In the early 2000s, he
began working with oil-
seeds as part of the bioenergy
movement, which evolved
into an extension and applied
research program, supported
by the state legislature.
Pan and his team of
researchers were tasked with
helping farmers find financ-
ing, supplies and informa-
tion to provide oilseed grains
Fletcher Farms Hemp Co.
A field of hemp grows in Oregon. The U.S. Drug En-
forcement Agency has requested that a judge throw
out a lawsuit challenging its regulations for the crop.
ing process, which would
“effectively destroy the bur-
geoning hemp industry.”
The lawsuit claims that
DEA lacks the authority to
regulate intermediate hemp
materials this way under the
Controlled Substances Act
and the 2018 Farm Bill.
In a court filing, however,
the Hemp Industries Asso-
ciation requested that DEA
fully explain the scope of the
regulations, which would
“guide whether plaintiffs
should file for a preliminary
injunction or instead dismiss
this case for lack of a case or
controversy.”
The hemp association
argued that DEA has made
“unclear statements” and
“heightened
confusion”
about the impacts of its
regulations on intermedi-
ate hemp products, despite
opportunities to clarify its
intentions.
For that reason, the
plaintiff asked for a court
order requiring the agency
to explain exactly how the
rules would be applied to
such hemp concentrates,
which could have rendered
the lawsuit moot.
The judge recently
denied that motion because
such “expedited discovery”
would be inappropriate
under administrative pro-
cedures for enacting federal
policy.
If the plaintiff’s “maneu-
ver” were allowed, any-
body could then use the
same approach to “force
the agency to develop a pol-
icy position and support it
with legal arguments,” the
judge said. “That would be
a problematic loophole.”
The DEA has now asked
the judge to throw out the
case entirely because the
proper venue for challeng-
ing the regulations is before
the U.S. Court of Appeals
for the D.C. Circuit.
The Hemp Industries
Association has also filed
a petition for that appellate
court to review the DEA’s
regulations, but claims that
legal action serves a differ-
ent purpose.
The petition for review
aims to overturn the reg-
ulations, while its lawsuit
seeks an injunction and
“declaratory relief” that
hemp processors cannot be
held criminally liable for
generating the intermedi-
ate substances, the plaintiff
said.
for the grow-
ing food oil
market.
That led
to acreage
gains over
a
decade,
making
it
Bill Pan
economi-
cally viable
to sustain the Viterra canola
processing facility in War-
den, Wash.
Asked about his suc-
cesses, Pan lists several:
• Mentoring students to be
new agricultural leaders.
•
Providing
leader-
ship in fostering the oilseed
movement.
• Developing the concepts
and science that led to build-
ing the Columbia Pulp straw
processing facility in Star-
buck, Wash.
• Providing leadership
for the Soil Science Soci-
ety of America from 2017 to
2020, including as president
in 2019.
• Working with others to
boost the state soil health ini-
tiative to protect and build
soils as an essential natural
resource that supports food
security and the ability to
adapt to and mitigate climate
change.
Pan trained more than
30 graduate students, with
many remaining or returning
to Washington to take lead-
ership positions, said Rich
Koenig, chairman of WSU’s
Department of Crop and Soil
Sciences and one of those
students.
“By any measure, Dr.
Pan’s achievements place
him at the top of his field,”
Koenig said. “Throughout
his career he worked on
over a dozen crops import-
ant in Washington, includ-
ing wheat, barley, canola,
various
biomass/bioen-
ergy crops, forages, corn,
potatoes, and even a few
weeds. He was famous
for his ability to form pro-
ductive
collaborations
with plant scientists, plant
breeders, animal scien-
tists, engineers, modelers,
and of course other soil
scientists.”
“He’s a listener,” said
Karen Sowers, execu-
tive director of the Pacific
Northwest Canola Associa-
tion and another former grad-
uate student. “He’s always
been a trusted source of
information for farmers.”
Pan plans to remain in
Pullman with his wife, Vicki
McCracken, associate dean
of WSU Extension.
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