MPERIAL, Calif., Sept. 20 — Rarely have so few had their hands on the spigots of so many.
Here in the Southern California desert, about 400 farmers and the local water authority hold Colorado River water rights that 17 million people closer to the coast desperately want. The two sides are struggling to resuscitate a deal that would sell water from the farms to the cities, but the obstacles are formidable, and time is running out.
There is more at risk than just the water now on the negotiating table. Unless there is a deal by the end of the year, the cities stand to lose much more, through an abrupt federal cutoff of 15 percent of Southern California's water supply.
The situation has elevated the farmers to a position of great power, and they are capitalizing on the moment, demanding more and more from the cities — beginning with payments of $2 billion over 75 years — for water the farmers now get for next to nothing.
Besides the money, the farmers are seeking a deal that would not require any crops to be taken out of cultivation and would indemnify them from any environmental damage caused by the loss of water to the nearby Salton Sea. The Salton is the country's second largest saline lake, home to millions of migratory birds.
"They have to make it worth our while," said John Hawk, who farms 1,800 acres of vegetables and hay in the Imperial Valley, a desert land made bountiful by water appropriated from the Colorado.
If a deal cannot be struck, said Dennis Cushman, assistant general manager of the San Diego County Water Authority, a major player in multiparty negotiations intended to win the cities access to the Imperial Valley farmers' water and avert threatened federal sanctions. "The consequences," Mr. Cushman said, "are potentially devastating to the economy and lifestyle of Southern California."
In many ways, what the sides are struggling to disentangle is an anachronism. The farmers of the Imperial Valley have the right to more Colorado River water than some entire states under a water-sharing agreement that dates from 1922, when towns like Imperial were already well established and Los Angeles was a pinpoint on the map. The valley's total is 70 percent of the water allotted to all of California, and six times what is guaranteed to arid Southern California cities, which have never had enough water of their own.
Until recently, the cities' spartan share from the Colorado did not matter much. For decades, California simply overdrew its allotment, relying on vast quantities left unused by Arizona, Nevada and upstream states.
But those states' growth has all but evaporated that surplus, and the federal government has vowed to force California to live within its means. A deal brokered by the Clinton administration in early 2001 gives the state 15 years to scale back its overuse, but it sets a deadline of Dec. 31 this year for the state to show progress.
The Imperial Valley provides a 25th of the country's lettuce, broccoli, wheat, cauliflower and other table crops and, thanks to weather that allows for year-round growing, about a seventh of the country's wintertime table needs.
But the farmers also consume water at about twice the rate per acre of other agricultural districts in California, a rate many times higher than that of arid cities like San Diego and Los Angeles.
About 200,000 acre-feet of water are at issue; that is a small fraction of the valley farmers' staggeringly large allotment of Colorado River water — some 3.1 million acre-feet per year, out of the state's total allotment of 4.4 million. An acre-foot is the amount needed to cover an acre to a depth of a foot, or 325,851 gallons.
But those 200,000 acre-feet are vital to California's effort to prove to the federal government and neighboring states that it is serious about weaning itself from decades of overuse of the Colorado. Unless a transfer in that amount from farmers to San Diego can be worked out by Dec. 31, California stands to lose about 600,000 acre-feet through a government-ordered halt to the wink-and-a-nod arrangement that for decades has allowed California cities to draw more than twice as much Colorado River water as they are entitled to.
Among those working feverishly to broker a deal are state and federal officials and water authorities including the Los Angeles-based Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which serves the 17 million people and is trying to meet the needs of a fast-growing population under water laws that adhere to the principle of first come first served.
"We are not in a position to be held hostage," said Adan Ortega Jr., a vice president for the Metropolitan water district. "But it's fair to say that this has really focused our attention."
Over breakfast in El Centro, the county seat, Larry Gilbert, 62, a third-generation farmer in Imperial Valley, offered the farmers' side.
"You shouldn't be able to steal something from people just because you outnumber them," said Mr. Gilbert, who farms 800 acres in a desert where virtually nothing would grow if it were not for the Colorado River, tapped by Imperial Valley farmers for nearly 100 years.
One reason for the increased pressure now is that a 1998 deal between San Diego and the Imperial Valley collapsed in recent months over environmental concerns about damage to the Salton Sea.
The earlier arrangements for a water transfer have been judged by environmental groups and government agencies to be unsatisfactory because they would have reduced the flow of agricultural runoff into the Salton. A major objective of the more recent negotiations has been to make a transfer without depriving the lake of freshwater runoff.
One formula being negotiated — one backed by at least $50 million in financial incentives — would require Imperial Valley farmers to leave as much as 10 percent of their fields fallow, allowing water runoff that would otherwise have been consumed to reach the saline lake.
But that plan, proposed in August by the San Diego County water district, appears to be foundering on farmers' opposition.
[A counteroffer by the farmers' district was on the table yesterday at a meeting in Sacramento. That offer calls for about 2 percent fallowing and larger upfront payments.]
Under Gale A. Norton, the Bush administration's interior secretary, the government has maintained pressure on the parties to make a deal.
One issue that people involved in the discussions described as critically important is whether the Imperial Valley farmers or the Imperial Valley Irrigation District, represented by an elected board responsible to 170,000 people, holds the farmers' primary water rights.
If negotiations with the Imperial Valley district break down, the Southern California water districts might seek a separate deal with the Imperial Valley farmers, based on the argument that it is they rather than the district who own the crucial water rights.
"We view this deadline with extreme seriousness," California's resources secretary, Mary Nichols, said in a telephone interview today, "and we are making every effort to make sure that this deadline is met."
