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– Weekend Edition – VOLUME 174 • ISSUE 82 | $1.00
mtdemocrat.com
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 10, 2025
El Dorado Irrigation District celebrates 100 years Shelly Thorene Staff writer
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00 years ago, around 1,000 community members got together and voted to create the El Dorado Irrigation District. On Saturday, Oct. 4 that legacy was celebrated with an open house at the EID office on Mosquito Road. Some of the agency’s equipment was on display and there were booths staffed by agency personnel. Director of Operations Dan Corcoran gave the guests a short history of water rights dating back to the Gold Rush and said early efforts “to pursue gold and water necessary to mine it boomed and busted several times over until 1919 when members of the community formed the El Dorado Water users Association. This group secured a contractual water supply of 15,080 acre feet from the mining venture and today that same supply can provide water to 45,000 homes or generate clean hydroelectric power.” On Oct. 5, 1925 that water supply was added to the
initial water portfolio of the El Dorado Irrigation District. Earthen ditches were replaced with modern pressurized pipelines creating a contiguous system delivering water through 1,100 miles of pipe, 3 dozen tanks, 3 dozen pump stations and over 250 pressure reducing stations to customers from over a 4,000 foot elevation in Pollock Pines to 400 foot elevation at the Sacramento County line. The district now serves more than 125,000 customers. Corcoran said throughout the district’s history “rate payers and local leaders have supported the acquisitions and investment necessary to meet the needs of a growing community. However, our greatest feats for independence were achieved over the past quarter century.” He added, “in 1999, the district acquired the water rights and facilities associated with Project 184, securing supplies from Caples Lake, Silver Lake, Lake Aloha, Echo Lake and the South Fork of the American River at Kyburz instead of relying upon a contractual commitment from PG&E. In 2001, the district
Democrat photo by Shelly Thorene
Former EID board member George Osborne,board members Paul Penn and Lori Anzini, ACWA Interim Director Marwan Khalifi, General Manager Pravani Vandeyar, Brixton Lane, representing Tom McClintock and EID President Pat Dwyer. secured 17,000 additional acre-feet of rights to access water conveyed by Project 184 facilities. Once only accessible for hydropower purposes, this water would thus be available for consumption.” Corcoran went on to list several more accomplishments including in 2003 when the district acquired through an act of Congress the Sly Park Unit of the Central Valley Project, securing local control over
Jenkinson Lake’s facilities and water supplies. Previously, the water rights and facilities were owned by the federal government. In 2016, the District secured a fifteen-year contract with the Bureau of Reclamation for the first exercise of the Permit 21112 water right at Folsom Reservoir. This bolstered water supplies during the 2021 drought. Also mentioned were the 2020 enlargement of
El Dorado Forebay which increased emergency water supplies from 1 to 6 days which proved to be crucial during the 2021 Caldor fire and the Sly Park Intertie Project connecting two drinking water arteries with the district’s two water treatment plants in Pollock Pines. The project is set to be completed next spring and will make it possible to take ■ See EID, page A5
Daughters of the American Revolution celebrate America’s 250 years The Young American Patriots Fife and Drum Corp make their way down Town Center Boulevard.
Shelly Thorene Staff writer
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he kick-off celebration America 250, sponsored by the Charlotte Parkhurst and General John A. Sutter Chapters of the Daughters of the American Revolution was held in Town Center Sunday. DAR is a nonprofit women’s service organization founded in 1890 to preserve history and promote patriotism. According to the DAR website, “Any woman 18 years or older who can prove lineal, bloodline descent from an ancestor who aided in achieving American independence
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Democrat photo by Shelly Thorene
is eligible to join the DAR. She must provide documentation for each statement of birth, marriage and death, as well as of the Revolutionary War service of her Patriot.” The event was held to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the birth of American Democracy. The all day event featured a parade with the the Young American Patriots Fife and Drum Corp, the Highway 50 Wagon Train, kids activities, history exhibits and lectures, musical performances and the Junior American Citizen DAR National Art and Poetry contest school winners award ceremony.
Local’s investment supports next generation of agriculture Linda DuBois California Farm Bureau
Farmers Jim and Normita Spinetta invested $200,000 in a fund established by the California Farm Bureau to help cultivate the next generation of agricultural leaders. Their donation supports the California Farm Bureau’s Young Farmers & Ranchers Open Discussion Meet, a program that helped shape Jim Spinetta’s own career nearly two decades ago. Spinetta is a fourth-generation winegrape grower whose family owned the historic Charles Spinetta Winery in Amador County until three years ago, when the family sold it to Jim’s childhood friend, Robert D’Agostini. Spinetta now lives in El Dorado County, where he grows citrus fruit on 2 acres. He’s serving as both the Amador County Farm Bureau president and the El Dorado County Farm Bureau vice president.
Spinetta said the donation to the fund is a way to ensure young people in agriculture have access to the leadership-building opportunities he had. “Everyone says, ‘I need to give back,’ but my mom would always say, ‘You need to give forward. You need to establish a legacy and make a change,’ so I’m giving forward to future generations,” Spinetta said. The Discussion Meet is a competition in which young farmers gather in a committeestyle meeting to discuss four real-world agricultural challenges and find viable solutions. Spinetta won the state-level event in 2005 and went on to place in the final four at the national level the following year. He also won the Achievement Award in 2006, earning a top 10 finish nationally. The contest topics are released several months before the competition. Spinetta said he took advantage of long hours on
Photo by Brian Farinas / California Farm Bureau
Jim and Normita Spinetta, right, present a $200,000 check to California Farm Bureau officers Shannon Douglass, center, Shaun Crook and Ron Peterson at the organization’s annual meeting. a tractor to study for the meet. Spinetta noted that it’s not just the young farmers who benefit from the event. The solutions the participants come up with are often used by the Farm Bureau at the local and national levels, he said. When he won in 2005, the final round focused on the
topic, “Where will tomorrow’s agricultural workforce come from?” He pointed out that the same challenges they addressed 20 years ago are still relevant today, adding when the family’s winegrape operation tried to use local labor, “People wouldn’t want to do it, or they did it but ■ See INVESTMENT, page A9