(Disclosure: Rose Law Group represents Fondomonte Arizona.)
Key Points:
- Lawyer for farmers and cities seeks to join lawsuit against Attorney General Kris Mayes
- Mayes accuses Fondomonte LLC of creating public nuisance by withdrawing too much groundwater
- Judge will soon rule on whether farmers can join lawsuit as affected parties
By Howard Fischer | Capitol Media Services
Saying she’s trying to overturn decades of settled water law, the lawyer for a group of farmers, businesses and cities told a judge they should be able to join the legal fight against Attorney General Kris Mayes.
Attorney Brad Pew acknowledged on August 12 that the attorney general, to this point, has filed suit against only Fondomonte LLC, with Mayes accusing it of creating a public nuisance because of the amount of groundwater it is withdrawing to grow alfalfa in western Arizona. The result, the attorney general argues, is that the company, a subsidiary of a Saudi dairy producer Alamari, is harming other nearby landowners.
But Pew told Maricopa County Superior Court Judge John Blanchard that what Mayes is doing is a wholesale attack on rural groundwater users.
“This case … is an open attempt to utilize the court system to disrupt long-standing statutory law governing groundwater use in Arizona,” he said.
More to the point, Pew contends — and Mayes does not disagree — that nothing farmers are doing actually violates state water law. And the attorney general admitted she has filed her nuisance lawsuit because the Legislature has failed to enact regulations and limits on pumping in rural Arizona.
What that means, Blanchard said, is that the outcome of Mayes’ unique lawsuit against Fondomonte could set a new legal precedent, one that would affect members of the Arizona Farm and Ranch Group Coalition which represents not just farmers, ranchers and cattle feeders, but also irrigation districts and cities like Holbook, Show Low and Winslow that pump — and rely on — groundwater.
That contention is being backed by Rose Law Group litigation attorney Briana Campbell, who represents Fondomonte. She wants Pew’s clients on her side when the case goes to trial.
And Campbell told Blanchard this legal fight is not just about alfalfa, saying that there are other crops grown in Arizona like cotton, that use more water, all of which could be affected by the outcome of this lawsuit.
“If Fondomonte, acting within the law, can be held as a public nuisance by the state of Arizona through the usurping of the Legislature, then so can every other farmer in Arizona,” Campbell said. And she told Blanchard those other operations — the ones Pew represents — also are entitled to be in court to argue that there is no legal basis for what Mayes is trying to do.
