Vineyard owner sues Napa County over well permit policy

“Wine is for drinking; water is for fighting.” The latest example of what could be the North Coast version of that quote misattributed to Mark Twain is a local wine grape grower’s federal lawsuit against Napa County over well permits.

Jayson Woodbridge, whose St. Helena-based Hundred Acre Vineyard has produced a string of 100-point-scoring wines over the past two decades, sued the county in San Francisco district court Sept. 5, alleging the county planning department overstepped state and federal laws and its own policies by requiring applicants for new well permits on the Napa Valley floor to commit to pumping significantly less than the limit on comparable existing permits.

“Any owner seeking a new well permit is being subjected to a 70% reduction in allowable water use, as compared with existing wells. That is not a legitimate use of the county’s regulatory authority,” said one of Woodbridge’s attorneys in the case, Jonathan Bass of Coblentz Patch Duffy & Bass in San Francisco and Napa.

Woodbridge’s legal team acknowledged in the 15-page complaint that the county can “exercise some degree of lawful authority” over groundwater under his vineyards and “exercise certain other regulatory functions” on his businesses.

At issue is whether the county’s approach to a 9-year-old state law that set up coordinated management of groundwater undid more than a century of legal precedent over what rights property owners have over the water underground, called “overlying” rights. Woodbridge is claiming county actions amounted to a taking of property and alleging federal constitutional violations. He’s seeking a jury trial to determine damages and also legal fees.

This is Woodbridge’s second legal action in as many years alleging county overreach of its authority.

Holly Dawson, deputy county CEO, responded to a request for clarification on policy and comment on the legal action, writing in an email, “The county’s standard practice is to refrain from commenting on potential or ongoing litigation.”

Fixing the local well-permitting system is “definitely top of mind for the agricultural community — by far,” according to Ryan Klobas, CEO of Napa County Farm Bureau.

“Mr. Woodbridge’s concerns are absolutely valid and have been echoed by many people that have talked to me about this issue,” Klobas said. “But I think that the ongoing conversations that we're having with Napa County are focused around trying to understand what the scientific and data approaches are to these regulations. Hopefully, the county will continue to engage the grower community about this.”

Klobas said the farm bureau has asked the county to schedule town hall meetings with growers to discuss the permitting process, because the midday meetings of the groundwater regulation technical work group are challenging for farmers to attend.

The Napa Valley Subbasin Groundwater Sustainability Agency was formed in December 2019, with the county Board of Supervisors as its directors. Agency meetings generally are held the same day the board meets, while the agency’s technical advisory group meets the second Thursday of the month at 1:30 p.m.

Woodbridge had applied for well permits for three of four St. Helena and Calistoga vineyards involved in the lawsuit. The county told his project team in September 2022 and on Aug. 29 of this year that a 0.3-acre-foot annual water-pumping limit would have to be agreed to before obtaining a permit, according to the court document. The responses convinced him not to apply for the fourth permit, the filing said.

Before the middle of last year, the pumping limit — or “water budget” — for valley floor wells was 1 acre foot per year, based on a 2015 county water availability analysis. (An acre-foot is 326,000 gallons, or about the annual amount of water used by roughly two average California households.)

That analysis was crafted to comply with court rulings and regulations since the state Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, which was signed in 2014 and took effect in 2017. Passed during a multiyear drought that saw federal and state agencies battling property owners for use of underground water, the law was intended to develop a coordinated approach to groundwater use over two decades.

Then in February 2022 amid the third dry winter in a row, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order that public agencies were barred from issuing new or altered well permits without determining whether the change would affect nearby wells or cause the ground to collapse, damaging infrastructure.

A key contention of Woodbridge’s lawsuit is that neither the state groundwater law nor the governor’s order affected overlying water rights, even ones that hadn’t yet been put into use. And county policy is that well permits are ministerial, meaning they would be issued if conditions were met.

Thus, the complaint contends, the county’s new well limits that differentiate between existing permits and new permits violate the Fifth and 14th amendments of the U.S. Constitution, covering self-incrimination and equal protection, respectively.

Nearly a year ago, Woodbridge sued in Napa County Superior Court over county policy to replant trees damaged or destroyed by recent wildfires. Instead, he planted a vineyard, arguing that it would act as a fire break, something vineyard trade groups have asserted as a benefit from such acreage in Wine Country in recent conflagrations.

That case is still proceeding in court. The judge granted a scaled-back temporary restraining order from what the county had requested, barring further installation of hillside vineyards until the case is resolved, according to a spokesperson for Woodbridge.

Jeff Quackenbush covers wine, construction and real estate. Reach him at jquackenbush@busjrnl.com or 707-521-4256.