A newsletter for our employees and friends
Summer 2006
CONTENTS
COACHELLA VALLEY
CANAL JOB
FOREMEN’S
ANNUAL SAFETY
MEETING
MESSAGE FROM
BOB BROSAMER
PROTECTING
CRITTERS ON
THE JOB
THE SAFETY ZONE
RENEWING
FRIENDSHIPS
MEET OUR
NEW FAMILY
MEMBERS
MEET OUR
NEW EMPLOYEES
PAYROLL PEOPLE
EMPLOYEE PROFILE
CONSERVING PRECIOUS WATER
THROUGH THE COACHELLA VALLEY
&L BROSAMER, THE
COACHELLA VALLEY WATER
DISTRICT AND THE FEDERAL
BUREAU OF RECLAMATION
broke ground in October
2004 for a new
36-mile concrete-lined
waterway to replace the last remaining
earthen portion of the 122-mile
Coachella Valley Canal in Southern
California, outside Niland (Imperial
County). The Coachella Valley Canal
diverts an average of 330,000 acre-feet
of Colorado River annually to the
Coachella Valley to irrigate 80,000
acres of predominately farmland.
This two and one-half year canal
lining project will preserve 26,000
acre-feet of water annually that has
long been lost to natural seepage.
Construction of the mostly earthen
Coachella Valley Canal began in the
1930s, and was completed in the late
1940s. Local farms first received water
in 1949. Initially, 38 miles of the canal
were concrete-lined; a parallel, con-
crete canal to address seepage replaced an
additional 48 miles in 1980. Since 1949, the
remaining 36 miles of canal have remained
earthen-lined, and seepage has become an
increasingly expensive issue.
“In 1980, when water wasn’t worth all that
much, they replaced only a portion of the
earthen canal,” says Shawn Otheim, R&L
Brosamer project manager. “Now that water
is worth its weight in gold, the water district
decided it was time to line the remaining
section of the canal.”
When the work is completed and all water
runs through the fully concrete-lined canal,
the amount of Colorado River water diverted
into the canal will be reduced by an amount
equal to the net savings. The canal construc-
tion site is located just north of Niland, and
extends north to the western border of the
Salton Sea, east of the city of Mecca.
The Coachell