ANNUAL NEWSLETTER

2023 Annual Newsletter

Happy New Year to all of our OID patrons and welcome to 2023! Your OID Board of Directors and Staff would like to invite you to attend our Annual Meeting. This year’s meeting will be on Monday, January 16^th at 12 noon in the OID office. The meeting will include updates on finances, operations, maintenance, planning and direction for the upcoming year. In addition, we will discuss the current snowpack information and reservoir outlook for 2023.

Now that 2022 is behind us we can look back and be thankful for making it through another tough year. Together we were able to navigate one of the worst water years on record, historic inflation, and the fallout from a global pandemic. At the annual meeting we’ll discuss in greater detail how we were able to weather those storms as well as provide updates on several of our ongoing initiatives, including Title Transfer, Infrastructure Modernization Project, Habitat Conservation Plan, Water Management Software Rollout, and our Communications and Outreach Plan.

In last year’s newsletter I shared that Crook County continues to deal with impacts of an exceptional and prolonged drought. That reality has not changed. The US Drought Monitor shows most of Crook County as D4 (Exceptional Drought) in its December 2022 map just like it did last year. (D4 is the highest level of drought on the scale) We are the only county in the state with that distinction and we have held that for longer than any other area in Oregon. We will actively monitor precipitation and snow accumulation throughout the winter to help determine the anticipated reservoir storage for water year 2023. The early indications are encouraging but we have a long way to go before we are able to make any projections. Due to our depleted storage levels, current low average stream flows and dry soil moisture profile; planning for irrigation in 2023 should take into account the likelihood that water resources could be very short again this year.

Once again, I’d like to thank all of our patrons who came together last year to help us get through one of the worst water years on record. My hope of course is that we don’t have to do it again this year but I’m confident that we’ll make it through together.

I hope to see you at the Annual Meeting or feel free to drop by and say ‘Hi’ anytime.

Sincerely,

Bruce Scanlon
Ochoco Irrigation District

It is OID’s mission to effectively and efficiently serve the current and future irrigation needs of our patrons by economically operating and maintaining the districts resources with honesty and integrity.