By Thomas Wood

Leadership at the Marin Municipal Water District has proposed raising the Nicasio Reservoir spillway to increase the level of the reservoir by more than 4 feet. It could have drastic consequences for Nicasio residents, especially for the Nicasio School, which serves students from kindergarten through eighth grade.

The period for submitting public comment closes on Aug. 4. As a director of the Nicasio Historical Society Board, I am writing, with the concurrence of the other directors, to inform readers about the reservoir’s 65-year history while explaining why the already annual flooding in Nicasio at the reservoir’s current level may be made much worse by raising it.

The community of Nicasio has had a fraught relationship with MMWD since the building of Nicasio Reservoir in 1960 put six thriving ranches completely out of business and crippled four more through loss of critical acreage. The doomed ranches saw their fences torn down, their homes, barns, outbuildings and fences bulldozed and burned, and their fertile land scraped clean of vegetation before the reservoir waters covered that land forever.

Longtime ranching families watched their homes destroyed, as their livelihoods were taken away. Rancher Heloise Tomasini recalled, “They cut everything down, all the trees, and dozed them into the creek bed, and they dozed the Gallaghers’ and our place and the Tognaldas’ across, knocked down the barns and the house and burned them … they set fire to everything. … It was just very, very sad.”

The overbearing take-it-or-leave-it tactics of MMWD made no friends in Nicasio. Indeed, reaction to the peremptory treatment of the ranchers led to the formation of the Nicasio Land Owners Association, which seeks to protect the character of Nicasio, and to have a voice in Marin County policy initiatives and development proposals affecting the area.

In the 65 years of Nicaso Reservoir’s operation, sediment and debris have visibly accumulated in its main feeder, Nicasio Creek, and the reservoir itself appears to be shallower from deposits of silt. In storms, Nicasio Creek swells to a high, swift torrent and, joined with water from tributary streams, routinely causes flooding in the low-lying terrain at the south end of the reservoir, most notably on the Nicasio School grounds.

In 2006, then-Nicasio School Principal Kathleen Ferrando described this winter flooding in a letter requesting help from Marin Water, noting that the yearly dredging of the creek behind the school had “not been done in the last several years” and that “the build-up (of sediment) in the creek may have added to the (flooding) problems as well.”

I expect that raising the height of the reservoir would exponentially amplify the winter flood waters that could sweep over the Nicasio School campus, fields, wells and septic systems. With the proposed rise, I suspect several homes and properties along Nicasio Creek that already flood in big storms will experience even worse flooding. The Nicasio Town Square, the main road through town, and acres of neighboring ranch lands can be expected to flood as well.

The water district’s own preliminary maps predict inundation of low-lying areas close to town, even during the dry season. In wet seasons, I believe the higher level of the reservoir, coupled with the large volume of winter runoff, could significantly damage Nicasio’s infrastructure of roads, bridges and culverts, and cause disastrous flooding of Nicasio School.

MMWD must explore alternatives to this project.

The historical evidence over 65 years tells the story. The facts on the ground are inescapable; raising the dam even 1 foot would increase flooding, but the proposed rise of more than 4 feet could be devastating, especially to Nicasio School. Although no Nicasio resident is connected to Marin Water’s system, we are sympathetic to the desire to increase its water storage. But obtaining extra storage must not come at the cost of the severe flooding in our town that could result if Marin Water were permitted to proceed with its proposal to raise Nicasio Reservoir.

Thomas Wood, of Nicasio, is a plein air landscape painter, and a board member for the Nicasio Historical Society.