Testimonial

Community of Fairmead

Fairmead is designated a disadvantaged unincorporated community in Madera County located along Highway 99 that intersects at Highway 152, just south of the City of Chowchilla. Fairmead was founded by the Co-Operative Land Trust Company of Palo Alto as a farming colony in 1912. Through the 1910s, Fairmead experienced significant economic growth with the agricultural production of alfalfa, fruits, and grains.

Fairmead’s population was initially made up of the Mennonite Farmers from Germany and Russia. During that same time as Fairmead's initial development, hundreds of thousands of Southern African Americans were recruited to the Central Valley by California farmers to pick cotton and other crops. Some of these recruits settled in Fairmead. As in many communities in America at the time, it was difficult for people of color to purchase homes in the cities like Chowchilla and Madera.

Initially, colonists hit water at sixty feet. Within a few years, wells to fifteen hundred feet were common, in 2023 wells need to be drilled down five hundred feet. Unlike many colony developers, the Cooperative Land and Title Company, the real estate firm that built Fairmead, left farmers to rely on groundwater rather than participate in the irrigation projects that reshaped the semi-arid Central Valley into one of the most productive regions on the planet. Ultimately, it was the lack of water that halted the town’s growth.

Today, Fairmead still lacks access to a sewer system, and the community’s access to drinking water is at risk. The core center of the community relies on two County-operated municipal wells, and residents residing in the outskirts of Fairmead rely on domestic wells.

During the previous drought, many domestic wells went dry in Fairmead as more and more acres of almonds were planted in the community, causing the water table to plummet far beneath residents’ wells. Many of these domestic wells were never replaced by the County’s emergency well replacement program, so several homes are still reliant on emergency water tanks and bottled water from the previous drought. Many domestic wells continue to run dry during the current drought.

Additionally, during the summer of 2020, Fairmead’s approximately 11-year-old community well, which is directly adjacent to 30 acres of almond orchards, began drawing up air and sediment as the groundwater levels dropped below the level of the pump. In response, Madera County expedited drilling of a second municipal well. While residents are relieved to have a second community well online, they are concerned that (without bold regulatory action) history will repeat itself. New Pistachios orchards have been planted near the new municipal well, just as almonds were planted near the first municipal well that was almost dewatered in 2020.

Residents of Fairmead are advocates for their community. To amplify the power building in their community, Fairmead Community and Friends; a 501c3 nonprofit was established in 2007. The volunteer resident driven group participated with the San Joaquin Valley Clean Water Advocates where they gained skills on topics ranging from Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) terminology, effective meeting collaboration, drinking water mitigation, and water data resources.

Fairmead residents also participated in community listening sessions with the Department of Water Resources (DWR) where residents voiced concerns regarding water challenges and advocated for the response they would like to see from DWR. This community led advocacy has resulted in implementing strategies for resiliency in the face of drought and climate change.