The Visalia City Council met on Monday, December 18, 2023, beginning with a work session at 5:00 PM to discuss city-owned orchard operations, followed by a closed session at 6:00 PM, reconvening for special presentations at 6:30 PM, and the regular session at 7:00 PM. All council members were present except Vice Mayor Brett Taylor. The meeting included work session discussions, consent calendar items (with three items pulled for separate consideration), public hearings on annexations and the Housing Element update, and multiple special recognitions.
City Manager Leslie Cavillia presented a detailed analysis of the city’s 900+ acres of orchard properties at the Water Reclamation Facility. The city currently farms 131 acres of walnuts (variety Tulare, planted 2015), 443 acres of pecans (planted 2013-2015), and 408 acres of row crop land (formerly intended for pistachios). Financial data showed substantial losses: walnuts cost ~$4,000/acre with revenue recently as low as $0.20/lb; pecans cost ~$3,500/acre; net losses ranged from $2,300 to $3,300 per acre over the past four years. Walnut trees suffer from crown gall disease and poor market prospects, while pecan trees are healthy and increasing production (expected $1.35–$1.65/lb in 2024 but still not breaking even). Staff recommended:
Seeing all staff here, I'm gonna bring it back to council work session item number one. West side farming operation, consideration of staff recommendations regarding the city owned orchard properties located at the water reclamation facility. Thank you, members of council, Leslie Cavillia, city manager, and in some instances just the last person standing on this one. So here we go. We're going to talk about west side farming, and by that I mean the approximately 900 acres that the city owns out by the wastewater treatment plant. In my estimation, it was a brilliant move many, many decades ago to purchase that land to protect the treatment plant for both changes in the regulations for growth and protecting it because everybody says they don't mind living next to treatment plant until they do, kind of like an airport, and then they do, and then it's very difficult. So I do think it was a very wise decision. Um we'll talk a little bit more about how other decisions came about. So why did the city actually start farming there? Um I was not directly involved in the um initial decisions. I was sitting kind of with that back row gallery back there when the decision was made listening, and remember it seeming very reasonable and a well measured and thought out opportunity because they were looking for something that they could utilize that land for in a productive way. They did, as I remember, engage with people in the industry as to what it might look like, and the decision was made to go from all one type of nut in a permanent planning into three different types walnuts, um, pecans, and pistachios. We never planned the pistachios, but um you know there was a decision made to diversify that crop. Um they went out for RFPs for the farm manager. Uh it was it was uh like I said, uh what seemingly was a well thought out um process. Uh but then life changed. And so it was all before. All before there were groundwater sustainability issues, uh, long before there was a drought, long before there was prevailing wage, which was then required to be utilized if we were farming as well, uh, long before COVID, um, long before the market dropped, long before varieties changes, it was just a different time. And so what became what began as something that made sense, and it had originally been uh leased out ground, and they found that as the lease got to the end, the grower was not necessarily taking great care of the of the trees, and we ended up with something that wasn't productive and something we could continue with. Um so they had gone with a fresh plant. Um we have before us now a very different situation in the farming environment and agriculture in Tularie County. And so we're gonna talk about some of that today. Um that we often talk about two types of farming. Um we had uh crops out on the east side, and we now have basins that are under construction out there, as well as there's well over a hundred acres that will become a park. So that used to be all farmed, but when we began to build the basins, the way the irrigation system was uh designed, it was no longer feasible to farm any of the permanent crops that were out there. Um so we no longer are farming on the east side. On the west side, however, we do have over 900 acres, and you can see in the yellow here, it's the walnut. The yellow off there on the upper left-hand corner is where the walnuts are. You can see the plant that is south of there. You see the walnuts were planted in 2015. The pecans were planted in three stages, um uh 20 uh 13, 14, and 15. And again, that's a that's a good strategy, so that they all don't end exactly at the same time. And then where you do see the row crop land, um, as I remember all of that was gonna go into pistachios, but the pistachio market began to change somewhat. Um, and again, I was not involved in the in the direct discussions, but the decision was made to hold off, especially uh in 2015 is when the groundwater sustainability agency came into being, and knowing that there was a great unknown in the ways of water and what was moving forward. So we do have the acreage that is out there now in two types of permanent crops. Hey, quick question on that. How many leaves is it for a pecan before it turns full production and how many leaves for the walnuts? Good question. So walnuts tend to be at least seven, between seven and ten is what you know, and in researching with folks more recently. It varies between seven and ten, but by seven, you've you're somewhat into the productive the full production. Um but it will strengthen over the next couple of years as well. Pecans tend to be 10 to 13. Again, 10 is kind of generally where you get and say, okay, I'm probably starting to break even on them. Um not the case now because of the downturn in the industry, but it is about that point. Thank you. So let's talk financials, and it's not fun. So when you look at it, we're gonna look over the last four years. Now, you know, you probably know I do come from a farming background. Um we do farm and we plant citrus, we know that we it is going to be red ink for us for 10 years. That's a given.