Supplied Entirely by Local Groundwater

The Kinneloa Irrigation District draws all of its water from local groundwater. The District imports no water from the Colorado River or Northern California and purchases no water from neighboring agencies for its everyday supply. The KID service area sits atop the Pasadena subarea of the Raymond Basin, a vast underground aquifer bounded on the north by the San Gabriel Mountains, on the south and east by the Raymond Fault, and on the west by the San Rafael Hills. Rain and mountain snowmelt percolate into the basin's soils and rock, where the water is naturally stored and, because of the basin's faults and formations, replenished by surface flows from the San Gabriel Mountains.

In a normal year, the District's customers use approximately 600 acre-feet of water — about 196 million gallons. Every drop is produced locally, disinfected, and delivered through the District's own wells, reservoirs, and pipelines.

The January 2025 Eaton Fire significantly impacted the District and its community. Recovery and rebuilding are ongoing, and the description below reflects the current state of the District's water sources as the system is restored.

The Raymond Basin

The Raymond Basin was adjudicated in 1944 in City of Pasadena v. City of Alhambra — the first basin-wide adjudication of groundwater rights in California — and has been managed by the Raymond Basin Management Board, appointed Watermaster in 1984. Within the basin's Pasadena subarea, the District holds decreed rights to 516 acre-feet per year.

Since 2008, the District has operated under a voluntary 30% pumping reduction to help protect basin water levels, setting its current annual baseline production right at 361.2 acre-feet. Basin levels have been relatively stable since then and rose following the back-to-back wet years of 2022–2023 and 2023–2024. Because average demand exceeds the baseline right, the District supplements its pumping through spreading credits and, when needed, by leasing rights from other basin parties.

2 Active Groundwater Wells

The District's primary supply comes from two vertical groundwater wells, both pumping from the Pasadena subarea of the Raymond Basin and both disinfected at the wellhead before entering the distribution system:

• K-3 Well — originally drilled in 1965 and redeveloped in 1989; delivers water to the Eucalyptus or Wilcox Reservoirs.
• Wilcox Well — originally drilled in 1924 and redeveloped to 581 feet in 1976; delivers water to the Wilcox Reservoir.

With the groundwater tunnels currently bypassed to spreading, these two wells supply all of the water delivered to KID customers. Production at both wells has declined over time with basin water levels and aging pump-and-motor equipment, and both are prioritized for rehabilitation in the District's capital improvement plan.

5 Groundwater Tunnels

Long before electric pumps, water was "mined" from these foothills through hand-dug tunnels — some dating to the 1880s, originally built to serve the ranches of the area. A horizontal shaft, or "drift," was dug into a hillside until it reached a water-bearing fault, and the water was then collected and piped to its destination. The District owns, but no longer operates, its five groundwater tunnels:

• Delores Tunnel
• Far Mesa Tunnel
• High-Low Pressure Tunnels
• House Tunnel
• Eucalyptus Tunnel

Several tunnels had been taken offline in recent years for elevated fluoride or bacteriological results. Today, all tunnel flows are bypassed to spreading basins, where the water percolates into the ground and earns the District groundwater recharge credits — leaving the District's two active groundwater wells to supply all water delivered to customers.

Spreading Operations

Under a methodology first established in 1973 and revised in 1994, the District can divert surface and tunnel water into spreading basins and earn recapture credits that are added to its adjudicated pumping rights. In general, the District receives a recharge credit equal to 80% of the water it spreads. With all tunnel flow currently directed to spreading, these credits — and continued investment in the tunnels — remain central to stretching the District's supply beyond its baseline pumping right and to long-term supply reliability.

0 Acre-Feet of Imported Water

The District is a member agency of the Foothill Municipal Water District (FMWD), one of 26 member agencies of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD), which imports water from the Colorado River and Northern California. Because there is no physical pipeline connecting the District to FMWD or MWD facilities, the District has never received imported water — a connection would require miles of new transmission pipeline and additional storage. The District pays an annual administrative share to FMWD, and its customers are assessed MWD-related charges on their property tax bills.

5 Emergency Interconnections

The District maintains five interconnections with neighboring Pasadena Water and Power (PWP), allowing either agency to deliver water to the other during emergencies — an important layer of resilience for a small, self-supplied district. When the 2025 Eaton Fire broke out, District staff activated the Pasadena interconnection within 20 minutes of notification, sustaining emergency supply through the night and keeping fire hydrants charged for firefighting operations. Water delivered through an interconnection is repaid in kind or reimbursed under the terms of the interconnection agreement.