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2025 Regular Session Introduced by George Borrello and 4 co-sponsors

Idaho SB 1041 would let owning irrigation entities appoint and set compensation for managers of main ditches, prorate fees by irrigated acres, and collect if unpaid.

DEFEATED IN CODES

Summary — Senate Bill No. 1041 (Idaho, 2025) — Irrigation and Drainage (Amend § 42‑909)

Status: Introduced March 13, 2025; DEFEATED in Committee on the Codes (05/05/2025).
Primary focus: amends Idaho Code § 42‑909 concerning appointment and compensation of managers for distributing laterals, ditches, or other conduits. (Note: legislative record contains unrelated materials from other jurisdictions also labeled “S.1041”; this summary addresses the Idaho bill that amends § 42‑909.)

Purpose / Intent

To clarify and revise who may appoint and set compensation for a manager of a distributing lateral, ditch, or other conduit when multiple water users take water from the same point; and to provide optional appointment authority to irrigation districts, canal companies, or other irrigation entities that own the main conduit.

Key provisions

Amends Idaho Code § 42‑909 to explicitly add “canal company, or other irrigation entity” alongside irrigation districts as an entity that may make appointments and set manager compensation when such an entity owns the main ditch, canal, conduit, or reservoir.

Changes appointment language so that when an irrigation district, canal company, or other irrigation entity owns the main conduit, the board of directors of that entity may (optional) — rather than must — make the appointment upon demand by a party taking water.

Transfers the authority to fix a manager’s compensation, in the ownership scenario above, from the district watermaster to the board of directors of the irrigation district/canal company/other irrigation entity.

Requires the secretary of the owning entity, at the irrigation manager’s request at season end, to prorate the manager’s compensation among users according to irrigated acres and mail statements requesting payment. If users fail to remit by the date when irrigation district assessments are delinquent, the manager may collect as provided in § 42‑910.

Includes an emergency clause and an effective date provision in the text (proposed effective date: July 1, 2025, if enacted).

Who would be affected

Irrigation districts, canal companies, and other irrigation entities that own main ditches, canals, conduits, or reservoirs

Boards of directors and secretaries of those entities (new/clarified duties)

District watermasters (reduced appointment/compensation authority in ownership cases)

Managers of distributing laterals/ditches and the water users served by those laterals (administrative/proration and collection procedures)

Procedural / timeline notes

Introduced in the Idaho Senate (Resources & Environment Committee) March 2025.

Included an emergency/expedited effective date (July 1, 2025) in the bill text.

According to the supplied bill information, the measure was defeated in the Codes committee on May 5, 2025, and therefore did not advance to become law.

Bill