Rules aimed at long-contaminated groundwater drive California farmers and residents to court

Some California farming communities have been plagued for years by problems with their drinking water due to nitrates and other contaminants in the groundwater that feeds their wells

Near fields awash with strawberries and greens, Ileana Miranda and her family pay $72 a month to get water piped into their home in a rural California community — and that's before they consume a drop.

They pay to bring it from more than a mile away because the groundwater beneath them has been contaminated with nitrates leached into the soil from years of large-scale farming.

Now, the San Jerardo cooperative — where Miranda and 300 others live — and environmental organizations have sued the state, demanding stricter rules about how much fertilizer farmers can use in the hope that the next generation of residents in the community 100 miles (161 kilometers) southeast of San Francisco will have cleaner water.

“We understand crops need these chemicals to grow, but you don't need to put that much in the groundwater,” said Miranda, who manages the cooperative. “It is essentially poisoning the groundwater that we need to live.”

Some California farming communities have been plagued for years by problems with their drinking water due to nitrates and other contaminants in the groundwater that feeds their wells. Advocates have long pushed to remedy the situation, which disproportionately affects low-income and Latino residents, many who worked in the same fields where farmers are accused of leaving too much nitrate behind.