State's Faulty Groundwater Portal Grinds to a Halt as Kings County Farmer Deadline Nears

California farmers in the Tulare Lake and Tule subbasins face a looming deadline to report groundwater usage, but the state's reporting system has failed. The state's GEARS (Groundwater Extraction Annual Reporting System) portal crashed on Monday, just weeks before a mandatory May 1 reporting deadline for farmers in Kings County and parts of Tulare County.

Farmers under probation must report pumping, meter wells at a $300 fee, and pay $20 per acre-foot pumped, with exemptions for small users. Local water managers report the portal is "a mess," with extremely low success rates for data uploads, predicting major compliance gaps.

The State Water Board has scheduled emergency in-person workshops in the region to help farmers navigate the broken system before the deadline arrives.