The company that sells Arrowhead bottled water has been denied a permit by the U.S. Forest Service to continue its nearly century-old practice of drawing water from the San Bernardino Mountains.
In a letter dated July 26, San Bernardino National Forest District Ranger Michael Nobles informed Blue Triton Brands’ to immediately cease operations and remove its equipment and infrastructure from Strawberry Canyon, located northeast of the Arrowhead Springs Hotel, where Blue Triton draws its water in gravity-fed pipes.
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The hotel is owned by the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, which also receives a substantial amount of water from Blue Triton’s pipeline, according to Nobles’ letter and a spokesperson for Blue Triton.
Nobles said the company’s failure to provide requested information in its permit application, particularly concerning the use of water being taken from forest lands, left the federal agency with no alternative but to deny the application.
Blue Triton, formerly known as Nestle Waters North America Inc., did not show it met forest land management standards pertaining to the construction, operation and maintenance of tunnels that minimize adverse effects on groundwater aquifers and their surface expressions, Nobles said in his letter.
“Compliance with state law in regards to water rights and uses is a precondition to the issuance of any special use permit,” Nobles said.
In a statement, a spokesperson for Blue Triton said the permit denial “has no legal merit, is unsupported by the facts, and negatively impacts the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, who rely on our renewable and sustainable water operations in Strawberry Canyon for water use and fire suppression needs.”
On Tuesday, Aug. 6, Blue Triton challenged the Forest Service’s action and filed a federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court, District of Columbia. Its statement said Blue Triton will continue to operate in compliance with all state and federal laws while it explores “legal and regulatory options on this matter.”
The Forest Service, according to Blue Triton Brands, has agreed to issue a temporary 30-day stay for the sole purpose of supplying the needs of the San Manuel tribe, including for fire prevention during the ongoing fire season.
Officials with the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians declined to comment Thursday, Aug. 8, saying the tribe is not part of Blue Triton’s permit application process nor the Forest Service’s denial of the application.
Blue Triton, which bottles and sells the water it collects as Arrowhead 100% Mountain Spring Water, maintains that, for nearly a decade and in coordination with the Forest Service, it has engaged expert scientific consultants who have studied the Strawberry Canyon area in an unprecedented level of detail. Dozens of technical studies, analyses, reports and submissions have been conducted, the company said.
“The findings and robust data set developed through these multi-year hydrological and ecological studies, some of which are ongoing, show no material difference between environmental and habitat conditions in the Strawberry Canyon watershed where we operate and the adjacent canyons where we do not operate,” a company spokesperson said in the statement.
“These studies prove that our careful stewardship of the water and land for over 100 years has not negatively affected the Strawberry Canyon environment. Credible evidence to the contrary has never been presented.”
On June 25, the nonprofit environmental group Save Our Forest Association filed a federal lawsuit against the Forest Service in U.S. District Court in Riverside, alleging the agency was violating federal laws by allowing Blue Triton to draw water from the canyon.
According to the lawsuit, Blue Triton’s special use permit expired in 1988, but the Forest Service allowed the company to continue diverting water. The U.S. Geological Survey, according to the lawsuit, documented that Strawberry Creek had become “dry and diminished,” leading to impaired riparian fauna and flora and a creek that cannot support fish.
“Blue Triton’s occupancy has dewatered Strawberry Creek and diverted natural springs leaving a Strawberry Creek with only intermittent pooling water and fractured habitats,” according to the lawsuit, which is still pending.
Rachel Doughty, the attorney representing the environmental group in the lawsuit, said the Forest Service’s denial of Blue Triton’s application was a step closer to resolving her clients’ lawsuit.
“We are aligned with the Forest Service now,” she said in a telephone interview Thursday.
In September 2023, state water regulators ordered Blue Triton to stop using some of its natural springs it has relied on for more than a century, maintaining that the company did not have permission to use the water. The order by the California Water Resources Control Board, however, did not ban the company from taking any water from the mountain, but it did significantly reduce how much the company could take.
Blue Triton has challenged that ruling as well, and the lawsuit remains pending in Fresno County Superior Court.
