He kept planting more and more trees. It wont hurt the canal, he said. Ag Giants Boswell, Vidovich Sling Mud at Each Other He is irrigating 121,000 of those acres. The dispute over the no fly zone was finally resolved by the invention of a netting that Resnick sheathes around his mandarins each spring. I take out my cellphone and swipe across Google Maps. She joined the Oakland Tribune in 2001. Water rights are like democracy, he told Forbes in 1989. Rubbish, said Vidovich, in a Los Altos office decorated with maps of his land holdings. Look, I delegate a lot of things, obviously. Inside, a Wonderful media specialist sees that Resnick needs to be rescued. Still, none of it would have happened without luck., What he and Lynda had done with the wretched pomegranate was another matter. It sure looks heavier than last year., Bernard smiles and nods to the others. Water War New Money Vs. Old Power in Parched California By the time they returned to Beverly Hills, he had lost interest in a book about his life, at least one that I might write. I waited five years before placing another call to his headquarters. But if its the tube that Im looking to follow, I must drive through the almond grove. The fight between the Tulare Lake Canal Company, controlled by the J.G. In a report filed Wednesday with the county . John, his oldest son, had served in the military as an intelligence officer and graduated from Santa Clara law school. This isnt any road. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you. She didnt understand his drive. Right there in the big canal of the Dudley Ridge Water District. The Boswell company, their attorneys and Tulare Lake Canal Company president Mark Unruh did not respond to repeated requests for comment. The water sent to Kern County1.4 million acre-feet a yearhas doubled the cropland. Its not easy to hear, but Im not going to sugarcoat this, she says. How can another record crop be sitting pretty on these trees? But you take some risks in business. But Vidovich has a history of selling and shipping water outside the valley, so some locals dont trust him. Scott: So we should talk about the labor that makes this all possible. In a profile of Vidovich written by Lois Henry then of The Bakersfield Californian now writing exclusively for her own service, SJVWater the farmer-lawyer-real estate magnate made no bones about where local misgivings began. As we hop down from the van to inspect the pomegranates on the eve of harvest, Resnick motions to Bernards belly. Theres a lot of people who dont like me, he said after his fathers death. There is a local water bank, a kind of underground lake, that the Resnicks control. Our relatives have been patient. He worries because there isnt enough water now to properly irrigate the almonds, pistachios, and pomegranates. This was how a billionaire who needed more water did politics. The Sotos made a name for themselves in Lost Hills by taking their taco trucks into the agricultural fields. Each bush is saddled with more than a hundred pomegranates the size of softballs and baseballs. Background details that you might want to know . Only after the media were alerted did Stewart and Lynda claim to have discovered the clear-cutting. Father Stephen excelled in land deals, trading the toil of farming for successful real estate offices and expense accounts. Shes now providing tutors and counselors in every region of California to boost the graduation rate. The Wheat King begets the Cattle King, and the Cattle King begets the Cotton King, and the Cotton King begets the Nut King and Pomegranate Queen. His 15 million trees in the San Joaquin Valley consume more than 400,000 acre-feet of water a year. He emptied the sky of tens of millions of geese and drained the 800 square miles of Tulare Lake dry. Pablo prunes and irrigates the almond and pistachio trees and applies the chemicals that cannot be applied by helicopter. Rather, they say, theyre harvesting health and happiness around the world through our iconic consumer brands. Their crops arent crops but heart-healthy snacks and life-extending elixirs. The bells in the churches pealed, and out came the villagers with their scythes and axes, believing they had found the reason for their poverty. The pipeline will pose a constant and continued threat to the easements function, compromising the structural integrity of the easement through saturation and subsidence or by negligent maintenance, wrote attorney Leonard Herr. But this outwardly unassuming multimillionaire has become a lightning rod of controversy. Special Report: Small Farmers Struggle as Ag Titans Boswell, Vidovich The compass in my car says Im headed east, but that means almost nothing inside a province of 15 million trees. Past Bakersfield and the high school football stadium where Frank Gifford and Les Richter, two future NFL Hall of Famers, squared off in the Valley Championship in 1947 in the driving rain. John Vidovich is 67 years old and was born on 11/23/1955. Four tribes of Yokut lived along its shores. But most of this water has been spent by the Resnicks and other account holders in years two, three, and four of the drought. John Vidovich, Student Loan Corp: Profile and Biography Her brother-in-law was killed recently in a car crash along Highway 46. He never knows when, but the pattern is the same, based on flight radar recordings. He had no intention of farming it, either. Stewart would deny that Giblers reporting played a part in their philanthropy. The states massive plumbing system is sending virtually nothing to farmers. A day later, I get a call from Mr. Resnick. It must have wounded all the more because she and Stewart thought of themselves as progressive Democrats. No rain in five years. Vidovich went home with $74 million in his pocket. Support. George Shirakawa Jr. once counted on Santa Clara County taxpayers and campaign contributors to be his benefactors, as he spent public money and campaign funds on luxury rental cars, gambling junkets, vacations and lavish dinners for staff and political allies. Scott: How sustainable is this operation given that California only recently came out of a long drought and may actually be headed there again soon? He unfolds a $20 bill from a wad he keeps inside a bent paper clip, and we take a seat in the far corner. John T Vidovich, 67 - Los Altos, CA - Has Court or Arrest Records Now theres something here. Thats $83 a tree. Uneasy about the slow plan to siphon Valley water for Southern California, farmers and water managers are worrying about a large land owner in the region. One cousin arrived only last week. She seems a little nervous waiting in the wings. Lets meet again in two weeks, he said. What? Lupe and Manuel, like many of the residents, grew up next to each other in a pueblo called San Antonio deep in the state of Guerrero, a mountainous region of dramatic beauty. Boswell, who owned more land and controlled more water than any other person in the West for most of the 20th century. On our trips to Disneyland, I must have blinkered my eyes heading down 99. The helicopter buzzing started in February, scattering cattle. I think I paid $9 million. Theyre the 300-pound gorilla, said Mark Grewal of Grewal Consulting, who worked for J.G. Then he turned and faced me. I sort of remember growing up on a farm, he said. I would have worn my Levis, he says, but Lyndas here, and she thinks I dress like a bum. Were standing in the sun outside the plants corporate office, a building whose clean lines and retro furniture wear the imprint of Lynda, too. They arrive in Chevy trucks and Dodge vans and spill out in groups of four or five under the sweat-stained hats of the 49ers, Penn State, and the Yankees. Frankly, Im having too much fun to think about retiring., Even if he were inclined to wind down, he had no successor in mind. But that doesnt make people buy a second bottle. She is twinkling from earlobe and finger. Wow. The image of water moves on and on through miles of western Kern. You may have never heard of John Vidovich, but his impact on the day-to-day life of the average southern San Joaquin Valley farmer is difficult to be understated. Since it is also true that Lost Hills has belonged to the Resnicks for 30 years, one of us might have blurted out, What took you so long to find it? As the film runs to credits, I can see that one credit is missing. Too many pomegranates. He takes a look at his watch. He used to work for the Resnicks before Stewart put him in charge of the district. They settled in Brooklyn among Jews who had fled their own pogroms, and his grandfather went into the needle-and-embroidery trade. I park the car and walk in the direction of a scattering of buildings slapped together with stucco and corrugated tin. He gambled on the price of nuts going up, and he gambled on the water never going dry. Selfo works 50 hours a week as an irrigator. Lupe says no one in her family, and none of her friends living in the trailer park or on the other side of town, drinks the water that comes out of the pipe. This was Lost Hills before Lynda got involved. A lot of it is undocumented and they are in these sort of company towns that you describe that are maybe even more sort of dedicated to the company than most. His frat brother got bored, as rich boys do, and Resnick bought out his half interest for $300. John Vidovich is a real estate developer who specializes in land use and development deals involving everything from mobile home parks and large apartment complexes to wine vineyards, pistachio farms and water baron. The sale is still considered a blow to Kings' water portfolio by other farmers. Then hed lose his temper and get the strap out.. For a long time, she got no credit. Iranian pistachios show up in Tel Aviv as nuts from Turkey. Welcome to San Antonio del Norte, he says. When the next shift ends, he tells me, the gym will fill up with workers looking to win the cash bonuses from the companys GetFit program. But, until now, nobody had the money to fight back.. The Resnicks are growing again. To change the microbial life in our digestive tracts and reduce inflammation that leads to disease, we have to reintroduce fermented foods into our diet. So in that time, we started cleaning windows, too. They named the business Clean Time Building Maintenance. Thats when the Resnicks decided to sell the concept of wellness to their 4,300 employees throughout the valley the same way they sell workplace safety. We are horrified by the lack of regard for both neighbor and nature, and we hope that the community will accept our deepest and most sincere apologies and find it in their hearts to forgive us. They pledge to donate the 380 acres to charity. Two strains of salmonella found in their pistachios had caused a multistate outbreak of illnesses. Where gravity needs a boost, the pipes run atop wooden crates used to pack boxes of fruit. The more water he got, the more crops he planted, and the more crops he planted, the more water he needed to plant more crops, and on and on. The pistachio trees in Wonderful number 6 million. Vidovich claims that he was . Nothing will stop the houses. Theyre our future, she says. His daughter, who used to own a restaurant, is busy raising her one son. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you. Arax: That is the question that you know Im dealing with in this magazine piece. She is determined that their lives will play out differently from the lives of their parents, but she means no disrespect by this. His father grew grapes, cherries, and apricots in the Santa Clara Valley . If I want to know more, I need to talk to Lupes brother, Gustavo, who has worked as an irrigator at Wonderful for five years and knows what the company is planning for the future. They were farmers back in San Antonio, growing lettuce, cilantro, and radishes on a small plot of land. He had his hands on 65 percent of the nations crop. It alleged that Vidovich broke state law by not doing an environmental review of the project. The oldest of five children, he came from Mexico when he was 18. When I crossed the border and found Lost Hills, there was nothing here, he says. The William Saroyan Theatre was packed that October 1996 night. Who knows when a five-year drought is coming? Financial Data. The highway runs two lanes here, three lanes there, through miles of agriculture broken every 20 minutes by fast food, gas station, and cheap motel. Hes smiling but speaks only Spanish. The pizza dough is cauliflower, too. The curriculum is being created by Noemi Donoso, the chief of education for the Chicago public schools before Lynda recruited her to Wonderful. The jolt and shudder would tear out the roots of a lesser species. He uses more water than any other person in the West. You dont lose one drop at all.. The bureau happened to be my house in northwest Fresno. Lynda is also mapping out a farm-to-food program where students will grow fruits, vegetables, and grains on a plot of village land. He started cleaning pizza parlors and drugstores. Like the wheat barons of the 1870s who lived on San Franciscos Nob Hill, Resnick isnt of this place. Each face wears its own weary. The truth a mercenary has landed on. He and Lynda decided in 1984 to buy the Franklin Mint, the maker of commemorative coins and other kitsch, for $167.5 million. The comments don't come from Boswell and Vidovich themselves, of course, but from the groundwater sustainability agencies each farming . This doesnt count the 21,000 acres of grapefruits and limes hes growing in Texas and Mexico. All told, 36 men operating six machines will harvest the orchard in six days. Today, at 81, his money is all but gone, and South African conservationist John Hume is throwing in the towel . How will courts rebuke of Berkeleys natural-gas ban affect the national movement it began? For a silent minute, we dig into our bowls. This sale made headlines because it was engineered by one farmeran outsider from the cityfor his benefit only. A van pulls up to the curb, and the door slides open. She splits her time between Palo Alto and Inverness, and in her spare time likes wildlife photography, swimming, skiing and backpacking. Yes. I had finished the last chapter of The King of California, a book I wrote with a good friend about J.G. His father, Stephen Vidovich, founded DeAnza Properties in 1966 and led the charge to convert the Santa Clara Valley from farmland and pave the way for Silicon Valley to become the hub of late-20th century and early-21st century American innovation. I find a former partner of Resnick. Even if they had wheels, they wouldnt be going anywhere. They rely only on rain, which concentrates the flavorful oils. Pink and white oleanders divide the highway, and every third vehicle that whooshes by is a big rig. Sandridge Partners, controlled by Vidovich, is building a 10-mile-long route on its properties to ship water from its wells in the north to its thirsty fields in the south. I look back at Resnick. It exists as one thing they can almost rationalize out in the fields. And you know why? Thousands of California oaks were felled. When youre making the kind of money were making, whats the upside? The baby is now a 20-year-old student at Bakersfield College. It is flowing to a place of dire thirst. The independent growers and processors, no surprise, regarded him as a bully eager to employ teams of lawyers and tens of millions of dollars to force his agenda. They have no way to grasp the $50 million to $80 million a year that the Resnicks say they are spending on philanthropy. The city of Los Angeles, by comparison, consumes 587,000 acre-feet. His story is the one Ive been carting around in my notebook for the past few decades, sure I was ready to write it after five years or ten years, only to learn of another twist that would lead me down another road. I didnt see our creation, much less the figures bent under the canopies of vine that our creation counted on.