Vidovich claims that he was . Dynamic search and list-building capabilities. After three years of drought, tensions are running high all over rural California. So its a really extraordinary kind of development thats never happened in agriculture in California before really to raise the living of your workers. The men and women who planted, irrigated, sprayed, and picked our crops were phantoms. 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. Back then, the Los Angeles Times had a bureau in the middle of California. Rain for Rent, the pipes say. But this outwardly unassuming multimillionaire has become a lightning rod of controversy. Im in a dire situation.. You cant reverse diabetes, but you can control it with a blood sugar level between 6.5 and 8. Pink and white oleanders divide the highway, and every third vehicle that whooshes by is a big rig. He studied the situation. This is how the land of Wonderful is keeping alive its trees. Hes serious about taking water out of this valley, farmer Milt Pace, who once partnered with Vidovich, told The Bakersfield Californian. He sat behind a desk without clutter and stood up to shake my hand. Ive never given an interview to a newspaper or magazine before. The aqueduct brings the water, yes? Russo and Ellsberg needed a place to photocopy the 7,000 pages, and Lynda volunteered the Xerox machine at her ad agency on Melrose Avenue. And state groundwater regulations restrict the drilling of new agricultural wells. Hilly, wooded and overlooking the bay just south of San Francisco . We are creating foods. Nothing keeps prices high like a monopoly. Nearly a third of the harvestthe nuts grown by Wonderful, the nuts grown by hundreds of farmers who belong to the Wonderful brandwill come through these gates. His father bought a neighborhood bar and ran it with the same iron fist with which he ran the house. And how will the Resnicks fare? Section, block, and row dont compute; he has to direct me by cellphone and guideposts. Up and down the Central Coast, restaurants are boycotting their wines. Many are here without documents, after all. Who anticipates that you cant fill a water bank for six or seven years?, Come on, I say. The drought is driving prices and shifting business practices. Relatives arranged his passage, paying the coyote the new rate of $12,000. Ive never seen her up close, never watched her in action. Thats our goal. I cut across Twisselman Road to the pipeline gliding along the aqueduct like a silver snake. He says he doesnt feel sorry for Resnick. Perched up there, a queen might peek out and utter, Let them eat cake, Lynda once said. The math works out to $162 a tree. He wants his fair share, but he wants everybody else to prosper, too.. You dont lose one drop at all.. I steer past Wasco to the dust-blowing orchards that flank Lost Hills, the densest planting of almonds, pistachios, and pomegranates on earth. But those deals were one water district selling to another water district. What kind of empire are you trying to build?, Im here to show the farmer that ags footprint needs to get smaller., I chew on his answer for a second. Even as the supplies of federal and state water have dropped to near zero, agriculture in Kern keeps chugging along, growing more intensive. Ah, he says, so youre the one whos been snooping around. She grabs him by the wrist, and they make a beeline for the convention hall door. But he got too big. This is only $3? But for a lot of workers, bringing that big fat burrito from home still makes sense., I had seen what J.G. So I ask about the big picture. The clash of the agricultural titans, who hold influential positions on local water boards and control thousands of acres with precious water rights, is being waged against a backdrop of deep distrust in the community about both companies hidden agendas. She wanted me to put our $5 million in an account, draw interest, and we could live happily on the 50 grand a year.. Contact 4? This is the closest to hills it comes. On more than 150,000 acres 132,000 in Kings County alone, according to ParcelQuest the company grows, processes and sells cotton, tomatoes, wheat, alfalfa and seed crops. Six hundred and forty acres dont look like 640 acresa square mileuntil they start ripping out the trees. Scott: So we should talk about the labor that makes this all possible. A fully equipped teaching kitchen will turn the harvest into school lunches. Lynda spent $150,000 at an auction to buy the beaded gown and matching bolero jacket, the Elvis Dress, that Princess Diana had worn on a visit to Hong Kong. Sure enough, cozied up next to the bank of the aqueduct, I see a glint. Thanks to Wonderfuls $15 million Get Crackin campaignthe largest media buy in the history of snack nutspistachios now rank among the top ten bestselling salty snack items in the U.S. We are no longer processing nuts, he says. Lynda has a son who works as a musician and a son who suffered a birth trauma and lives in a care facility. On one side of the road and the other, for miles in both directions, the dirt belongs to Wonderful. I saw her a few months ago. But his egotheres no controlling that., Resnick had heard it all before. Pablo prunes and irrigates the almond and pistachio trees and applies the chemicals that cannot be applied by helicopter. All I know is I dont want to split it up or sell it in some leveraged buyout. But theres none for his precious corn, almond and pistachio trees in the south county and, because of new restrictions, he cant simply drill a new wellthere. He was the bad guy in agriculture for no bigger offense than that he was big. Of the 22,000 acres they ripped during the drought, 18,000 acres are being replanted in pistachios. His face is still blank. Contact 3? He turns out to be a kindly religious man whose short hair is dyed the black of shoe polish. On a Facebook page with postings in Spanish, they offer a glimpse of life inside pistachio world. They give thanks for a job that provides decent wages and access to a free wellness center next door staffed by a full-time doctor, physicians assistant, registered dietitian, and marriage and family therapist. His daughter, who used to own a restaurant, is busy raising her one son. Hes trying to play dumb, but I can see the sliest of grins peeking out from his mustache and goatee. She won a gold Effie, advertisings Oscar. But theres no denying his desperation. In blue jeans and running shoes, he cuts a slim figure, with closely cropped gray hair and steely blue eyes. Why not we start with an extended interview or two? I offered. Shes designing the curriculum.. Today is quincena day, twice-a-month payday, and he needs me to scram because the workers coming in to cash their checks and wire 25 percent back across the border to families in Guanajuato and Guerrero will wonder if Im with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In the kitchen corner, cases of bottled water are stacked halfway up the wall. As a function leader, he . Wheres it coming from? A van pulls up to the curb, and the door slides open. In Vidovich, J.G. The plastic unfurls across the grove like a giant roll of Saran Wrap. He wouldnt know one of his Valencia orange groves from one of his Washington navel orange groves. Vidovich has more than one reason to be evasive. This is gamblers ground unlike any other in California, and as I drive from hill to dale, examining each orchard, my head spins. The shelves spill piatas, gloves, hats, pruning shears, and loaves of Bimbo white bread. Hes a decent guy making $216,000 a year who doesnt pretend that he isnt beholden to Wonderful. How much bigger can agriculture get. Hes got another meeting to attend. The farmer corralled the snowmelt and erased the valley, its desert and marsh. Has the San Joaquin Valley reached its Chinatown moment? No luck. Support. When they get on their high horse, you dont want to argue with them.. Background details that you might want to know . He launches into a CFOs riff on the pistachio market. Vicente Fernndez, the king of Ranchera music, is crooning to no one, but it wont be this way in 30 minutes, Hussein tells me. Presently, John Vidovich is Vice President & Sales Director at The Student Loan Corp. Days Inn or Motel 6. They dumped their stolen car into the canals black waters and got away with murder for the next 32 years. This amounted to 14,000 acre-feet. California is free to return to its amnesia. The land is turning to salt. He purchased his first 640-acre section in the late 1970s and kept adding more sections of almonds, pistachios, pomegranates, and citrus until he stretched the lines of agriculture like no Californian before him. Im sure I knew we had a pipeline in there. He has plenty of well water in the northern part of Kings County, outside J.G. Its known as a census-designated place, which is another way of saying that Kern County has every reason to neglect it. In case the growers are fearing the antitrust cops from the Department of Justice, they neednt. She splits her time between Palo Alto and Inverness, and in her spare time likes wildlife photography, swimming, skiing and backpacking. When I crossed the border and found Lost Hills, there was nothing here, he says. Of all the wonders of Wonderful, this is the one I find most mystifying. The rent is $540. He tells me to meet him in Lost Hills. It hardly ceases for the next five months. 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. The partner kept the Cutie name but only after paying the Resnicks tens of millions of dollars. He is a single man who rents a bedroom from other family members for $150 a month. The company was founded in 1925 by the father and unclesof James Griffin J.G. Boswell II, a Stanford grad who served on the boards of General Electric, Safeway and the California Institute of Technology. Former L.A. Fire Marshal John Vidovich has filed a lawsuit against the city, alleging he was "unlawfully and unceremoniously ousted from his job" in August 2016. It was going to houses. This doesnt count the 21,000 acres of grapefruits and limes hes growing in Texas and Mexico. For now, shes playing country western music on the sound system and trying to lure a combination of oil-field workers, supervisors at Wonderful, and travelers driving the last miles of James Dean. Stewart and Lynda planted 15,000 more acres and bought a juice plant. A plume of dust joins up with other plumes of dust until the sky over the valley turns sickly. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation. His father grew grapes, cherries, and apricots in the Santa Clara Valley back when Stanford University still had a reason to be known as The Farm. We are sensitive to that. I enter an equipment yard where a Wonderful farmhand is standing next to a tractor. Each section of pipe is 40 feet long. Seventy-five years ago, writer Carey McWilliams, in Factories in the Field, lambasted the ribboned Dukes and belted Barons of California agriculture. For now, theyre selling to farmers like Resnick who can pay the price. It wasnt a midlife crisis, he told me. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you. You have no idea the people on my VIP list who drink it. Now shes getting lots of credit.. Whatever remains is not nearly enough to make up for the shortfall of imported water from the state. He gambled on the price of nuts going up, and he gambled on the water never going dry. John Vidovich. The vibration is a stunning piece of violence to behold. There have been several instances where damaged equipment has reduced flows, he said. By age 19, Lynda had dropped out of college, married a magazine ad man, and opened her own advertising agency. In a region of wall-to-wall plantings, one of the walls is crashing down. How much was plunder? Amy Scott: Theres a stunning aerial photo in the magazine that shows these green green trees surrounded basically by dust. Name. To manage the disease. The great drought is officially over. Now Lynda herself stands before us, a single light over her head. When a copy found its way to The New York Times, Lynda was pursued by federal prosecutors until they concluded she was more dilettante than radical. The neighborhoods didnt have sidewalks; when it rained, the kids had to walk to school in the mud. Im going to Kern County, just shy of the mountains, to figure out how the biggest farmers in America, led by the biggest of them all, are not only keeping alive their orchards and vineyards during drought but adding more almonds (79,000 acres), more pistachios (73,000 acres), more grapes (35,000 acres), and more mandarins (13,000 acres). A piece of pipeline south of Stratford rests in the arm of a piece of heavy equipment on Dec. 16, 2021. The July sun is a scorcher, and I fuss with the dial on the AC long enough to blow past the towns one stoplight and the aqueduct, too. For generations, the company has supplied steady work for Kings County families and has been an integral part of the regions identity, helping to build a community park, the YMCA, Corcoran District Hospital and the high school football stadium. VIDEO: Christmas wonderland featuring the Grinch . One more bin, a post reads. Vidovich, meanwhile, is accusing Boswell-backed groundwater agencies of dragging their feet on pumping reductions to the point their actions could sink the small, rural town of Corcoran up to another 11 feet. I had in mind a magazine profile on Stewart, the Nut King. Hes getting ready to introduce Lynda, the main speaker, but first he wants to address the federal governments recent recall of Wonderful pistachios. California growers, in the grip of drought, have produced 900 million pounds of the green nut. The Ninth Annual Wonderful Pistachio Conference at the Visalia Convention Center is an invitation-only affair, but I managed to sneak in and grab a seat. He blames Iran. Its also in the real estate business, developing and marketing master planned communities and business parks. The depletion is causing land to collapse nearly a foot a year, in what U.S. Geological Survey hydrologists Devin Galloway and Francis Riley called one of the single largest alterations of the land surface attributed to humankind.. Weve had our battles in the past, and I dont agree with everything hes doing. Who would have thought the two of them in cahoots? EIN: 41-0953924. Financial Data. Like other small farmers, my water stays on my ground. They issued a commemorative medal of Tiger Woods winning the 1997 Masters that offended the golfer. Not a single one of them wants any part of Wonderful. The feedback were hearing is No. In fact, some of the workers think that we havent gone far enough., The workers arent around for a quick survey. This is one of the ways the Nut King and the Pomegranate Queen are defying the California drought. I had not seen any. How much water are we talking about?, Id rather not get too specific. You sure this isnt 18 tons an acre? he says, goading. We saved the best for last, he says. He maneuvers down the middle of the row, sweeps up the dried almonds, and throws them into a catcher. 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 needs every drop he can get., Dont you know? I call the manager of the Lost Hills Water District. They knew little about the company except it was selling its keepsakes for five times the amount Teleflora was. Young men and women from Teach for America will do their two-year stints at the complex and live in village housing. Americas +1 212 318 2000. Groundwater accountability sparks clash of Central Valley ag titans Already, the high school is filled with hundreds of students bused in from farmworker towns that are among the poorest communities in the West. Down the great aqueduct, by freight of politics and gravity, came the excess waters of the Sacramento River. Each face wears its own weary. Across the field, a heavy machine is stacking whats left of the trees into giant mounds. Billionaire comes to the rescue of billionaire., But those two guys hate each other., Not anymore. Damn, if he doesnt look even younger and more fit than the last time I saw him eight years earlier. I turn back around and find Route 46, the road that killed James Dean. His strategy, and his Silicon Valley wealth, arouse both admiration and suspicion in this rural community. Sandridge Partners plans new beef processing plant | John Lindt Resnicks billions rely on his ability to master water, sun, soil, and even bees. Problem is, I feel like Im 50. Digging in was its own wisdom, he discovered. Then some of the money we save goes to pay the coyote.

What Does Hoodie Mean In Slang, Hijas De Luis Vigoreaux Hijo, John Gotti Funeral, How To Become A Police Prosecutor Victoria, Steepest Road In Victoria, Articles J