Photo credit: Mia Ring/Pacific Legal Foundation
A family farm reduced to 290 acres
A Washington farmer who returned to his family’s farm in 1984 is challenging a long-running dispute with the state Department of Ecology after penalties over irrigation threatened the future of his agricultural business. Ron Fodé and his wife, Robin, say the agency refused to help them find a lawful way to irrigate their crops before imposing penalties that originally totalled $618,000. The case has reached the Washington Supreme Court, which heard arguments on October 1, 2026. The Fodés said they have had to sell nearly everything they once farmed, reducing their operation from 4,000 acres of owned and leased land to 290 leased acres.
At its centre is a question about whether the state agency followed a law requiring it to provide technical assistance to water users before moving to penalties. The prolonged dispute has had a substantial effect on the family’s agricultural operation. They argue that the conflict could have been avoided if the agency had helped them identify a lawful route to irrigation before imposing penalties. The court’s decision will determine the legal questions before it. Until then, the dispute remains unresolved, and the Fodés continue to challenge the state’s handling of their irrigation application and the penalties that followed.
How the dispute began
He took over its operations in 1984 when his father began experiencing health problems. He and Robin raised their four children on the farm, which grew to cover about 4,000 acres at its peak. The dispute began in 2017, when Fodé needed sufficient water rights to irrigate farmland he owned and leased, including fields used to grow potatoes. Fodé applied for a seasonal change in January 2017, according to the Washington Court of Appeals’ 2022 ruling. On February 14, a state watermaster told him that his request had been denied and that he should not irrigate the affected parcels. The Fodés argue that the February 15 deadline effectively blocked them from applying for a seasonal transfer, even though it had not been formally adopted through a public process.
Because he had missed an internal February 15 deadline, however, according to The Spokesman-Review, the Department of Ecology refused to accept another application. They say the case is therefore about more than the penalties against their farm: it concerns whether agencies can impose rules affecting the public without following the required legal procedures.
Their opinion also quoted a regional water resources programme manager at the Department of Ecology as saying, “That’s just something we didn’t do,” when asked why the agency had not provided the assistance they said the law required. Ron Fodé grew up on the family farm in Grant County, Washington. Under Washington law, farmers generally need legal water rights to withdraw groundwater for irrigation. State law also allows water users to apply for seasonal transfers, which can temporarily shift water rights from one property to another. Fodé maintained that other water-transfer options were available and that he wanted to find a lawful way to continue watering his crops. The Department of Ecology’s position and the legal questions must be assessed through the court proceedings; the couple’s guest opinion presents their account of the dispute.
The case has reached the Washington Supreme Court, which heard arguments on October 1, 2026. Fodé continued irrigating during the 2017 growing season. The Department of Ecology later issued penalties covering 103 days of irrigation. The original penalties comprised $206,000 for irrigation on land Fodé owned, $103,000 for a 65-acre property and $309,000 for 335 acres leased from another landowner, according to the Washington Court of Appeals’ ruling. The combined amount was $618,000.
The penalties were initially issued jointly to Fodé and his landlords, but the agency later withdrew the penalties against the landlords, leaving Fodé solely liable for the amounts imposed on the three parcels.