The McCloud Watershed Council held a community meeting over the proposed Nestle plant, and while the town's still clearly divided over the project, even the proponents have got to be kicking themselves over the lopsided contract.

After all, Nestle's getting the water for about 1/4000 the cost paid by a similar plant in Ohio, and you can almost hear the uneasy murmurings from the crowd in this passage from the Mount Shasta Herald story:

It lists a #8220;Coca-Cola or Pepsi#8221; water bottling plant in Twinsburg, Ohio that pays $107,531 per acre-feet of water on the high end. On the low end is Nestle's proposed McCloud plant at $26.40 per acre-feet of water.

#8220;The average price of water we found is $1,500 to $2,000,#8221; stated Anderson. #8220;We know our water in McCloud is great, so the value should be way up there.#8221;

In his response, Palais noted that Nestle would be paying a negotiated set price for the water used, and that the price is more than the current rate for McCloud citizens.

Tim Rajeef couldn't cast across the gap between $107,000 and $26, and Nestle Corporate Hit Man Representative Dave Palais' unimpressive response (paraphrased: "bite me") wouldn't settle my stomach much.

Want to Know the Whole Nestle Story?

You're only getting snapshots of the Nestle story here on the Underground; if you want to read an excellent aerial view of the whole messy situation (McCloud's become ground zero in the bottled water wars), read this beauty from those flaming water liberals at BusinessWeek.

It skips over a lot of Nestle's less-savory antics (like their intimidation lawsuits target individuals), but at least you'll know the setting -- and start to understand why so many folks are tired of Nestle's community-splitting, watershed-draining tactics.

What Water's Really For

Nothing makes me want to get out on the river (even a river that's fishing like hell) like a Nestle story; trout may be stupid and often uncooperative, but they live in cool places, and I don't count greed and vanity among their sins.

See you on the river, Tom Chandler.