It’s a familiar lament in many California communities.

Kids that grow up in a town — especially in high growth areas such as South San Joaquin County — often can’t afford to either rent or buy in their hometown when they are young adults.

There is some truth to it.

What brings this up are two letters to the editor about Ripon.

More, specifically it is where Ripon is at as a community.

Ripon, between some Department of Finance annual population estimates, has dropped slightly in population. It is still about the size it was in 2020 when the last Census placed the population at 16,121.

The 2020 Census placed Manteca’s population at 83,498. Based on previous annual state estimates and home construction in the past year, Manteca is likely now at 97,500 residents.

Manteca has added basically the population of Ripon in six years.

Lathrop, which includes River Islands, has been almost as crazy.

The Census count in 2020 put Lathrop’s population at 28,701. Lathrop at the start of this year likely passed the 40,000 population mark. That means, at the current pace, sometime in 2028 Lathrop will have added 16,000 plus people since 2020.

In eight years, Manteca and Lathrop will have absorbed the equivalent of twice Ripon’s population.

If you need to get an idea of what that is like, drive around Manteca or Lathrop on a Saturday or Sunday when local street traffic is at its peak.

Clearly, the barn door has long been open in Manteca and Lathrop when it comes to growth.

Depending upon your perspective, that is either a good thing or a bad thing.

Where Ripon is today — as well as where Manteca and Lathrop are — is the result of deliberate decisions.

And to be clear, it’s not that Ripon hasn’t added homes in recent years. They have been in the dozens perhaps on an annual basis opposed to Manteca that, once you include apartments, has been adding housing units in excess of 1,000 annually for a number of years.

Two key events in the past two decades have kept the lid on wild growth, so to speak, in Ripon.

One was a successful pushback— aided by the late Bob Piccinini, a Manteca High grad behind the massive expansion of Save Mart — that derailed Walmart plans to open a larger store on Jack Tone Road than the one the massive retailer has in Manteca.

The other was the decision by city leaders to be less than lukewarm toward a proposal advanced in Stanislaus County for a second river crossing to open up areas northwest of Modesto for residential development by building an expressway.

That would have aligned with Olive Avenue and tied into an envisioned interchange about a mile north of the Jake Tone Road.

Rest assured had that happened, developers would have been flocking to Ripon eyeing land for future homes near the Olive Avenue expressway.

Building a major arterial and connecting it with an interchange is a powerful magnet for attracting development in a growing region such as this part of the Northern San Joaquin Valley.

The problem is how does Ripon continue to keep the brakes somewhat on growth as it has successfully done.

It is a question that needs answering especially since the state in recent years has adopted legislation that essentially undermines local growth caps and zoning designed to discourage the building of more homes.

Not only has the state put laws in place, but Sacramento has been more than willing to sue cities that try to block housing developments.

All you need to do is look at what happened in Manteca and Lathrop to find the answer.

Growth on the level it is happening in both cities is due to the attention devoted to putting infrastructure in place over the years, especially when it came to wastewater treatment and securing surface water.

Each city got there in a different way.

Lathrop partnered with a developer with the means, commitment, and foresight — as well as the ability to secure a 4,800 acre parcel as you can only do on a reclaimed “island” on the Delta’s outer perimeter such as Stewart Tract.

Manteca did it almost all by the city leading the water-sewer infrastructure vision.

Say what you want about Manteca, but they clearly positioned the city well when it comes to water and wastewater treatment.

So how does Ripon make itself less appealing for developers when it comes to residential growth?

The best answer based on using two state edicts is to resist ever taking surface water from the South San Joaquin Irrigation District.

The state only allows the blocking of new housing development if a city can’t serve it with water or wastewater services.

At the same time, the state has mandated that groundwater use by “neutral” by 2045.

That means water is pumped from the ground can’t exceed the amount the aquifer is being replenished.

It is true — based on some calculations and in the era of stepped up conservation — that an acre of farmland and an acre of urban development have basically the same demand for water.

Relying 100 percent on groundwater going forward will clearly be dicey especially given an overall groundwater basin needs to be taken into consideration and not just what sits underneath a city.

That means Ripon, or any other city for that matter, would no longer be able to put in new water wells without trying to run a gauntlet of what will clearly be a daunting approval process even by California standards.

There are solid reasons why Ripon would want surface water.

But here’s the rub: If Ripon did buy into the SSJID water treatment plant and built a pipeline, it would need to retire what would likely be an expensive 30-year bond.

To pay that off, unless there is a stomach to burden city water users with significantly higher water bills, would require growth.

Great civilizations through time have vanished due to droughts drying up essential water sources.

Droughts may not have quite the same effect in 2026.

But a state mandated zero net change with groundwater pumping will make it harder to argue that cities that don’t rely on a mixture of surface and ground water supplies will be able to support large housing projects as the years unfold.

Ripon, by harnessing the power of state water edicts, could successfully shield itself from ever channeling Manteca or Lathrop when it comes to growth.

This column is the opinion of editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Bulletin or 209 Multimedia. He can be reached at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com