For three decades, developers have tried to build a new town at the foot of Friant Dam. On Tuesday, Fresno County supervisors may finally approve one, based on a water plan built on a claim the federal government says is false. Friant Ranch is a billion-dollar new town proposal just south of the community of Friant, aiming to grow to the size of the city of Fowler. To get through a drought, the county says, the town can count on a multi-year supply of water stored in Millerton Lake. But the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, which controls releases from the lake, told Fresnoland that isn’t so. Water can be held behind the dam for only one year, not several. … That leaves Friant Ranch’s water supply in limbo during a multi-year drought like the one in 2014 and 2015, a Fresnoland investigation shows. If such a scenario were to happen again, public officials could be left scrambling to find an emergency water supply for thousands of people.