[env-trinity] Tom - Please call me ASAP About the Court Victory! 916-685-2245, ext. 24

[Daniel Bacher]

>From: "Tom Stokely" <tstokely at trinityalps.net>
>To: "env-trinity" 
<env-trinity at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us>,        
<salmon at pelicannetwork.net>
>Subject: [env-trinity] SF Chronicle- Tribes win Trinity flow fight
>Date: Wed, 14 Jul 2004 08:34:01 -0700
>
>       SAN FRANCISCO
>       Tribes win Trinity flow fight
>       Court gives green light to revival of salmon population
>
>       Harriet Chiang, Chronicle Legal Affairs Writer
>       Wednesday, July 14, 2004
>
>
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
>       Two Northern California Indian tribes scored a victory in their 
effort to restore ancestral fisheries Tuesday when a federal appeals court 
gave the go-ahead for a plan to revive the Trinity River's once-thriving 
salmon population.
>
>       The Hoopa Valley and Yurok tribes have been waging a decades-long 
battle to increase the flow of water from a dam on the Trinity and boost the 
river's salmon population. On Tuesday, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of 
Appeals in San Francisco said a deal the tribes reached with government 
agencies could be put in place, rejecting objections from a Central Valley 
water agency that benefits from diverted Trinity flows.
>
>       Since the Trinity River Dam was built in 1964, 90 percent of the 
Trinity's water has been diverted to the Sacramento River for farmers and 
other water users. The result was an 85 percent drop in the Trinity's 
population of chinook salmon, which local Indians had fished for 
generations.
>
>       In 2000 the Hoopa Valley Tribe, taking the lead in negotiations 
for the two tribes, devised a plan with the U.S. Interior Department and 
other federal and state agencies to try to restore the Trinity River fishery 
by reducing the amount of water diverted to 50 percent.
>
>       The plan was immediately challenged by the Westlands Water 
District, a 600,000-acre agricultural tract on the west side of the San 
Joaquin Valley that gets some of the water diverted from the Trinity. In a 
federal lawsuit, the district and other irrigation and power companies 
charged that the plan did not comply with federal environmental laws.
>
>       But a unanimous federal appeals court rejected most of those 
challenges Tuesday and ordered the restoration plan to be implemented.
>
>       "Twenty years have passed since Congress passed the first 
major act calling for restoration of the Trinity River and rehabilitation of 
its fish populations,'' Judge Alfred Goodwin wrote in the court's opinion. 
"And almost another decade has elapsed since Congress set a minimal 
flow level for the river to force rehabilitative action.''
>
>       Having disposed of the issues raised by the district and others, 
Goodwin concluded, "nothing remains to prevent the full implementation 
of the (2000 agreement), including its complete flow plan for the Trinity 
River.''
>
>       The decision reverses most of a ruling in January by U.S. 
District Judge Oliver Wanger in Fresno. He had found that the 2000 plan did 
not take into account the effect that increased flows in the Trinity would 
have on endangered species in the Sacramento River and the Delta.
>
>       "This opinion is a clear victory for the anadromous fishery 
of the Trinity River and the future of our people,'' said Lyle Marshall, 
chairman of the Hoopa Valley Tribe.
>
>       Robert Franklin, senior hydrologist for the Hoopa Valley 
Fisheries Department, called the decision "a home run.''
>
>       "Budgeteers and administrators will see how quickly we can 
move forward to restoration,'' he said.
>
>       Tupper Hull, a spokesman for the Westlands Water District, said 
there were some "mixed decisions'' in the ruling that could be 
interpreted in favor of his client. "We're evaluating them carefully, 
and we're evaluating all our options,'' he said.
>
>       But he acknowledged that the decision "certainly is not good 
news'' for the district.
>
>       The Yurok Tribe, which historically fished the Klamath River, 
became involved in the negotiations because it gave up hundreds of acres of 
aboriginal land in the late 1800s in return for fishing rights on the 
Trinity.
>
>       "That promise has not been kept," said Scott Williams, 
a Berkeley lawyer who represented the tribe.
>
>       He called the restoration plan and Tuesday's court decision 
"a good step toward repairing that broken promise.''
>
>       E-mail Harriet Chiang at hchiang at sfchronicle.com.
>
>
>
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