[env-trinity] SACBEE- Valley water deals ripped

[Tom Stokely]

Valley water deals ripped
Democrats suggest Bush administration 'payoff' for support from agribusiness.
Sacramento Bee - 8/24/04
By Stuart Leavenworth, staff writer
Six House Democrats are accusing the Bush administration of brokering sweetheart water deals with certain Central Valley farm districts that could affect how much water is available to California's cities and environment over the next 25 years.

In an Aug. 20 letter sent to the Interior Department, the six California representatives - led by Rep. George Miller of Martinez and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi - say they are "extremely concerned" about the ongoing contract renewals and suggest they are being rushed to precede the November elections.

"It looks like the Bush administration wants to hand a big payoff to agribusiness in exchange for their support," said Miller, who called on federal officials to delay signing the pacts until Congress and the public can review them further.

Representatives of farm districts and the Bush administration rejected claims Monday that the contract renewals are being negotiated hastily. Bennett Raley, the Bush administration's point man on Western water issues, suggested that Miller was playing politics himself.

"I'm fairly comfortable that Congressman Miller would be unhappy regardless of what we did, unless we established fairly punitive pricing requirements on contractors," said Raley, assistant interior secretary for water and science.

David Guy, director of the Northern California Water Association, said the federal Bureau of Reclamation has been "very deliberate and very contemplative" in working on the contracts for several years.

"They have to follow a whole set of federal laws. It's a big job," said Guy, whose group represents 70 farm water agencies in the Sacramento Valley.

At issue is the amount of federal water that farmers and other contractors can receive from the Central Valley Project over the next quarter-century, and how much they will pay for it.

The CVP controls about one-fourth of all water used in California, and for decades critics have blasted the Interior Department for skirting environmental commitments and pricing water so cheaply that it discourages conservation.

In 1992, Miller spearheaded legislation - the Central Valley Project Improvement Act - that reallocated 800,000 acre-feet for environmental purposes, and left many farmers fuming.

Since that time, Miller and other California Democrats have lost much of their influence on water policy as Republicans have taken control of Congress.

Bush also has appointed several farm-friendly officials to top posts, including Raley, a Colorado lawyer who previously represented irrigation districts.

Two months ago, federal officials proposed a new set of 40-year contracts for 140 old-time water users in the Sacramento Valley. Those pacts would entitle the so-called "settlement contractors" to receive 2.2 million acre-feet of water each year - enough for 4.4 million homes.

That same month, federal officials also renewed contracts for 36 water agencies in Northern California with more junior water rights. It also is preparing a new long-term contract for Westlands Water District near Fresno, even though its contract doesn't expire for another three years.

Hal Candee, a lawyer for the Natural Resources Defense Council, says the Bush administration has wide legal latitude to encourage conservation through varied pricing but has refused to pursue those options.

"California's water needs have changed dramatically in recent years, but these contracts just lock in the status quo," said Barry Nelson, who works with Candee at NRDC in San Francisco.

As an example, Nelson pointed to Sacramento Valley farm districts that get benefits from Shasta Dam and other federal facilities but pay nothing for their base supply. Some of those districts then turn around and sell that water for more than $100 an acre-foot.

"It's a huge windfall," Nelson said.

Some in Congress are also frustrated that water contractors aren't promptly repaying the capital costs for CVP projects, as the law requires.

"More than $1 billion of the original federal investment in the CVP remains unpaid after over 50 years," Miller and Pelosi said in their letter, which also was signed by Reps. Howard Berman, Anna Eshoo, Ellen Tauscher and Mike Thompson.

Jeff McCracken, a spokesman for the Bureau of Reclamation in Sacramento, said the contract renewal process, while obscure to many, has been conducted in the open. In recent years, the bureau has held scores of public meetings on the contracts, he said, and has put many of the documents on its Web site, www.usbr.gov/mp/.

The bureau now is preparing nine sets of environmental reports that will assess the impact of the contracts. Unfortunately, said McCracken, the preparation of those reports has lagged behind the contracts themselves, making it difficult for the public to comment on their potential impact.

Nelson, of NRDC, says the process isn't accidental. "From the beginning, the bureau has tried to make this as convoluted as possible, to make sure nobody noticed," he said.

McCracken said officials understand some of the frustration. Once the environmental documents are completed, he said, "We will look and see if we need to extend the comment period."#

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