[env-trinity] Contra Costa Times October 9

[Byron]

This is from more than a week ago, but I've been gone (aren't you're lucky).
It is significant to the Trinity River as well as all other Northern
California rivers.  It's what I've been haranguing you about for a long
time.  It is IMPORTANT.

 

FISHERIES PROTECTION

Dems demand inquiry into salmon study

Contra Costa Times - 10/9/04

By Mike Taugher, staff writer

More than a dozen congressional Democrats called for an investigation Friday
into allegations that an analysis of how California salmon might be affected
by the state's water system was politically manipulated.

The 300-page study examines how politically charged plans to rejigger
operation of dams and pumps that deliver water through the Delta from
Northern California to Southern California will affect several species of
threatened and endangered salmon and steelhead.

The lawmakers said they feared there was an ongoing "catastrophic failure of
oversight" that could drive salmon and steelhead toward extinction.

"I would hope the inspectors general would investigate these allegations
immediately," said Rep. George Miller, one of 19 members to seek the
investigation. "There is a great deal at stake."

Miller, D-Martinez, was reacting to the differences between two versions of
the salmon report: one written late this summer by biologists at the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's fisheries office and a
second version that contained revisions by the agency's managers.

The latter version, if made final, would make it far easier to renew
long-term water contracts in the Central Valley and boost the capacity of
Delta pumps that deliver water to Southern California.

Although the study, called a "biological opinion," has yet to be finalized,
the Times obtained portions of the earlier draft and a full copy of the most
recent draft.

The versions have key differences, most notably that the earlier version
says water operations will jeopardize the continued existence of some fish
species, and the later draft does not. The differences were first reported
in the Sacramento Bee last week in a story that prompted the congressional
letter.

In addition, the earlier draft contains a requirement that would have forced
the Contra Costa Water District to shut down one of its water supply canals
for six months a year. The revised report says only that the agency must
monitor salmon caught in the canal.

A Contra Costa water official said the earlier version was in error because
biologists had wrongly assumed the canal at Rock Slough was used for all of
the district's water supply, an assumption that led them to conclude more
fish were being killed there than actually were.

"That was a goof," said Contra Costa Water District assistant general
manager Greg Gartrell.

Jim Lecky, the assistant regional administrator at the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration who oversees the salmon report, said there were
other errors.

"I reviewed my staff's work and I didn't think they did a good job," Lecky
said. "There were a bunch of errors in their assumptions about the project."

The congressional letter is the latest in a series of efforts by Miller to
slow down and examine plans by federal water managers in California. For
weeks, he has been trying to get the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to
reconsider plans to renew dozens of long-term water contracts for farmers
and others throughout the Central Valley that Miller considers unduly
favorable to water users.

In addition, water officials are looking to increase the capacity of pumps
that move water from the Delta to Southern California.

Both the contract renewals and the increased pumping hinge on the salmon
study, which technically is a review of a U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
document called the "Operations, Criteria and Plan" that describes how the
state's two largest water delivery projects, the Central Valley Project and
the State Water Project, will be operated.

The congressional letter suggests the bureau, "in its haste to finalize
water contracts in California, has improperly undermined the required NOAA
fisheries environmental review process."

Reclamation Bureau spokesman Jeff McCracken said his agency had no improper
influence on the biological opinion.

"We never saw the earlier draft that had the alleged different opinion in
it," McCracken said.

Earlier in the week, state Sen. Mike Machado, D-Stockton, asked for an
independent scientific review of the biological opinion.

Lecky said the issue was being blown out of proportion.

"This is a typical consultation process," he said. "It's nothing out of the
ordinary."

 <http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/politics/9877179.htm>
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/politics/9877179.htm

 

 

Byron Leydecker

Chair, Friends of Trinity River

Consultant, California Trout, Inc.

PO Box 2327

Mill Valley, CA 94942-2327

415 383 4810 ph

415 519 4810 ce

415 383 9562 fx

bwl3 at comcast.net

 <mailto:bleydecker at stanfordalumni.org> bleydecker at stanfordalumni.org
(secondary)

http://www.fotr.org

http://www.caltrout.org

 

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