[env-trinity] AP in New York Times - Settlement Agreement with Water Districts

[Byron]

See last two paragraphs in bold


U.S. Agrees to Pay for Diverting Water to Aid Two Rare Fish


By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

Published: December 23, 2004




SACRAMENTO, Dec. 22 - The federal government has agreed to pay four
California water districts $16.7 million for water that the government
diverted a decade ago to help two rare fish in the Central Valley, officials
said Tuesday. 

The settlement came after a federal judge awarded $26 million to the water
districts a year ago. The debate over appealing that decision or settling
the case grew into a larger debate over the Endangered Species Act and
privacy rights.




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Some politicians, including Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of
California, urged the government last week to fight the decision, while the
chairman of the House Resources Committee, Representative Richard W. Pombo,
Republican of California, urged the government to agree with the judge's
ruling that the water districts were entitled to money for water they had
lost.

Environmental groups feared that the ruling would force the government to
pay millions of dollars each time it reserved water to help threatened
wildlife.

But the water districts argued, and the judge ruled, that they deserved
compensation under the Fifth Amendment, which protects private property from
government seizure.

The water districts said in a statement that Senior Judge John Wiese of the
Court of Federal Claims had carefully safeguarded states' rights to make
water allocation decisions even as he protected property rights.

The four agencies are the Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District, the Kern
County Water Agency, the Lost Hills Water District and the Wheeler
Ridge-Maricopa Water Storage District. They will get their legal costs on
top of the water's market value for water diverted to aid endangered
winter-run Chinook salmon and threatened delta smelt.

Senator Feinstein said the decision "could seriously harm California's
historic water rights system."

"This precedent could make it impossible for the state and federal agencies
to protect and manage the San Francisco Bay-Delta, the heart of the state's
water system," without vastly increased expenditures, she said.

 

 

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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