[env-trinity] Feds pull plug on Trinity water shift

[Tom Stokely]

Feds pull plug on Trinity water shift

Eureka Times Standard – 5/10/08

 By John Driscoll, staff writer

 

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has backed away from a proposal to take more water from the Trinity River this year, citing a 2000 Interior Secretary decision on fisheries restoration. 

 

Reclamation was considering a shift from a normal year to a dry year, which would have stifled releases from Lewiston Dam to the river. Water managers were looking to possibly adjust the seasonal forecast used to craft the flows to reflect conditions in May, instead of the April 1 date called for in the 2000 record of decision. 

”It's what the record of decision calls for,” said bureau spokesman Jeff McCracken. 

 

Much of the state is headed for drought, and snowpack in the Sierra Nevada is poor. Conditions have been dry in the northern part of the state as well, after substantial precipitation earlier in the year. Trinity River advocates protested the possible decision by reclamation, saying the river should not suffer because of what they called mismanagement of the Sacramento River delta water system in recent years. 

 

Half of the Trinity River's water is diverted to the Sacramento, then pumped from the delta to farms and cities to the south. Flows meant to aid fisheries restoration are released beginning in April. A shift in the water year type would have crimped releases to the river. 

 

The Hoopa Valley Tribe wrote in a May 6 letter to reclamation that such a move would be patently illegal. 

”There is no legal justification for such a 'transition' and the Hoopa Valley Tribe urges you to refrain from taking such a damaging action,” wrote tribal counsel Tom Schlosser. 

 

Schlosser also pointed out that the addition of spawning gravel into the upper river is occurring now, and requires high flows to move the material effectively. 

Reclamation officials met with members of the council that sets policy for the river this week, and on Thursday informed the group that the issue was now settled. #

http://www.times-standard.com/ci_9216302?IADID=Search-www.times-standard.com-www.times-standard.com



Trinity River water flow running at normal level despite drier weather
http://www.redding.com/news/2008/may/11/trinity-river-water-flow-running-at-normal-level/

By Dylan Darling (Contact)
Sunday, May 11, 2008 

Even though it's been relatively dry for the last 2½ months, water flows down the Trinity River are running as strong as they would in a normal year.
That means 647,000 acre-feet of water will be allowed to flow in the river this year, rather than the reduced flow of 453,00 acre-feet that would have followed a "dry" year declaration, said Jeff McCracken, spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation in Sacramento.

An acre-foot is enough water to flood an acre of land with a foot of water.

"It's going to take more water out of Trinity" Lake, McCracken said.

The flow schedule was established in early April and the bureau considered reducing it last week.

But a review of a 2000 federal court ruling guiding management of the river showed that such a change would be illegal, said Brian Person, manager of the bureau's Northern California Area Office.

"So we are staying with the normal year hydrograph," he said.

A hydrograph is a chart that plots reservoir releases down a river over time.

Although Person said the higher flows this summer on the Trinity will help the fish in the river, reducing the water level in Trinity Lake could pose a problem down the road, said Tom Stokely, Trinity County planner and river advocate.

"If we have another dry year after this we are going to have some serious temperature problems on the Trinity and Sacramento rivers," he said.

About half of the releases from the Trinity Lake go to the Trinity River, while the other half is diverted into the Sacramento River system, McCracken said.

Critics of the bureau's failed plan to lower flows on the Trinity said that reducing the flows likely would mean increased diversions to the Sacramento and irrigators whose acres are south of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

"That would have been a bonanza for the south-of-the-delta folks," said Tom Scholosser, an attorney for the Hoopa Valley Tribe who has been involved with debates over Trinity water for years.

Tom Birmingham, manager of Westlands Water District, declined to comment on the Trinity flows. The district encompasses more than 600,000 acres of farmland in western Fresno and Kings counties.

When the Trinity River was dammed in the 1960s, much of its water was diverted into the Sacramento River. But the Trinity River experienced a major decline in its fishery, said Spreck Rosekrans, senior analyst with the Environmental Defense Fund's San Francisco office.

In 2000, a federal judge ordered the bureau to put more water down the river each year in an effort to restore the fish habitat. The flows each year are based on declarations of "normal" or "dry" years, which are declared after a review of inflow forecasts made in early April.

Rosekrans said that leaves room for the weather to change after the year is declared, but it shouldn't be changed because things will even out. In 2005, the scenario was opposite of this year, with a dry year turning wet after April.

"They didn't change (the year type) then and they shouldn't change it now," he said.

Reporter Dylan Darling can be reached at 225-8266 or at ddarling at redding.com.

 
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