[env-trinity] [FOTR] SF Chron 2 12 10
Greg King
gking at asis.com
Sun Feb 14 12:33:17 PST 2010
Mark,
Thanks for this reminder. We will be signing on.
Greg
--
Greg King
President/Program Director
Siskiyou Land Conservancy
P.O. Box 4209
Arcata, CA 95518
707-498-4900
gking at asis.com
http://siskiyouland.wordpress.com/
On Feb 14, 2010, at 10:49 AM, summerhillfarmpv at aol.com wrote:
> Greg, would be good if you could sign onto the letter attached done
> by NRDC and EDF. We need to get as many groups on this letter as
> possible. Resnick is a big landowner in Kern county, majority
> owner of the Kern Water Bank, and largest citrus farmer in
> America. Has many companies related to ag, and is a billionaire.
> Close supporter and friend of Feinstein.
>
> To sign on tell bnelson at nrdc.org, and agupta at nrdc.org. They both
> need to have name, title and organization. Thanks, This is a big
> deal!
> Mark Rockwell
>
> In a message dated 2/14/2010 10:00:08 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
> gking at asis.com writes:
> This is just incredible. It's not water for farmers, it's water for
> cash. The article says Feinstein is acting primarily at the behest
> of Stewart Resnick. Who is Stewart Resnick? To wit:
>
>
> http://www.c-win.org/news/alternet-how-limousine-liberals-water-
> oligarchs-and-even-sean-hannity-are-hijacking-our-water-s
> "The leader of these recent water privatization efforts in
> California is a Beverly Hills billionaire named Stewart Resnick.
> Stewart and his wife, Lynda Resnick, own Roll International
> Corporation, a private umbrella company that controls the flowers-
> by-wire company Teleflora, Fiji Water, Pom Wonderful, pesticide
> manufacturer Suterra and Paramount Agribusiness, the largest
> farming company in America and the largest pistachio and almond
> producer in the world. Roll Corp. was ranked #246 on Forbes' list
> of America's largest private companies in 2008 and had an estimated
> revenue of $1.98 billion in 2007. ...
>
> "Public Citizen's "Water Heist" report uncovered evidence that the
> Beverly Hills farmer was instrumental in the privatization of the
> Kern Water Bank. Not surprisingly, Resnick's Paramount Farms
> emerged with a majority stake in the venture. In fact, Resnick's
> farm empire controls the Kern Water Bank so thoroughly that it is
> not easy to discern where Paramount ends and the Kern Water Bank
> begins. The Kern Water Bank Authority, which administers the bank,
> is located in Paramount's corporate office building outside of
> Bakersfield, California."
>
> Keep reading (from the link above; many thanks to C-WIN) to learn
> about the $73 million sale of Central Valley Project water (that
> would be public water) to the Mojave Water District. These are the
> "farmers" that Feinstein represents, just as she has represented
> the destructive side of virtually every natural resource issue
> she has weighed in on. Don't be surprised if she inserts herself
> significantly into any upcoming Klamath legislation, however dead
> those deals ought to be by now.
>
>
>
> On Feb 13, 2010, at 8:35 AM, Emelia Berol wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> From: Byron Leydecker <bwl3 at comcast.net>
>> To: FOTR List <fotr at mailman.dcn.org>; Trinity List <env-
>> trinity at mailman.dcn.org>
>> Sent: Fri, February 12, 2010 3:25:02 PM
>> Subject: [env-trinity] SF Chron 2 12 10
>>
>> Feinstein proposes Central Valley water plan
>>
>> Carolyn Lochhead, Chronicle Washington Bureau
>>
>> Friday, February 12, 2010
>>
>> (02-12) 04:00 PST Washington - -- Sen. Dianne Feinstein ignited a
>> firestorm among fellow California Democrats on Thursday as word
>> spread of her proposal to divert Northern California water to
>> Central Valley farmers.
>>
>> IMAGES
>>
>> <image001.gif><image002.gif><image003.gif>View Larger Images
>>
>> Feinstein needs to be put on notice that she will have to become a
>> Republican if she wants to run for governor in this state.
>>
>> She might as well switch parties, she has never been a true
>> Democrat anyway.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> More News
>>
>>
>>
>> Feinstein wants to attach the proposal as an amendment to a fast-
>> tracked Senate jobs bill. She is pitching the plan as a jobs
>> measure to address the economic calamity in the Central Valley. It
>> would increase farm water allocations from 10 percent last year to
>> 40 percent this year and next, an amount that farmers say is the
>> bare minimum they need.
>>
>> Bay Area Democrats were livid, accusing Feinstein of concocting
>> the plan in secret, upending fragile water negotiations that
>> Feinstein has supported and pitting California's Central Valley
>> against its coast. Telephone calls flew as lawmakers learned of
>> Feinstein's plan.
>>
>> "I was pretty shocked," said Rep. Mike Thompson, a St. Helena
>> Democrat and ally of North Coast salmon fishermen who support
>> efforts to save fish species that are declining.
>>
>> Influential farmer
>>
>> Feinstein has long supported California agriculture but began to
>> weigh in on the side of farmers in the water wars after requests
>> from Stewart Resnick, the well-connected owner of Paramount Farms,
>> which grows citrus and nuts on 118,000 acres in Kern County.
>>
>> In September, Resnick wrote Feinstein complaining that "sloppy
>> science" by federal wildlife agencies was causing farm water
>> shortages. A week later, Feinstein forwarded the letter to Obama
>> administration officials, who authorized a review by the National
>> Academy of Sciences.
>>
>> "It seems to be a complete reversal of her position," Thompson
>> said. "The entire Bay Area delegation had agreed we would do this
>> National Academy of Sciences report to find out scientifically
>> what should and shouldn't be done, and for her to turn that on its
>> head and go out unilaterally with this proposal does not take into
>> consideration the needs of all of California."
>>
>> Thompson accused Feinstein of "trying to spin this as a job saver,
>> but that ignores the jobs up north that depend on water." He
>> compared Feinstein's plan to the Bush administration's water
>> diversions in the Klamath River Basin in 2002 that severely
>> damaged fisheries and were later reversed.
>>
>> Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, said, "Best I can see, she's
>> making a decision that jobs in the Bay Area and Northern
>> California and the Peninsula south of San Francisco aren't as
>> important as jobs in the Central Valley."
>>
>> Feinstein contends that the amendment to the jobs bill would not
>> waive the Endangered Species Act but instead follow a 2003
>> precedent that guaranteed water deliveries in New Mexico despite
>> restrictions imposed to protect the silvery minnow.
>>
>> Miller, a former chairman of the House Natural Resources
>> Committee, said Feinstein's amendment would suspend federal
>> environmental laws that protect fish.
>>
>> Verifying the science
>>
>> Feinstein made no mention Thursday of her demand for the National
>> Academy of Sciences report, due next month, to verify the science
>> behind fish-conservation demands.
>>
>> Resnick's business has given $29,000 to Feinstein's campaigns and
>> $246,000 more to Democratic political committees during years when
>> she sought re-election, according to a report by California Watch,
>> an investigative journalism nonprofit organization, that was
>> published in The Chronicle in December.
>>
>> Rep. Dennis Cardoza, D-Atwater (Merced County), defended
>> Feinstein's move. "The situation in the valley is continuing to
>> deteriorate, and we have a situation where even with more rain
>> than usual, we could have less allocations than last year,"
>> Cardoza said. He said even with large cutbacks in water
>> allocations to farmers, delta smelt and other fish populations
>> have not improved.
>>
>> Cardoza said recent studies show the pumps that environmentalists
>> say pulverize fish are in fact destroying only a handful. "The
>> pumps were shut down for six or 10 additional fish," Cardoza said.
>> "This is the height of insanity, and it's time we quit devastating
>> the California economy and understand what is really going on here."
>>
>> In a statement Thursday, Feinstein said that recent weeks of heavy
>> rain and Sierra snowfall have brought snowpacks to 130 percent of
>> their normal level. At the same time, "water has been gushing past
>> the canals and into the oceans while farms on the west side of the
>> (Central) Valley are likely to receive a very low percentage of
>> their water allocations for a second year because that water
>> cannot be pumped and stored."
>>
>> Political jockeying
>>
>> Feinstein's action comes after months of political jockeying
>> between Republicans and Democrats over whether the Endangered
>> Species Act is destroying California's farming industry. Several
>> fisheries on the coast from southern Oregon to San Luis Obispo
>> have been shut down for three years for lack of runoff, idling
>> commercial and recreational fishing and devastating the small
>> businesses that depend on it.
>>
>> Farmers have also seen water supplies evaporate. Before this
>> season's heavy rains, a three-year drought forced big cuts in
>> their water allotments, forcing 400,000 acres to lie fallow and
>> pushing unemployment in some towns toward 40 percent.
>>
>> Farmers, fishermen and environmentalists had been negotiating on a
>> long-term remedy to the decline of California's delta estuary, one
>> of the largest in the world and on a scale with Florida's
>> Everglades, but even more heavily damaged by a century of water
>> diversions.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Byron Leydecker, JcT
>>
>> Chair, Friends of Trinity River
>>
>> PO Box 2327
>>
>> Mill Valley, CA 94942-2327
>>
>> 415 383 4810 land/fax (call first to fax)
>>
>> 415 519 4810 mobile
>>
>> bwl3 at comcast.net
>>
>> bleydecker at stanfordalumni.org (secondary)
>>
>> http://www.fotr.org
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> <image001.gif><image002.gif><image003.gif>
>> _______________________________________________
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>
> --
> Greg King
> President/Program Director
> Siskiyou Land Conservancy
> P.O. Box 4209
> Arcata, CA 95518
> 707-498-4900
> gking at asis.com
> http://siskiyouland.wordpress.com/
>
>
>
>
>
> =
>
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> <OpposeFeinsteinESARider2-11-2010(5).doc>
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