[env-trinity] State and feds announce release of Delta studies after massive complaints

[Dan Bacher]

http://blogs.alternet.org/danbacher/2011/11/30/state-and-feds- 
announce-expedited-access-to-delta-plan-documents/

http://www.fishsniffer.com/content/1530-state-feds-announce-release- 
delta-studies-after-massive-complaints.html

State and feds announce release of Delta studies after massive  
complaints

Laird and Hayes continue to fast-track peripheral canal plan

by Dan Bacher

The state and federal governments on November 29 announced they plan  
to release Delta science studies in response to the voluminous  
comments they received criticizing a controversial agreement that  
fast-tracks the construction of the peripheral canal under the Bay  
Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP).

Tuesday's press release from the U.S. Department of Interior claimed  
that Interior, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the California Natural  
Resources Agency and the California Department of Water Resources  
"announced a first step in responding to public comments on a draft  
Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with California water agencies that  
will enhance transparency in developing the Bay Delta Conservation  
Plan (BDCP) by speeding access to draft technical documents."

"This initial step will be followed by additional responses to public  
comments that have been filed on the MOA," Interior noted.

The "public comments" included letters from unprecedented 242  
fishing, tribal and environmental organizations, 17 California  
Legislators and 11 Members of Congress, who slammed the top-down  
process that is dominated by corporate agribusiness and water agency  
interests that export water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River  
Delta. To read the entire Environmental Water Caucus letter, go to:  
http://www.ewccalifornia.org/reports/moaLetter11-16-11.pdf.

The letter from the 242 groups stated, "The MOA was negotiated behind  
closed doors and only serves to reinforce the growing awareness that  
the BDCP is biased in favor of the export water contractor’s agenda  
to increase exports from the Delta and its connected rivers, despite  
the documented negative impacts those exports have had on endangered  
fish species, Delta habitats, water quality and public trust values."

Both Deputy Secretary of the Interior David J. Hayes and Secretary of  
Natural Resources John Laird extolled the "virtues" of the plan to  
build the canal or tunnel to export more water to corporate  
agribusiness and southern California.

“The Bay Delta Conservation Plan may propose the largest habitat  
restoration project ever to be undertaken in the United States in the  
largest and most important estuary on the west coast of the  
Americas,” claimed Deputy Secretary of the Interior David J. Hayes.  
“This needs to be done right, and that is why we are announcing our  
joint commitment that all parties have access to key documents  
involved in the development of the BDCP.”

“Our expectation is that broad stakeholder understanding of its  
scientific underpinnings will improve their engagement in both the  
plan and its implementation," said Secretary of Natural Resources  
John Laird. "Fish, farmers and the 25 million average Californians  
who rely on the San Francisco-San Joaquin Delta for water deserve  
nothing less."

Laird continued: "One thing is absolutely clear as review of the  
comments on the MOA have begun -- no one wants even the appearance of  
a special advantage. Thus, while other comments on the MOA will be  
addressed in coming weeks, there is no need to wait on committing to  
release all documents to all parties at the same time."

The "enhancement" will be finalized in a letter among the controlling  
agencies in December, according to Interior. The letter will spell  
out that key BDCP-related documents will be posted on the internet at  
http://www.BayDeltaConservationPlan.com and made available to all  
parties for review at the same time. A list of expected release dates  
will be posted on the website within the week.

I am glad that Laird and Hayes have agreed to releasing all of the  
controversial BDCP documents "to all parties at the same time."  
However, I find Laird's comments greenwashing the peripheral canal  
plan, under the guise of a habitat conservation plan, disturbing.

When he says, "Fish, farmers and the 25 million average Californians  
who rely on the San Francisco-San Joaquin Delta for water deserve  
nothing less," Laird echoes the false notion that the only "real  
stakeholders" regarding the future of the Delta are fish, "farmers"  
and urban water users, a concept that both the Delta Vision and BDCP  
fiascos have embodied.

What about Delta residents, boaters, recreational anglers, commercial  
fishermen, California Indian Tribes, conservationists, environmental  
justice communities, business owners and all of those other people  
whose lives depend on the health of the Delta and its fish  
populations? Laird has to date done nothing to include them in the  
BDCP Management Committee because he apparently considers water  
exporters and political hacks to be the only "real" stakeholders.

Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla responded to Interior's release by stating,  
"The BDCP decides to start releasing science documents because they  
haven't been transparent. So now we are supposed to trust the science  
that they are selectively releasing - after we were not at the table  
to see how that 'science" was created. Judge Wanger, the Delta smelt  
judge who retired a few weeks ago, is now a lawyer for the Westlands  
Water District (Nothing like the growing nexus between corporations  
and the judiciary in this country.)"

"Phil Isenberg, chair of the Delta Stewardship Council, is telling  
everyone that the contractors will settle for a 9000 cfs. pipe to  
grab Delta water, and (drumroll please), the BDCP, which doesn't have  
a project, released a job description for a project manager to build  
the tunnel. Qualifications are: he/she must have worked for one of  
the water contractor groups that wants to take the water," Barrigan- 
Parrilla noted.

Laird and Gerald Meral, Deputy Secretary of the Natural Resources  
Agency, have continued the abysmal environmental policies of Governor  
Arnold Schwarzenegger in pushing for the construction of a peripheral  
canal or tunnel through the Bay Delta Conservation Plan.

However, Laird and Hayes have actually eclipsed the Schwarzenegger  
and Bush administrations in slaughtering Delta fish and Central  
Valley chinook salmon in the state and federal water project  
facilities in the South Delta. The Obama and Brown administrations,  
under the "leadership" of Laird and Hayes, have killed record numbers  
of Sacramento splittail and other fish in the pumps while exporting  
record amounts of water out of the Delta this year.

Over 11 million fish, including 9 million Sacramento splittail, have  
been "salvaged" at the Delta pumps near Tracy in 2011. The previous  
record salvage number for the splittail, a native minnow found only  
in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River system, was 5.5 million in 2006.

The other 2 million fish "salvaged" at the pumps include striped  
bass, largemouth bass, Sacramento River spring chinook salmon,  
Central Valley steelhead and other species. Yet the numbers salvaged  
are just a fraction of the actual loss of fish in the pumps;  
scientific studies point to the real loss being 5 to 10 times the  
"salvage" numbers. (http://blogs.alternet.org/danbacher/2011/09/09/ 
over-11-million-fish-salvaged-in-delta-death-pumps-since-january-1).

The state and federal water projects pumped a record 6.5 million acre- 
feet of water from the Delta in 2011. The previous record, set during  
the Schwarzenegger and Bush administrations, was 6.3 million acre- 
feet in 2005.

The peripheral canal or tunnel that Laird and Hayes are pushing will  
only result in the extinction of protected Central Valley steelhead,  
Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt,  
Sacramento splittail and green sturgeon because this "improved  
conveyance" will inevitably result in increased water exports from an  
estuary that has been ravaged by the current diversions.

The BDCP is in reality a "Bad Delta Canal Plan," not a "Bay Delta  
Conservation Plan."

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