[env-trinity] Mercury News editorial: Feinstein bill risks further damage to Delta

[Tom Stokely]

http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_25608771/mercury-news-editorial-feinstein-bill-risks-further-damage# 
 
Mercury News editorial: Feinstein bill risks further damage to Delta
Mercury News Editorial
POSTED:   04/21/2014 01:13:26 PM PDT2 COMMENTS
UPDATED:   04/21/2014 02:50:50 PM PDT

California Sen. Dianne Feinstein's willingness to do Big Ag's bidding at the expense of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta is increasingly alarming. Last week she released a revised drought bill that has environmentalists up and down the state fuming -- with good reason.
Feinstein stripped out the best part of her original legislation: $300 million for conservation and efficiency measures and aid to low-income farmworkers hurt by the drought. She admits she did it to attract Republican support. It raises the question of how far she is willing to go to maximize the amount of water sent from the Delta to Central Valley farmers, even if it causes catastrophic harm to the estuary.
House Republicans are demanding that any drought legislation roll back crucial environmental protections and end the San Joaquin River restoration project. They act as if these rules are all about helping fish, but keeping the river system healthy is critical for people who rely on its water.
That's particularly true in the Bay Area. The Delta supplies about half of Silicon Valley's water supply. But for major agricultural interests, this battle is all about money.
For example, billionaire Stewart Resnick of Los Angeles, who has considerable Central Valley farming interests, and his cohorts at Westlands Water District have spent $600,000 lobbying Congress in the past three years. The Sacramento Bee reported that Resnick and his wife have donated $321,000 to federal candidates and PACs over the same time period. They want to pump as much water as possible from the Delta to irrigate their crops.
The forces driving the Feinstein bill are also behind the Bay Delta Conservation Plan, the $25 billion project that's likely to result in the biggest water grab in California history. And that's saying something, considering Southern California's greedy past.
We sympathize with the Central Valley farmers who provide the vast majority of the state's fruits and vegetables. The state needs to find every drop of water available for them, as long as it doesn't permanently harm the Delta.
But Big Ag has a dirty little secret: Wealthy Central Valley farmers have doubled the area of profitable almond orchards in recent years to 800,000 acres, largely for export. Unlike crops such as tomatoes, orchards can't be allowed to go fallow in dry years, and they gulp twice as much water as vegetables.
On top of that, while Santa Clara County was responsibly restoring the groundwater it was pumping from wells, the Central Valley has been draining its aquifers while planting more crops than water supplies reasonably could sustain. The current shortage is largely Big Ag's own fault.
Feinstein has a choice. She can pander to corporate farming interests who are big donors, or she can stand up for reasonable protection for the Delta to ensure safe, adequate water supplies for future generations in California -- both on farms and in cities.
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