[env-trinity] Stories on reformulation of BDCP

[Tom Stokely]

The Bay-Delta Conservation Plan reminds me of the "Six Phases of a Project and I wonder which phase they are in?  Maybe No. 3?
Six Phases of a Project:
1.  Enthusiasm2.  Disillusionment3.  Panic4.  Search for the guilty5.  Punishment of the innocent6.  Praise and honors for the non-participants

Here is the Mercury story plus more links:Jerry Brown’s revised water tunnels plan adds political problems -- For years, Gov. Jerry Brown used the promise of habitat restoration to broaden the appeal of his plan to build two tunnels to divert water around the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to the south. David Siders and Phillip Reese in the Sacramento Bee$  Bettina Boxall in the Los Angeles Times$ Paul Rogers in the San Jose Mercury$ Scott Smith Associated Press -- 5/1/15




New $17 billion Delta tunnels plan with less environmental restoration unveiled by Brown
By Paul Rogersprogers at mercurynews.comPOSTED:   04/30/2015 02:53:23 PM PDT8 COMMENTS| UPDATED:   ABOUT 12 HOURS AGOLATEST DROUGHT STORIES ...    
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OAKLAND -- Gov. Jerry Brown on Thursday unveiled a new version of his besieged plan to build massive tunnels under the Delta, this time significantly reducing the project's environmental restoration work.The latest version -- the third in three years -- brought down the cost from $25 billion to $17 billion. But it made the project even more risky politically.Environmental groups immediately blasted the plan, arguing that without extensive work to restore fish and wildlife in the Delta, the proposal is little more than a water grab by Southern California and Central Valley agribusiness. And it drew tepid responses from the big water providers that must pay for the tunnels.But Brown dug in.Recalling the efforts of his father, Gov. Edmund "Pat" Brown, and President Franklin Roosevelt, the governor said that since the 1920s modern California has been built with dams, canals and other water projects -- which have often been controversial when first proposed. They are costly but essential in a state as arid and crowded as California, Brown said."Civilization isn't free, and it's not cheap," he said at a news conference. "Yes, this costs money. But compared to what? Compared to a stadium? This is the basis of human existence."The central purpose of the tunnels, which would take 10 years to build, is to make it easier to move water from Northern California south to cities and farms, through the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, a vast system of sloughs and wetlands south of Sacramento that is the hub of much of California's water supply.AdvertisementPreviously, Brown had proposed building two huge tunnels, each about 35 miles long and 40 feet wide. They would take water from the Sacramento River north of Sacramento and move it under the Delta to state and federal pumps in Tracy.That project would have cost an estimated $25 billion, with $8 billion paying for a 50-year environmental plan that was expected to restore 153,000 acres of land, including roughly 100,000 acres of wetlands, to help bring back crashing populations of salmon, smelt and other fish and wildlife.But Thursday's plan does away with the 50-year environmental component, largely because the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other agencies would not give it permits. They said the state couldn't prove it would benefit the species.Instead, Brown and his deputies promised Thursday to restore 30,000 acres of habitat, which they said would cost only $300 million.The governor said the smaller environmental restoration can be funded, while the old project, whose written plan cost $240 million and was 30,000 pages long, was less certain."This is a step forward because it's a concrete action," Brown said. "It's real. It's happening in the real world. The other was more a desire."The Delta Cross Channel between the Sacramento River and Snodgrass Slough near Walnut Grove, Calif. (Rich Pedroncelli / AP)But the new plan's future, like one of Brown's other big projects, the $68 billion high-speed rail system, remains in question.Environmentalists said Thursday that without a guaranteed major environmental restoration component, it is very similar to Brown's efforts when he was governor decades ago to build the so-called Peripheral Canal, a huge canal around the eastern edge of the Delta. Those efforts were soundly defeated by voters in a statewide ballot measure in 1982."The common definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results," said Robert Wright, an attorney with Friends of the River.Wright said that the likelihood is "100 percent" that opponents will file a lawsuit next spring when the final environmental study on the revised plan is completed. Environmentalists also noted that nearly all the 30,000 acres the new plan promises to restore already were required under an agreement with the federal government dating back to 2010 as part of a plan to restore endangered fish -- and that state studies this year estimated its costs at $20,000 per acre -- twice what Brown's staff said it would cost Thursday.Brown is counting on major water agencies to pay the $17 billion to build and operate the tunnels. They have said they will raise that money through higher water rates on the public and possibly by raising property taxes.On Thursday, with few details of Brown's revised plans made public, large water agencies were guarded."We will thoroughly review with our board this new proposal," said Jeff Kightlinger, CEO of the Metropolitan Water District, which provides water to 19 million people in Southern California.Reducing the scale of the environmental restoration could make it more difficult for the big water agencies, which include the Santa Clara Valley Water District and Westlands Water District in Fresno, to invest billions to build the tunnels.That's because the 50-year "habitat conservation plan" was supposed to guarantee them insurance against endangered species lawsuits and decisions by the federal government that have limited Delta pumping in recent years to protect endangered fish.Brown and his lieutenants said the tunnels will not provide more water than California now takes from the Delta, but they will provide more reliability, even without the 50-year habitat conservation plan. They said that's because moving the intake structures north will reduce reliance on the huge pumps near Tracy, which kill fish and make parts of the Delta run backward."I believe water users, both urban and agricultural, will invest the money, because they have no choice," Brown said. "They are facing reduced water. I mean, the people in Livermore, and the Santa Clara Valley Water District, and growers. If they don't do this, they are absolutely certain to suffer serious losses of water in the future."
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