[env-trinity] YubaNet: Groups Slam Sweetheart Settlement for Westlands Water District

[Dan Bacher]

http://yubanet.com/california/Groups-Slam-Sweetheart-Settlement-for-Westlands-Water-District.php#.VftRM93DyRo


  Groups Slam Sweetheart Settlement for Westlands Water District


Published on Sep 17, 2015 - 8:05:51 AM


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By: Dan Bacher

September 17, 2015 - Remember the powerful Westlands Water District,  
the organization that has sued the federal government every summer  
over the past three years in unsuccessful attempts to stop  
supplemental releases from Trinity Reservoir to prevent a massive fish  
kill on the lower Klamath River?

Well, the same Obama Administration that Westlands sued to block  
desperately needed flows for salmon and steelhead signed a binding  
agreement today with the powerful water district, located on the arid  
and dusty west side of the San Joaquin Valley.

Conservation groups blasted the settlement for guaranteeing the  
district vast amounts of Sacramento and Trinity River water to keep  
irrigating toxic, drainage-impaired soils filled with selenium and  
other toxic salts.

In a statement, Gayle Holman of the Westlands Water District announced  
that the U.S. Department of Justice and Westlands Water District have  
approved a legal settlement, that, if approved by Congress, would "end  
a decades-long dispute over the Bureau of Reclamation’s responsibility  
to provide drainage for the farmland within Westlands." (http://mavensnotebook.com/2015/09/15/this-just-in-westlands-water-district-statement-on-settlement-of-drainage-lawsuit/ 
)

"It provides a fair and equitable solution for Westlands’ landowners  
who lost the productive use of their land caused by Reclamation’s  
failure to provide drainage services to those lands, while at the same  
time providing a cost savings of approximately $3.5 billion to the  
United States," according to Holman.

She said the drainage settlement requires Westlands to "assume full  
responsibility for drainage management within its boundaries." Under  
the agreement:

• Westlands will be required to retire a minimum of 100,000 acres of  
land and to repurpose the non-irrigated lands for "environmentally  
friendly" uses.

• Westlands will be relieved of repayment obligation for prior  
expenditures by the United States for construction of the Central  
Valley Project (CVP).

• The Department of the Interior will oversee Westlands’ management of  
drainage.

Finally, "The settlement relieves taxpayers of a liability of  
approximately $3.5 billion dollars and caps water deliveries to the  
District at seventy-five percent of its contract amount," said Holman.

Holman also claimed, "The Westlands Water District is"the most  
productive agricultural land in the U.S., generating $3.5 billion in  
farm-related economic activities and more than one billion dollars’  
worth of food and fiber. Westlands’ 700 family-owned farms feed local  
communities, California and the nation."

In response, the California Water Impact Network (C-WIN), Food and  
Water Watch and Restore the Delta issued a joint statement blasting  
the agreement for settling litigation "over an unfulfilled federal  
requirement to provide drainage while forgiving Westlands’ debt to  
U.S. taxpayers with an unconscionable sweetheart deal."

Rather than relieving the taxpayers of liability, the conservationists  
said the agreement would in fact increase the federal deficit by $340  
million through forgiving Westland’s interest-free repayment  
obligations to the taxpayers for construction of the federal Central  
Valley Project. "Westland’s current two-year water contract will be  
converted to a permanent contract for 890,000 acre-feet of water  
annually, further draining the Sacramento River watershed and Delta,"  
they said.

The groups noted that under the agreement, "water would be provided at  
lower prices, without acreage limits, and with permanent entitlements.  
These terms will lead to ever-increasing water deficits for  
California’s communities, economy, and environment."

“We are outraged that the Obama Administration has sold out California  
taxpayers and their water,” said Adam Scow, California Director of  
Food & Water Watch. “This bad deal will allow corporate agribusinesses  
in Westlands to keep irrigating water-intensive almonds and pistachios  
on toxic land in the desert, mostly for export to China. We will work  
to defeat this taxpayer giveaway in Congress.”

They also criticized the Obama Administration for ignoring previous  
calls by the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service  
and many others to retire over 300,000 acres of poisoned lands.  
Instead, they said the deal will require only 100,000 acres of land  
retirement - less than Westlands has already retired voluntarily.

Environmental groups, Indian Tribes and fishing organizations have  
frequently slammed Westlands and other corporate agribusiness  
interests for being big beneficiaries of "corporate welfare" through  
massive subsidies from the federal and state governments. Annual  
subsidies to Westlands range from $24 million to $110 million a year,  
the Environmental Working Group (EWG), an independent economic  
analysis firm, estimated.

"A better plan, outlined recently by EcoNorthwest, found 300,000 acres  
of toxic land in the Westlands Water District and three adjacent water  
districts could be retired at a cost of $580 million to $1 billion,"  
said Scow. "Retiring this land and curbing the water rights associated  
with it would result in a savings to California of up to 455,000 acre- 
feet of water. For reference, the City of Los Angeles uses 587,000  
acre-feet in a typical year."

Read the EcoNorthwest Report at: http://www.econw.com/our-work/publications/estimated-costs-to-retire-drainage-impaired-lands-in-the-san-luis-unit

Scow also said this course of action would "cost significantly less"  
than Governor Jerry Brown’s plan to build two massive Delta Tunnels to  
divert water from the Sacramento River for the benefit of Westlands  
and other corporate agribusiness interests on the west side of the San  
Joaquin Valley. The state and federal governments recently renamed  
this plan, formerly the Bay Delta Conservation Plan, the "California  
Water Fix." Estimates for the real cost of the project range up to $67  
billion.

"Because most of the poisoned lands will remain available for  
irrigation, the salt and selenium drainage problem will continue, but  
the U.S. Government will no longer have any role in its management,"  
Scow noted.

In fact, critics said the current agreement is worse for the  
environment and taxpayers than earlier agreements proposed under the  
Bush administration.

“Unlike the earlier proposals from the Bush Administration, the Obama  
Administration is making no demands of any kind as to how that  
drainage is managed, including no monitoring requirements, no  
performance standards, no ‘drainage plan’ for review or approval by  
state authorities, etc.," said Tom Stokely from the California Water  
Impact Network. "The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control  
Board does not require any monitoring for selenium discharges to  
groundwater, so desert growers in Westlands have been given a free  
pass to expand the pollution in the aquifers of the Western San  
Joaquin Valley in perpetuity with cheap water that is desperately  
needed by people in the source watershed.”

Stokely said the "disastrous consequences" of industrial-scale  
cultivation of seleniferous lands became obvious in 1983, when  
thousands of migratory waterfowl, including ducks and geese, were  
deformed or killed outright at Kesterson Wildlife Refuge due to  
deliveries of toxic drain water from Westlands Water District  
corporate farms. That huge environmental scandal was exposed by Felix  
Smith, a brave U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist at the time  
who now serves on the Board of the Save the American River Association  
(SARA).

“The diversion of water from the Delta for Westlands Water District  
has significantly contributed to the destruction of the Delta’s  
fisheries and water quality for agriculture,” said Barbara Barrigan- 
Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta. “Leaving this land  
in production will ensure perpetual taxpayer subsidy to agriculture’s  
wealthiest 1% and continued environmental destruction of fish,  
wildlife, water quality and air quality from desertification of salty  
lands. The Obama Administration is making a terrible mistake that will  
haunt us for generations to come."

Congressman Jerry McNerney (CA-09) also slammed the drainage  
settlement between Westlands and the federal government that was  
approved today, calling it a "sweetheart deal." (https://mcnerney.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/rep-mcnerney-issues-statement-in-response-to-westlands-settlement 
)

“This settlement between Westlands Water District and the Department  
of the Interior is nothing short of alarming," said McNerney. It’s a  
‘sweetheart deal’ negotiated without transparency – resulting in an  
outrageous windfall for Westlands regardless of how much affected land  
is ultimately retired. The settlement forgives Westlands’ massive $350  
million debt owed to the government and taxpayers while giving them an  
advantageous, no-need-to-review contract that could improve the water  
deliveries they receive from the San Joaquin-Sacramento Delta and  
further devastate the Delta’s fragile ecosystem."

Since the drainage agreement between Westlands and the federal  
government must be approved by Congress, you can expect a big battle  
by fishing groups, Indian Tribes and environmental organizations and  
their political allies to block the approval of this settlement.

Westlands has acquired a reputation among public trust advocates as  
the "Darth Vader" of California water politics because of the water  
district's frequent attacks on efforts to save and restore salmon,  
steelhead, Delta smelt and other imperiled fish populations.

The Hoopa Valley Tribe, Yurok Tribe, Pacific Coast Federation of  
Fisherman's Associations, Institute for Fisheries Resources and  
Department of Interior won a legal victory on August 26 when a federal  
judge denied a request by Westlands and the San Luis Delta Mendota  
Water Authority for a temporary restraining order and preliminary  
injunction against the higher supplemental flows from Trinity  
Reservoir released in August and September to stop a fish kill on the  
lower Klamath River. (https://intercontinentalcry.org/judge-sides-with-hoopa-valley-and-yurok-tribe-scientists-preventing-a-fish-kill-on-the-klamath/ 
)

For more information on the history of Westlands Water District,  
please read Lloyd Carter’s superb Golden Gate University Environmental  
Law Journal article, "Reaping Riches in a Wretched Region: Subsidized  
Industrial Farming and Its Link to Perpetual Poverty," at: http://digitalcommons.law.ggu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1033&context=gguelj

Background on the Groups:

The California Water Impact Network (C-WIN, online at http://www.c-win.org 
) promotes the just and environmentally sustainable use of  
California's water, including instream flows and groundwater reserves,  
through research, planning, media outreach, and litigation. http://www.c-win.org

Restore the Delta is a 20,000-member grassroots organization committed  
to making the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta fishable, swimmable,  
drinkable, and farmable to benefit all of California. Restore the  
Delta's mission is to save and restore the San Francisco Bay-Delta  
estuary for our children and future generations. http://www.restorethedelta.org

Food & Water Watch works to ensure the food and water we consume is  
safe, accessible and sustainable. So we can all enjoy and trust in  
what we eat and drink, we help people take charge of where their food  
comes from, keep clean, affordable, public tap water flowing freely to  
our homes, protect the environmental quality of oceans, force  
government to do its job protecting citizens, and educate about the  
importance of keeping shared resources under public control. http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org


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