[Sosfbay-discuss] Delta Shad in your water?

[Wes Rolley]

 From the newsletter of Restore the Delta 
(http://www.restorethedelta.org/), comes a good directional statement 
after reading about a law suit in Federal court over pumping delta water.

> Delta Flows – Weekly Highlights from Restore the Delta
>
> For the Week of March 26, 2007
>
> Restore the Delta has very little to add to the article below other 
> than congratulations to Bill Jennings and the California Sportfishing 
> Protection Alliance. We think that water agencies complying with the 
> law is the essential first-step to restoring the California Delta.
>
> We also want to see state water agencies begin developing regional 
> self-sufficiency programs for water delivery, conveyance, and use.  By 
> creating regional conservation and reclamation programs, excessive 
> water exports from the California Delta can be reduced permanently. 
>
> We have also begun questioning whether it is wise to rely on a water 
> conveyance system that spans hundreds of miles across the state. 
>  Restore the Delta does not believe that shipping water from north to 
> south is a wise way to protect the water supply from a natural or 
> manmade disaster for all Californians.
>
> *************************************************************
>
The Link: http://www.insidebayarea.com/search/ci_5512677
The Reporter: Mike Taugher has been a good environmental reporter for 
the Contra Costa Times. - Wes

I think that Restore the Delta's questioning is right on the money. 


*************************************************************
Judge says Delta pumps may have to shut down

Endangered species ruling may cut off water to much of state

By Mike Taugher, MEDIANEWS STAFF

Inside Bay Area

Article Last Updated:03/24/2007 02:41:22 AM PDT

The state's largest water delivery system serving millions of people from
the Tri-Valley to Southern California must shut down in 60 days unless water
officials comply with the state endangered species law, a judge ruled.

The decision, which sent shock waves through water agencies up and down
California on Friday, says state water officials failed to obtain a state
permit to kill threatened or endangered salmon and Delta smelt.

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch ruled that the Department
of Water Resources was violating the California Endangered Species Act but
said he would delay turning off the pumps for 60 days to allow state
agencies to comply. The ruling also said the 60-day clock will not start
ticking until the ruling becomes final after a 15-day comment period.

State officials said they would ask the judge to reconsider, arguing they
are trying to develop a long-term conservation strategy and that shutting
off the pumps would deal a devastating economic blow.

"I don't think it's possible to comply with what the judge says in 60 days,"
DWR director Lester Snow said.

Most major water agencies have sufficient backup water supplies to get them
through a short pumping shutdown. However, if the permit required by the
court's decision further restricts pumping, it could reduce the amount of
water those agencies get in the long term.

At issue are massive pumps that supply water to more than 23 million people
in Alameda County, Silicon Valley and Southern California. The pumps are
powerful enough to alter the flow of rivers, disrupt fish movement and kill
millions of fish each year.

Among those fish are species such as Delta smelt, winter-run salmon and
spring-run salmon that are protected under state and federal endangered
species laws. The pumping plant has a permit to harm endangered fish from
the federal government, but not from the state.

Environmentalists say a state permit might force water supply cuts because
the state law is more stringent than the federal law.

The ruling does not affect smaller federal pumps that serve San Joaquin
Valley farms.

Stan Williams, chief executive officer of the Santa Clara Valley Water
District, said groundwater and access to San Francisco's Hetch Hetchy
aqueducts would provide short-term backup water supplies but a prolonged
shutdown could cause problems.

He added that he views the threat of a shutdown as plausible. "I think it's
real," Williams said.

The general manager of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern
California, the state water pumps' biggest customer, said he was
disappointed in the ruling but added that emergency water reserves can meet
the summer needs of its 18 million customers.

"What we need from Fish and Game is their best analysis of what they can do
in 60 days and then see if that will satisfy the court," said Met general
manager Jeff Kightlinger. "We're working rapidly on our contingency
planning."

Environmentalists, meanwhile, were elated.

"It's a mind-buster. I'm stunned," said Bill Jennings, executive director of
the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, which filed the lawsuit
last year.

The ruling comes at a time of deepening disarray in California water policy.
The state's major water source, the Delta, is laboring five years into an
ecosystem collapse that many scientists say is at least partly due to the
water pumps.

The failure of state water officials to obtain a permit for the pumps was
uncovered in 2005 by a state Senate committee.

That committee's investigation was in response to a MediaNews report showing
that in early 2005, just as the severity of the Delta's ecosystem crisis was
becoming apparent, state and federal water officials twice overruled the
advice of biologists appointed to enforce the federal endangered species
law.

State water officials argued that even though they lacked a formal permit, a
series of agreements and other documents dating back to the 1980s formed a
"patchwork" of compliance with the law.

The judge strongly disagreed, saying the documents "do not qualify as carte
blanche authorization" to kill or harm endangered fish.

Michael Lozeau, the lawyer that represented environmentalists in the
lawsuit, said the state endangered species law is stricter than the federal
version.

Under state law, the water resources department would have to offset the
death of every protected fish, possibly by dramatically reducing pumping or
improving habitat elsewhere in the Delta, Lozeau said.

"They have to replace every single fish," Lozeau said.

Jennings said that opens the door to force the state water department to
make up for years of illegal operations.

"When you catch the embezzler, what do you do? You make them pay it back,"
Jennings said.

Contact Mike Taugher at (925) 943-8257 or mtaugher at cctimes.com 
<mailto:mtaugher at cctimes.com>.

-- 

I have been impressed with the urgency of doing.
Knowing is not enough; we must apply.
Being willing is not enough; 
We must do. –Leonardo DaVinci
Wesley C. Rolley
17211 Quail Court
Morgan Hill, CA 95037
(408)778-3024 - http://cagreening.blogspot.com