Delta Flows- July 7, 2010
Training wheels
Richard Roos-Collins, one of Governor Schwarzenegger’s appointees to the Delta Stewardship Council (DSC), has resigned. Roos-Collins, an attorney for the Natural Heritage Institute, had previously served on the BDCP steering committee. Restore the Delta and other groups thought that this constituted a conflict of interest, since one function of the DSC is to evaluate the BDCP.
Roos-Collins had not yet been confirmed by the Senate. The Governor’s other three appointees – Phil Isenberg, Randy Fiorini, and Hank Nordhoff – also have not been confirmed. California law allows a Governor’s appointees to serve for one year pending confirmation.
The DSC will have a Delta Plan long before that. So confirmation is kind of a moot point: so much for legislative oversight and accountability.
And think what the newly-reactivated Water Commission could do with water bond money before they are formally confirmed in their positions? Newly condemned land in the Delta for new conveyance? New dams?
Pipe dream
The Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) has produced a June 2010 Status Update with several interesting maps. They’re looking at management strategies and “opportunity areas,” and considering “site selection criteria” for 5 in-river intakes at 3,000 CFS capacity each (“to avoid high population density areas”).
If you aren’t looking carefully, you could miss this subtle change on the map titled “Proposed Conveyance and Habitat Restoration Options”: the central alignment is identified as a “Pipeline/Tunnel.”
We don’t remember seeing the term “pipeline” being used in earlier BDCP documents. This map describes the “Pipeline/Tunnel” as having “2 bores, each 33 feet inside diameter.” That was the same as last summer’s “tunnel” description.
In a future update, we expect to see “tunnel” dropped altogether. “Pipeline” seems so much smaller, so inconspicuous.
You can find a PDF to download at this website: http://www.baydeltaconservationplan.com/bdcppages/BDCPInfoFactSheets.aspx
We’ve been framed
Have you noticed that certain words and phrases are used over and over again to describe the Delta, while other conditions never get described at all? Discussions about the Delta have been “framed” by people invested in seeing it in a particular way, whether or not that way is accurate.
Think about how often you have seen the Delta described as the “hub” of California’s water system, as if that image conveyed everything important about the region.
But anyone looking at the system honestly would have to admit that the Delta’s days as a “hub” are over. Water coming in is limited, fluctuating, and/or compromised. Sending historic levels of that water out is fatal to the ecosystem.
Describing it instead as “an estuary formerly used as the hub of California’s water system” might help push public perceptions in the direction of regional sustainability.
Another example of insidious framing: In the early drafts of the Regional Conditions Report for the Central Valley Flood Protection Plan, every time the phrase “levee failure” appeared, it was preceded by the word “catastrophic.”
People in the Delta know that not every levee failure is a catastrophe, and catastrophe is less likely if adequate emergency response systems are in place. Restore the Delta managed to get a lot of those “catastrophics” out of the report, but not all of them.
One indicator that Senator Feinstein is still thinking inside the box about the Delta is the language in the bill proposing a NHA. Look at what the language says and what it doesn’t say.
Said:
“The Sacramento and San Joaquin River Delta is in crisis . . . invasive species are predominant in the Delta . . . the native species of the Delta . . . are in decline . . .”
Not said:
Changes in hydrology resulting from export pumping have given invasive species a foothold in the Delta and have pushed toward extinction four ESA-listed runs of salmon that depend on sufficient clean cold water flowing through the Delta.
Said:
“pollutants and chemicals have deteriorated the water quality . . . studies indicate that effluent from wastewater treatment plants on the rivers and tributaries of the Delta have changed the food web and negatively impacted native species . . . derelict ships, in particular, the Ghost Fleet of abandoned World War II era Military Ships, leach toxic chemicals into the waterways . . .”
Not said:
Toxic run-off from unaddressed drainage issues in the Southern San Joaquin valley contributes to degraded water quality in the Delta. The history of Kesterson Reservoir tells us that the selenium packed runoff from the Westside of the San Joaquin Valley is capable of causing disfiguring mutation to the offspring of waterfowl.
Said:
“the Sacramento and San Joaquin River Delta is at risk. . .”
Not said:
Conditions in the Sacramento and San Joaquin River Delta make it impossible to continuing exploiting the region as a hub of the state’s water system and a profit center for exporters of taxpayer-subsidized water.
Said:
“as levees and water exports have altered the flow of water through the system, many of the islands of the Delta are between 10 and 20 feet below sea level . . . many of the levees in the Delta are at risk of failure, threatening communities and infrastructure with flooding, and the risk of an earthquake in the Delta is high. . .”
Not said:
The state has increased exports of water through the Delta without committing to maintaining all the levees that contribute to sustaining the export system and regional infrastructure. Periodic levee breeches that would otherwise have primarily local impact thus become a threat beyond the Delta region. Despite the region’s proximity to fault lines in the San Francisco Bay Area, Delta levees have never collapsed in reaction to earthquakes to the west. However, the rigid, concrete-lined California aqueduct on which millions of export users rely runs along a fault line on the western side of the Central Valley, making continued reliance on this infrastructure unwise.
Plus, rather than developing new technologies for environmentally sensitive/responsible dredging to help with levee maintenance, dredging for Delta maintenance has been curtailed by the state.
If the NHA process were to begin in the Delta itself, we would start out with a much different picture than the one painted by DWR, the PPIC, and Delta Vision and now seen everywhere in government documents and in state and national media.
The more control we have over how the Delta is described, the more control we will have over its fate and our own.
New lawsuit considers groundwater and the public trust
The Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA) and the Environmental Law Foundation (ELF) have filed a lawsuit against the State Water Resources Control Board and Siskiyou County based on the idea of using the public trust doctrine to regulate groundwater.
Since 1980, the State Board has regulated pumping of groundwater within 500 feet of the Scott River, where the Legislature had found geology and hydrology to be uniquely interconnected (Water Code Section 2500.5 (b). PCFFA and ELF assert that failure to regulate more distant pumping has depleted surface flows and hastened the decline of the coho salmon.
See “Should the public trust doctrine be extended to groundwater?” at http://baydelta.wordpress.com/
“Paper Water” online
Bruce Tokars of Salmon Water Now has been prolific in producing informative videos about water politics and posting them online where they can reach a lot of viewers. His most recent effort is “Paper Water: and Other Sordid Tales.” This is a great overview of Stewart Resnick, the Kern Water Bank, The Monterey Amendments, and Paper Water. You can watch this in four parts on YouTube. The whole 35-minute video is also posted on Vimeo.
Delta Flows June 28, 2010
It sounded like a good idea to us
The Delta Stewardship Council couldn’t wait to get started on the part of the Interim Plan that involves “review and approval of Proposition 1E expenditures for selected projects.”
When voters approved 1E in 2006, that approval included $35 million “to reinforce those sections of the levees that have the highest potential to suffer breaches or failure and cause harm to municipal and industrial water supply aqueducts that cross the Delta and which are vulnerable to flood damage.”
EBMUD partnered with Delta reclamation districts to propose a Delta Levees Special Flood Control Project that would protect the District’s Mokelumne Aqueducts, Kinder Morgan petroleum pipeline, Burlington Northern Santa Fe raid line, and other Delta infrastructure, including State Highway 4.
The FloodSAFE Environmental Stewardship and Statewide Resources Office (FESSRO), Delta Levees Special Projects Branch, recommended moving ahead with the project.
FESSRO noted that if the DSC didn’t approve the project, the legislative mandate would not be met; the funds (which had to be reserved by June 30) would revert; the opportunity to provide jobs in an economically depressed region would be lost; and water supply and reliability for the East Bay would remain at its current level of risk.
There were so many good reasons to move ahead with this, including the fact that “Recent court decisions have made it clear that the state and other public entities may be held liable for the consequences of failing to maintain a flood management system or for failing to mitigate a known danger.”
But DSC staff told the Council that indemnifications for the project weren’t adequate and that more CEQA work was needed. And Patrick Johnston wondered why EDMUD and the counties weren’t paying for this themselves.
Well, you see, there was this legislation. . . . . But never mind that. The DSC apparently has other plans for this money.
Correction: DSC Director Joe Grindstaff did NOT say the BDCP had “gone rogue,” as Restore the Delta reported last month. He did say that some believed they had “gone rogue,” but he said that he thought that was wrong and explained why.
We’re dancing as fast as we can
As Delta farmers struggle to file water use reports by July 2 to comply with last year’s legislation changing reporting requirements, the Senate will be voting this week on SB 565 (Pavley). This bill would establish several new penalty and investigative powers at the State Water Resources Control Board dealing with water rights, while reducing or eliminating existing due process and property rights protections for California water rights holders.
SB 565
- Allows the State Water Board to review and revise any water right without cause, giving this agency new invasive power to inspect private property for vaguely defined purposes to ascertain whether the beneficial purposes of water use are being met.
- Shifts the burden of proving forfeiture of a water right to the water right holder – dramatically increasing the likelihood of a frivolous lawsuit being filed by a third party.
- Forces property owners to pay for the extremely costly engineering reports that will ultimately be used against them by third party litigants.
- Increases exponentially the penalty to reflect the “market value” of water (regardless of the actual value of the water to the user)
These provisions were considered for inclusion in last year’s SBx7 5 on water rights enforcement, but were ultimately abandoned for lack of support.
Many Delta farmers believe, and we concur, that these new authorities will be used to litigate Delta farmers out of existence. By keeping Delta farmers in a position of defense, those who want to usurp their water rights will keep the financial pressure on, forcing Delta farmers to “sell” the farm. This is a blatant attempt to rewrite the California water code to justify taking away the historical water rights held by Delta families.
What is even more shameful about this proposed legislation is that it does not help to meet the long term environmental needs of the Delta, but actually sets the stage for even more water diversions.
Delta Flows, June 23, 2010
“Lipstick on a pig”
That was Senator Lois Wolk’s description of AB 2775, a bill that would amend the water bond to remove language that would allow nongovernmental partners to be part of joint powers authorities formed to own and manage dams.
Assemblymember Jared Huffman and Senator Dave Cogdill, who never agree about anything with respect to water, coauthored this bill focusing on a “narrow point of consensus,” a “surgical change” (to quote Huffman). Huffman presented it to the Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee on June 22. It has an urgency clause.
Why the urgency? In a deeply flawed water bond, the joint powers provision is one of the deepest flaws. Organizations opposing the water bond have noted that this provision would open the gate for more entities like the Kern Water Bank, where private investors profit from public infrastructure investments. The legislature wants to get it out of the water bond before the Secretary of State prepares the measure for the November ballot.
So why did Wolk, alone among the senators on the committee, vote against the amendment? Because, as she noted, the amendment makes the bond more palatable, but “This won’t eliminate the possibility of gaming the system.”
The real problem is with Section 6252 of the Government Code, which allows mutual water companies to enter into joint powers agreements with public agencies. For example, Westside Mutual Water Company is the entity that allows Stewart Resnick to control the Kern Water Bank. Removing the reference to nongovernmental partners from the bond won’t eliminate mutual water companies or change the Government Code.
Huffman admitted that this is a problem, but he wants to fix it some other time. Cogdill said he was surprised at the attention the issue had received. A number of legislators who voted for the water bond reportedly didn’t even notice the provision.
We wonder what else in the water bond they didn’t notice.
AB 2775 will require a 2/3 vote of the legislature, and requires fiscal committee review. Did we mention that it is urgent?
And while we’re tweaking things . . .
In their enthusiasm to pass the “historic water package” last November and create a Delta Stewardship Council to put things right in the Delta, lawmakers neglected to address the matter of paying for the Council.
To correct this oversight, Assemblymember Huffman presented AB 2092, a long-term financing plan for the DSC, to the Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee.
AB 2092 requires the DSC to develop a financing plan based on the “beneficiary pays” principle. This will involve defining private and public benefits, as well as identifying both benefits and negative impacts of any action.
A variety of financing strategies will be necessary. Huffman emphasized that any new fees would be subject to legislative approval. Both supporters and opponents focused on this issue of fees. Delta county representatives supported the bill but noted that fees need to be proportional to the benefits received, and that there should be a provision for fees to be offset by previous work. Several upstream water districts opposed the bill, expressing concerns that they could be charged for downstream impacts.
The bill contains a provision for crediting beneficiaries who “prepay,” coming forward in advance with money to pay for “time-sensitive” projects. Kathy Cole, representing the MWD, testified that larger urban water users would be the most likely to make use of this option. Senator Alex Padilla expressed concerns that the “prepay” strategy might influence outcomes. But Huffman insisted that that kind of “undue influence” will be avoided through “vigorous oversight.”
Unfortunately, we have seen how much difficulty Huffman’s Water, Parks, and Wildlife Committee has had already in overseeing the activities of the DSC.
Just to clarify one little point about beneficiaries: Huffman said that any diverter IN the Delta is diverting FROM the Delta. While his statement may be true in the grammatical and logistical sense, he forgot about a few codes like riparian and pre 1914 water rights, as well as the North Delta Water Agency Contract. Delta users are not beneficiaries diverting surplus Delta water. They are the Delta community, and the Delta is tied to their homes and their livelihood. Lumping them in with the State Water Project and Central Valley Project water exporters ignores a hundred years of California water law, and sets a dangerous precedent for blaming the victim in the mismanagement of the Delta.
Feinstein’s favor for Resnick et al. is still a bad idea
Senator Dianne Feinstein’s S. 1759, “Water Transfer Facilitation Act of 2009,” is on the U.S. Senate Legislative Calendar, and opponents fear that it could be included in omnibus legislation. This is the legislation that would relax the law in order to benefit the Kern Water Bank and other private entities profiting from taxpayer subsidized water and infrastructure. It would allow high flows in the San Joaquin River, crucial to the Delta’s ecological health, to be diverted outside of the CVP service area and to non-CVP contractors for use in the state’s multi-billion dollar private water sales market.
Under the legislation, federally subsidized $20 an acre foot water could be resold in the open market for more than $1000 an acre foot. Environmental review would be relaxed, with a single programmatic EIR used for the Central Valley Project transfers. This would help hide the environmental impacts of individual transfers.
Restore the Delta has joined conservation and fisheries communities in asking the chairs of the Committee on Energy & Natural Resources and the Subcommittee on Water and Power to prevent this legislation from advancing.
Confirmation of something we guessed
Writing in the California Progress Report, Alegria De La Cruz, Legal Director of the Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment, talks about those farmworker demonstrations on the Westside last summer:
“What about the ‘spontaneous’ demonstrations by farmworkers marching under the ‘Fish vs. Jobs’ banner? Go talk to the laborers in the small destitute towns of the regions such as Five Points, Firebaugh, Mendota and Dos Palos. I have. If you can gain their confidence, they’ll tell you, as they’ve told me: these demonstrations were orchestrated by farm labor contractors and their employers. Workers were either strongly ‘encouraged’ to joint the demonstrations with the implication that their jobs were at stake, or were simply paid to march. This is not meant as a criticism of the marchers; on the Westside, you cannot afford to pass up a day’s wages. The system is designed that way.”
De La Cruz’s family has been fighting corporate agriculture on the Westside for three generations. You can read the whole article, “Tales of the Westside” at http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/site/?q=node/7871
Delta Flows Newsletter
Tracking
Senator Feinstein wants to help out the Delta by introducing federal legislation that would designate the Delta a National Heritage Area.
This effort by the Senator has come at the request of representatives for the Five Delta Counties: Contra Costa, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Solano, and Yolo. Restore the Delta recognizes that the Five Counties have been working hard to protect Delta Communities in the myriad of Delta processes being led by the state.
Restore the Delta also thinks there may be some positive things about an NHA. But we’re suspicious of anything that comes from the top down rather than being initiated by the people who will be affected.
It is our understanding that the creation of an NHA usually involves many community meetings so that the area involved can articulate what it would like to see happen for itself within the designation. This type of ground level consensus building has not happened.
And of course we’re a bit suspicious of the Senator’s motives given her track record supporting water exporters.
Stay tuned.
They made a wrong turn back there
It has been 15 years since five State Water Project contractors and DWR met behind closed doors in Monterey to renegotiate how water is divided between urban agencies and agricultural users in drought years.
Before the Monterey Plus Amendments, DWR had to allocate water to urban areas first, which could force farmers to fallow their fields – at that time, mostly annual row crops. Under the Amendments, the division of water became 50% to farmers and 50% to cities.
Cities lost their “urban preference.” And a few agribusinesses got the deed to the Kern Water Bank.
Despite a lawsuit by the Planning and Conservation League and others, courts allowed DWR to operate provisionally under the Monterey Plus Amendments. On May 5, 2010, DWR formalized the 1995 agreement giving ownership and operational control of the water bank to the Kern County Water Bank Authority.
Last week, a suit was filed in Sacramento Superior Court by the California Water Impact Network, the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Central Delta Water Agency, and the South Delta Water Agency.
The suit challenges the legality of the following:
- Institutionalizing the concept of “paper water” – water promised by contract that can never realistically be delivered.
- Eliminating the “urban preference,” which prioritized water deliveries to municipal customers during drought. This change resulted in water shortages and higher utility rates for southern California ratepayers.
- Illegally transferring state property known as the Kern Water Bank to private entities and undermining the California Water Code by masking the purpose and place of water use.
- Increasing water exports from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, thus worsening water quality problems and triggering the collapse of the Delta’s ecosystem and fisheries.
The lawsuit seeks to reinstate the urban water preference during drought in State Water Project contracts, reduce the pumping of Delta water that has resulted in the collapse of fisheries, and return the Kern Water Bank to public ownership.
EPA to BDCP: Just what do you want?
In a letter this month to regional administrators for the Bureau of Reclamation, the National Marine Fisheries Service, and the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, EPA administrators expressed unwillingness to review the BDCP when its most recent Purpose Statement (in the 2/13 Notice of Intent) includes delivering up to full contract amounts of export water.
The EPA points out that the SWP and CVP have never exported more than about 6.3 MAF annually. (And as we know, that’s bad enough.) But the full contract amounts are “at least 1 million acre feet more than has ever been exported historically.”
The EPA notes that you can’t analyze the scope of alternatives when it isn’t clear whether the purpose of the project is to change the method of conveying the historical amount or to deliver the full contract amount. They also point out that increasing exports out of the Delta is inconsistent with recent state legislation.
And the EPA says that “significantly increasing exports out of a stressed Delta is the wrong policy.”
EPA suggests that either the federal action agencies return to the project purpose in the 4/15/08 Notice of Intent or start with the “coequal goals” language in the 2009 Legislation.
Failure to sort it out could slow down the BDCP’s expedited schedule.
A Flood Management Plan inches forward
Can the Central Valley Flood Management Plan (the CVFMP) achieve what the Legislature intended in 2007 when it directed DWR to develop documents to guide integrated flood management for the Central Valley?
Five regional work groups (the Upper and Lower Sacramento regions, the Upper and Lower San Joaquin regions, and the Delta) have produced a Regional Conditions Summary Report, the first step in generating the Central Valley Flood Protection Plan (CVFPP), due in 2012.
The report is over an inch thick. It turned out to be so long and detailed that DWR produced a second document, “Interim Progress Summary No. 1” for elected officials, the general public, and others who need something more user-friendly.
In producing these documents, DWR used an outreach effort it describes as “robust.” The work groups included 192 members across the five regions, and they met eight times. A team of engineering and collaborative policy consultants ran interference between DWR and often-skeptical Delta work group members.
So did that robust outreach produce accurate documents? In early drafts, “fragile hub of California’s water supply” descriptions dominated discussions of the Delta. Much of that framing is gone. Not every levee failure is described as “catastrophic.” Delta work group participants succeeded in giving the Delta a face as a region worth protecting for its own sake.
On June 3, work group representatives from all five regions met for a CVFMP Valleywide Forum in West Sacramento. Two panels gave their views on what needs to happen to make this process effective.
A sample of concerns expressed:
- Can this plan actually be implemented? Is this just the latest in a long series of time-consuming processes that end when they reach a difficult place?
- How will it be paid for? How can we avoid unfunded mandates?
- How will the process be integrated with local land use planning? The state pays for flood damage, but local agencies have authorized development, usually with no real understanding of flood risk.
- The feds are more interested in urban projects; do we want the same level of protection in a rural area if it would encourage development?
- How do we get back to a system that can at least handle design flows?
- Why wasn’t the Corps of Engineers at the table during the Phase 1 process?
DWR Director Mark Cowin told the audience that the norm will no longer be single purpose projects regulated by just one agency. The Department will integrate all flood management process and focus not on risk management but on sustainable flood protection.
Participants agreed that without a unified vision and a systemwide plan, permitting takes too long and agencies give conflicting advice.
There is plenty of disagreement among work group members. For example, participants disagreed on the subject of dams, with one asking how you get to 200-year protection without dams upstream and another arguing that dam removal in some places has increased flood safety. Another said that slowing flood flows rather than moving them through is “a recipe for disaster.”
One of those representing the Delta was Marci Coglianese, who noted that floods are more costly disasters than earthquakes. And after all of this, there is still no emergency response plan in the Delta.
DWR and the consultants got a lot of initial pushback from Delta work group members about assuming that conveyance was a given and that we would just have to do flood management around it. The BDCP and associated conveyance do not appear in the Summary Report under “Pending Projects and Programs.” Included are projects under construction, approved for construction, or in final planning stages and due to be completed before the CVFPP update in 2017.
The Delta workgroup fought to have flood planning and public safety considered before the BDCP went forward. Last year, Secretary Chrisman sent a memo to the work group promising coordination between the CVFPP and the BDCP. DWR staff insist that all the Department’s “top people” support Chrisman’s promises, and a meeting of consultants and the public is tentatively scheduled for July or August. It looks like that will be just in time for the BDCP’s EIR/EIS Scoping Report.
Phase 2 of the CVFPP process will be looking at “solution sets.”
By invitation only?
Joe Del Bosque, a Fresno farmer and a member of the California Latino Water Coalition (CLWC), was sworn in last Friday as a member of the California Water Commission, the agency resuscitated by November legislation to hand out money for dams if voters approve the water bond in November.
Also appointed to the Water Commission by Schwarzenegger is Daniel Curtin, Director of the California Conference of Carpenters. According to the California Farm Water Coalition, Curtin is also a member of the CLWC.
Restore the Delta wonders who else will be appointed to this Commission?
Thus far, as reported last week, we have a representative from The Nature Conservancy – the group that wants to convert Delta farming communities into an inland sea with some land for habitat that TNC’s friends can manage; a representative from the community that wants to continue farming unsustainable crops and selling water to developers; and a representative from the trade groups that wants to build new Delta Conveyance. (Members of the building trades should be put to work improving levees throughout the state using existing bond money.)
Perhaps, the Governor will add an expert on privatizing water for profit to the Commission? That way the cabal to destroy the Delta will be complete.
Delta Flows- June 3, 2010
Ten more years to deal with that pesky selenium?
West side farmers just can’t make that deadline for cleaning up their irrigation water. They’ve been trying for 14 years and have spent $100 million – although not all their own money, of course. But they need more time to develop a water treatment plant to eliminate contamination from 97,000 acres between Firebaugh and Interstate 5.
The Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board has given its approval for a 10-year extension for the Grassland Bypass Project. The California Sportfishing Protection Alliance and the California Water Impact Network argued that contamination will jeopardize revival of salmon runs and harm wildlife as far out as Suisun Bay. They said that a two-year extension would have been more reasonable than a full decade.
Farm representatives argue that fish pass through the river when higher flows dilute the selenium level.
Next, the matter goes to the State Water Resources Control Board, which is not known for making decisions that might inconvenience west side agriculture. They apparently still don’t view selenium as a stressor.
Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2010/05/28/1950835/west-side-farmers-clear-water.html#ixzz0pd9sWHk2
Only fast thinkers need apply
On May 28, the State Lands Commission, on behalf of the Delta Protection Commission, sent out a letter soliciting Proposals for Consulting Services entitled “Development of the Framework for Preparation of an Economic Sustainability Plan for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta” (Bid Log No. 2009-14).
The final date for proposal submission is June 14, by 2:00 p.m.
That allows just 17 days, 14 if we don’t count the Memorial Day weekend that immediately followed the letter’s mailing date.
The timeframe could be viewed as favoring bidders already well-connected to Delta policy and governance processes.
Of course, the DPC is itself driven by the same legislation that is driving the rest of Delta governance activities. The legislation gave the Delta Stewardship Council a January 1, 2012 deadline for delivering the Delta Plan. The DSC need a an interim plan by this August in order to have a first draft of the Delta Plan by November and allow three turnaround drafts during the comment period.
A positive angle: The economic sustainability plan must include flood protection recommendations to state and local agencies.
Estimated contract start date is July 15.
No hurdles for Mount
The Delta Reform Act of 2009 requires the new Delta Stewardship Council to appoint an Independent Science Board “not directly affiliated with a program or agency subject to the review activities of the ISB.” It also requires that the ISB review and comment on the draft EIR/EIS for BDCP.
At the DSC meeting on May 27, ten candidates out of a pool of 63 applicants for the ISB were submitted to the Council. The candidates were selected by Dr. Cliff Dahm, the interim lead scientist; Phil Isenberg, the chairman; and Dr. Jeffrey Mount, the chair of the previous CALFED Independent Science Board.
The candidates included Dr. Mount.
According to what definition is this “independent”?
For several years, Mount has been saying that significant portions of the western and central Delta will inevitably revert to open water habitat. That is the future he envisions.
We hope to see people on the Independent Science Panel who might be more inclined to consider reinforcing levees so that they can withstand floods, earthquakes, and sea-level rise, protecting people and property, infrastructure, agriculture, and recreation.
You couldn’t run a business this way
by Karen Medders
It has been interesting theater witnessing the learning curve of the private citizens who are our new Delta Stewardship Council members. Besides sorting out the overwhelming number of agencies, entities, outside and inside interests all with fingers in the Delta pie, these new members have to learn about water rights laws and the current paper water mess. They’ve also gotten a crash course in BDCP 101.
At the May 27-28 DSC meeting, they got a taste of what we are accustomed to from the BDCP, including the MO of waiting until the very last minute to provide any documentation for PowerPoint presentations. The Council also got to see the usual fuzzy prints projected on the wall for nobody to see, not to mention all of the acronyms which of course will make your eyes bleed.
It was satisfying to hear Council member Hank Nordhoff give the BDCP Public Outreach Panel a well-deserved rebuke. Mr. Nordhoff, chairman and chief executive officer of Gen-Probe, with an MBA in international business and finance from Columbia University, said that the lack of time to read and process this new information was making him feel like a complete idiot. He also chastised the presenters for the poor quality of the slides being projected.
Later the first day, Mr. Grindstaff commented that the BDCP has ‘gone rogue’ and is in need of monitoring. To that end, Mr. Nordhoff requested the BDCP provide a written summary of the previous month’s activities to be submitted for review at each DSC meeting. He also suggested the Council come up with its own list of alternatives and instruct the BDCP to address those alternatives, instead of the other way around.
The Council members will also be dropping in on BDCP Steering Committee meetings to monitor how the meetings are coming along.
It is nice to finally see the dog wag the tail, instead of the tail wagging the dog. We just might have a real opportunity to get this out-of-control government process back under some scrutiny and control. Thank you, Mr. Nordhoff and Council members!
Will the DSC be better listeners?
The DSC heard from three panelists from outside the BDCP process regarding their perceptions of what “success of the BDCP” would look like to them.
Gilbert Cosio of MBK Engineers raised the issue of flood control, an issue about which the North Delta Water Agency’s Melinda Terry continually reminds the BDCP Steering Committee. Mr. Cosio commented on the failure of the BDCP to incorporate any mention of flood control in their plan. He then addressed the current situations with Delta levees and advised the Council against waiting to take near-term actions.
Mr. Cosio mentioned that monies from Propositions 84 and 1E have been appropriated, but the Reclamation Districts cannot get the funds from the Department of Finance; $15,000,000 has been waiting at the Department of Finance since April 2009. Matching grants for maintenance and repairs have been funded, but the RDs have no idea if bonds have been sold, and DWR has no idea when the money will be released.
Dick Poole, owner of San Francisco-based Pro-Troll Products (a company that creates and markets innovative fishing and marine products) spoke on behalf of the salmon fishing industry. He said that their major stakeholders have been “mostly shut out” of the process.
He reminded the Council of the economic losses sustained by the salmon industry during the past 2 years. Mr. Poole noted that at the April 11th Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife hearing, there was no mentioned of protections for fish. Aggressive deadlines make it impossible to adequately address these issues.
Mr. Poole presented 10 Action Steps to the Council. Included is a request that the Council write a letter in support of the Biological Opinions and also support the State Water Board flow in-Delta criteria submitted to the Interim Plan process. This would be helpful in turning around the salmon numbers. This same report was presented to the National Academy of Science and has been cited by the NAS in their presentation in Davis.
Mark Pruner, President of North Delta Community and Residents for a Stable Environment (CARES) represented landowners and residents in the North Delta area of the Primary Zone and Clarksburg stakeholders’ interests. Along with most of the previous panel members, Mr. Pruner criticized the BDCP for its failure to make use of extensive local Delta expertise and knowledge. He also criticized BDCP’s failure to seriously consider viable alternatives.
To the question whether local landowners, residents and business owners would have the people to participate in these processes, the answer was a resounding “YES”.
As supervisor Don Nottoli said, “We cannot solve the problems of the state on the backs of the people of the Delta. It is not just the Delta environment at stake, it’s the people, too.”
A glimpse of how the Dutch view floods
The DSC got a European perspective from Annemieke Nijhoff, Director-General, Directorate-General of Water Affairs at the Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management, the Netherlands. She said that the Netherlands designs for 10,000 year sea flood events and 1,250 year river flood events. By contrast, here in California we are thinking in terms of 100, 200, or 500 year floods.
Another point Ms. Nijhoff made is that for sea level rise or other fresh water concerns, entrepreneurs must have time to change their business operations and long term plans, and the business community, especially agriculture, needs 30-40 years to make changes.
Delta Flows- May 27, 2010
Who’s in whose pocket?
In our last issue, we mentioned that Governor Schwarzenegger has appointed The Nature Conservancy’s Anthony Saracino to the Water Commission. In addition to overseeing Water System Operational Improvements – dams – if the water bond passes, the Water Commission is the governmental body authorized to condemn land for the State Water Project. DWR itself can’t do that.
TNC has a history of doing land deals in the Delta. You could call Saracino’s appointment “working closely with state and federal resources agencies and local partners.”
Or you could call it a conflict of interest.
TNC pragmatism Part 2: Nestlé
Not only is TNC tied up with BP (see our last edition). It has been tied up with Nestlé Waters North America (NWNA) for at least five years.
Back in 2005, Nestlé Waters North America donated $1 million dollars to The Nature Conservancy “to protect important freshwater ecosystems across the United States.” Although that donation focused on two projects in Texas and Virginia, TNC announced that “The funds will also go toward Conservancy projects to find new approaches for storing and using water to serve human needs, including drinking water and electricity, while preserving the health of the nation’s critical rivers and lakes.”
NWNA was already in a battle with Michigan citizens about pumping water from a stressed stream and lake for its Ice Mountain bottled water in Mecosta, Michigan. It was in 2005 that the Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed a 2003 trial court ruling that Nestlé’s pumping violated Michigan water law. That’s how much Nestle cared about preserving the health of rivers and lakes.
This is about the same time that NWNA was trying to persuade the people of McCloud, California to let Nestlé contribute to the local economy by bottling water from a plant near Mt. Shasta. McCloud eventually said “No,” but Sacramento recently said “Yes” to allowing NWNA to bottle and sell municipal water. You see, it creates jobs.
(For a great piece on Nestlé’s shenanigans in Maine, google Jim Wilfong’s “Who Owns Maine’s Water – Nestlé or the People?”)
TNC is proud of its alliance with NWNA. From where we sit, it just looks like trading public resources for land.
We wouldn’t call this pragmatism. We’d call it privatization.
In a nutshell, TNC supports Delta water exports to water contractors who will profit from water sales through new conveyance, with an expanded Delta conservancy not controlled by Delta local landowners. This seems to fit TNC’s pattern of trading public resources for land.
Wanger leads us all in a big, costly circle
Remember when U. S. District Judge Oliver Wanger found the Biological Opinions were inadequate to protect fish in the Delta? He ordered export reductions while fishery agencies went back to redo the BiOps, and exporters had a long, noisy fit.
The new BiOps require nearly the same export restrictions to protect fish. Now Wanger doesn’t find enough science there to support decreased exports.
Last week, Wanger decided that water officials must consider humans along with fish in limiting use of the Delta for irrigation. The arguments of urban and agricultural water users convinced him that the federal government’s science didn’t prove increased pumping from the Delta imperiled salmon.
Wanger followed that decision with another this week that lifted pumping restrictions designed to help endangered salmon. Urban and agricultural water users argued that these restriction could be lifted without harming the fish. The order will be in place until June 15.
As of this writing, pumping restrictions to protect smelt remain in place. According to John Ellis, reporting in the Fresno Bee, users have focused on the salmon restrictions because they are less onerous than those for smelt. But Tom Birmingham, general manager of Westlands Water District, admits that continued smelt restrictions could cancel any water delivery gains resulting from lifting the salmon restrictions.
Writes Ellis, “Wanger also ordered federal officials to monitor the increased pumping. If more endangered spring-run Chinook salmon or Central Valley steelhead are found around the pumps or being killed by them, the federal government or environmental groups can ask Wanger to reverse his ruling.” But at this point, “most of the endangered spring-run Chinook salmon and Central Valley steelhead had already passed through the Delta and out to the Pacific Ocean.”
To some, this looks like the same plan for operation that Wanger invalidated in the previous salmon management plan because it jeopardized the species.
And what will they do with that water?
Wanger’s decisions means that Westlands water users will get about 10% more irrigation water for the next 20 days.
Cropping decisions were made last fall. So some of the water available now will be stored at San Luis Reservoir for future use.
KFSN in Fresno interviewed Kerman almond and cotton grower Paul Betancourt. Said Betancourt, “The immediate change won’t be in acres planted but it will be in groundwater pumped. The quality of surface water is much higher than groundwater so we can use the surface water. Get some of these salts flushed out of the soils.”
Wait! You mean you have salts in your soil?
Tackling selenium, or not
Today, the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board is considering a “time extension for compliance” to allow the continued direct discharge of selenium-laced agricultural water into Mud Slough, a tributary to the San Joaquin River and about 50 miles as the crow flies to the Southern California drinking water pumps. This toxic water has caused reproductive failure and death in aquatic life, migratory birds, and salmon.
One source of toxic selenium pollution is Westlands, where irrigating 300,000 acres of toxic lands mobilizes selenium into the waters of the state and thousands of acres outside of the Grasslands area where drainage is discharged or seeps into the federal San Luis Drain and the San Joaquin River.
Recent reports estimate up to a 50% mortality in Chinook Salmon exposed to these high toxic discharges. Meanwhile, export interests focus on urban sewage discharges as the main cause of fish deaths.
The only way to deal with selenium-laced water is to dilute it, in this case with water from the San Joaquin and Merced Rivers. RTD keeps saying that we can’t solve any of these problems without plenty of fresh water flowing through the whole system.
Flushing compromised Westlands soil with Delta water certainly doesn’t help.
The expectation is that the Central Valley RWQCB will continue not to enforce selenium standards
Delta Flows May 25, 2010
Souls for sale?
On the surface, the Nature Conservancy’s “compatible development” seems like a good idea, pragmatically accommodating the needs of both business and environmentalism. But can you really preserve land and resources by partnering with profit-driven corporations?
Maybe not.
On May 23, The Washington Post reported that one of the Nature Conservancy’s business partners is British Petroleum , the oil spill people. TNC says they partner with BP for wind energy, not for oil drilling. But according to The Post, TNC “has given BP a seat on its International Leadership Council and has accepted nearly $10 million in cash and land contributions from BP and affiliated corporations over the years.”
TNC chief executive Mark Tercek is quoted as saying, “The oil industry is a major player in the gulf. It would be naïve to ignore them.” Someone commenting on the article pointed out that this is a false dichotomy. You can recognize BP as a major player without allying your organization with them.
What is naïve is believing that corporations will let any consideration trump their bottom line.
Some Nature Conservancy members are not happy about this level of “pragmatism.” They think TNC has taken “non-confrontational” too far. It’s time to confront.
Here in the Delta, we’ve watched the Nature Conservancy’s “pragmatism” win it a seat as a token environmental organization at the BDCP table, advising on restoration programs from which it will surely profit. We’ve watched it go along with the 2009 Comprehensive Water Package that takes big steps toward dismantling water and property rights in the Delta and small steps toward addressing California’s unsustainable water habits.
Now Governor Schwarzenegger is turning to the TNC yet again for green washing, appointing Michael Eaton to the Delta Conservancy and Anthony Saracino to the Water Commission. (The Water Commission is the resuscitated agency that will oversee the Water System Operational Improvements – dams – that get 27% of the funding that will become available if voters approve the water bond in November.)
Eaton was senior project director for the Nature Conservancy from 1995 to 2007. Saracino has been director of the California Water Program at the Nature Conservancy since 2005.
Following the dotted line of influence, we find that since leaving the Nature Conservancy in 2007, Michael Eaton has been executive director of the Resources Legacy Fund, which is funding the Governor’s Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative.
The MLPA called for an evaluation of the current state of California’s coastal waters and the creation and management of a network of marine protected areas along the California coastline. Critics say the MLPA process is effectively privatizing public trust ocean resources to pave the way for offshore oil drilling, wave energy projects and corporate aquaculture.
If Eaton’s work with the MLPA is any guide, we shouldn’t expect much ecosystem restoration or local economic vitality to come out of the Delta Conservancy. We shouldn’t expect much transparency, either. The MLPA has openly violated the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, banning video and photo journalists from its work sessions.
So how does all this apply to the Delta? TNC and the Resources Legacy Foundation, working with the creators of the water legislation package passed last November, the Delta Vision Blue Ribbons task force, the new Delta Conservancy, the Delta Stewardship Council, and the BDCP, have played a major part in the script to push forward its version of ecological restoration for the Delta onto California voters. They are selling it in support of the water bond as the pragmatic approach of the “co-equal goals” of restoring the Delta and managing water supplies for all of California. We cannot help noticing how this pleasant sounding phrase of environmental responsibility, “co-equal goals,” mimic’s TNC’s promotion of “compatible development” in the Gulf.
And as we all know in the Delta, these government appointed task forces, and the professional meeting attendees from groups like TNC who are appointed repeatedly to carry forth the official party line of water management in California, ignore existing Delta communities. They have actively worked to exclude Delta stakeholders in the decision making process by consistently saying that ideas brought forth from the Delta are not worthy of consideration. This is what happened with the Delta Vision process, CalFed, and is happening with the Bay Delta Conservation Plan. (Government processes that include stakeholder meetings in which recommendations made for protecting the Delta by Delta people are written down and filed away in a drawer because they aren’t the answers officials want to hear, is not dialogue or true engagement.)
Thus, as seen with the Marine Life Protection Act, local communities have been alienated and local knowledge ignored in order to superimpose the new environmental model for California’s water future onto the people already here.
And this is exactly why the TNC/Delta Vision/Delta Conservancy/Delta Stewardship Council/BDCP model for water management for California fails. It doesn’t acknowledge the relationship between the environment and the people of its commons – the people who are the stewards of the Delta. It doesn’t meet the needs of environmental justice communities that need access to clean drinking water. It doesn’t make more water for the system. It doesn’t protect Delta fisheries. But, through the bond that TNC and friends are promoting, our general obligation debt will increase by $800,000,000 annually for thirty years.
Second, this model for managing the Delta, diverting even more water from the Delta with new engineering, all under the guise of new management standards for flows, letting islands go (which will put Delta urban populations at risk), and promoting a return to predominately Delta wetlands (which will require even more surface water than Delta diverters use presently and very well could increase methyl mercury production for fisheries), has never been implemented successfully anywhere in the world. We have yet to find a river system that has been improved by diverting water from it. But we are supposed to trust the TNC model and vote for an $11.4 billion water bond to fund implementation of the model, even though California is broke.
As we have seen with BP in the Gulf, people running highly engineered systems that take from the environment promise a lot, but can fail in major ways to deliver on those promises. While the Nature Conservancy did some great work a generation ago, and still manages some worthy projects in the present, they and their employees who move into related government appointed positions, are too willing to allow for the sell out of communities to corporations which desire to control natural resources – like in the Gulf of Mexico, on the California Coast, and in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
This type of corporate environmentalism –heavily engineered systems that are mismanaged by regulatory agencies that fail to respect, engage, and protect local communities — has little to do with protecting the Earth. It’s about protecting corporate profits and giving the corporate status quo a green appearance.
Isenberg: still stealing the show
by Brett Baker
Delta Stewardship Council Chair Phil Isenberg has been the point man moving from appointment to appointment in the evolving Delta planning process, continually using his interpretations of California Water Law and Public Policy to shape and direct the debate over the Delta. From discussions with lawmakers behind closed doors as a lobbyist for the Irvine Ranch Water District to public forums as chair of the Delta Vision to his most recent appointment as Chair of the Delta Stewardship Council, Isenberg has been working hard to muddy the thinking of folks directly involved in the Delta planning process as well as the general public.
In November, he wrote an op-ed to provide political cover for Darrell Steinberg after the passage of the Comprehensive Water Package. He has appeared and testified before countless legislative committees to support and justify bad policy, all the while requesting increased appropriations of taxpayer dollars to fund the process and paying lip service to transparency and the public trust doctrine.
At the April 22nd meeting of the DSC, with DWR and Resources agency staff playing their supporting roles, Isenberg was in his element.
After the usual formalities, introductions and roll call, Keith Coolidge, Interim Chief Deputy Executive Officer DWR, gave a Delta briefing to set the stage. Coolidge gave an overview of Supply and Demand In California’s Water System, citing tree-ring studies. How would this council know that tree-ring studies have actually been shown to have a weak correlation with hydrologic conditions? Many factors may influence tree growth. Also there are statistical weaknesses associated with analyzing an individual organism and extrapolating conditions for an entire region, let alone a state with as much climate variability as California.
With respect to demand, Coolidge claimed that it will inevitably increase as population continues to grow. The discussion regarding supply is continually centered around increasing urban demand, while the vast majority of our state’s water, and more specifically the water exported from the Delta, is used for agricultural irrigation.
Some members of the Council have extremely limited knowledge of California water and especially the Delta, and they will most likely be making decisions based on the poor PowerPoint presentations and consultant analyses that will be continually be paraded in front of them throughout this process.
After the presentation, it was time for questions. Council member Hank Nordoff had some good questions about the willingness of ag users to sell water to urban users. Isenberg seemed to support such sales, saying they were a traditional short term strategy, but he admitted that perhaps that policy needs revisiting.
Nordoff also asked about the price per acre foot of San Diego urban water vs. ag water. This question was thrown around like a hot potato from council member to staff and back again before Executive Director Joe Grindstaff finally said there is basically no difference between what Kern County Water agency users and MWD users pay for their “raw water,” but you see, urban users have to pay all those administrative, distribution, and treatment costs. Glad we cleared that up.
Isenberg asked for any final questions and right on cue, Gloria Gray asked about water rights. Isenberg just happened to have a PowerPoint presentation of his own all ready to go on the overhead projector, and he proceeded to give a run down of California’s water rights system. He started with Pueblo Rights handed out by the Spanish Government, went on to riparian rights, and followed up with appropriative rights and a brief overview of the Public Trust Doctrine and Area of Origin assurances. Don Nottoli, Sacramento County Supervisor and Chair of the Delta Protection Commission asked Isenberg about his views on whether or not water rights should be considered property rights. Isenberg asserted that water right were “akin” to property rights and therefore might not warrant the same assurances as property in a court of law.
Such is Isenberg’s position that his opinion regarding water rights carries a disproportionate amount of weight.
There was a great deal of other discussion about technicalities and logistical issues facing the Council. They have to define the scope of their work; establish policy objectives; decide whether it is appropriate for them to take positions on bills in the state legislature; and coordinate with State agencies (DFG, DWR, and State Lands Commission-SLC) as well as federal agencies (DOI, NMFS, USFWS).
At the April meeting, the DSC also discussed acquiring an independent contract consultant to analyze the BDCP. First they had to define “independent.” There was a good deal of discussion as to excluding folks that had worked on BDCP, Delta Vision and CALFED. But excluding them would leave very few “competent” consultant agencies to choose from. Also, considering the tight timeframe for producing a Delta Plan, it would be next to impossible to crest the steep learning curve required to gain a coherent understanding of the Delta’s hydrological and ecological system.
It’s no surprise that the DSC ended up selecting CH2M Hill, even though that consultant had worked on the BDCP.
Delta interests remain under-represented and under the microscope, with in-Delta water users fighting off claims that their lands lack rights to water. Salmon fisherman continue to be demonized as environmental extremists for wanting to protect and preserve their way of life, and Delta and north state taxpayers are being forced to fund the means to their demise. Meanwhile, the pumps in Tracy keep humming along, and exporters continue to cry about allocations, throwing out percentages of water that doesn’t exist.
You can catch the DSC show this week, May 27th and May 28th at the Secretary of State Auditorium, 1500 11th Street in Sacramento. Tell Chair Isenberg and his supporting cast what you think of his Delta illusions.
3rd Annual Waldo Music Fest
The Waldo Holt San Joaquin Wildlife Conservancy will have its 3rd annual music festival Saturday June 5, 2010, from noon to 6 p.m. at 3536 Rainier Avenue.
Enjoy your favorite musicians, meet your friends, bid in the auction, have some great food, and help save our wildlife!
Musicians Dirk Hamilton; Dave Halford; Water Bros.; and Snap Jackson & The Knock on Wood Players will perform!
Salmon protections eased at request of water agencies
Contra Costa Times-5/26/10
By Mike Taugher
To read about this important ruling that could jeopordize Delta fisheries
Link:
http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_15161932?source=rss&nclick_check=1
Delta Flows May 17, 2010
Prodding Interior about Two-Gates
On Tuesday, May 11, the Assembly Committee on Water, Parks and Wildlife got together for a second “Oversight Hearing: Delta Stewardship Council and Bay Delta Conservation Plan Progress and Update.” (The first oversight hearing was in early March.)
Before tackling the DSC and the BDCP, the committee considered an Assembly Joint Resolution, AJR 38, proposed by Assemblymember Caballero. This resolution would request the U.S. Department of the Interior to complete its study of the Two-Gates Fish Protection Demonstration Project.
Caballero said she originally thought the Two-Gates proposal was a simple short-term way to deal with the turbidity that attracts smelt to the export pumps. And last September, Interior seemed interested, too. In fact, $28 million for the project was included in the November Comprehensive Water Package. But then Interior put the project on hold, calling for more study of the underlying science.
This makes Assemblymembers like Caballero, Arambula, and Fuller impatient. It makes ACWA, the San Luis and Delta Mendota Water Agency, and the Metropolitan Water District impatient. It makes Westlands Water District very impatient.
In fact, Westlands’ General Manager/General Counsel Tom Birmingham himself was there to explain why, technically, Westlands doesn’t actually have junior water rights. The issue of water rights arose because two WHEREAS’s in the Resolution referred to junior water rights and to percentages of allocations and deliveries last year.
According to Birmingham, Westlands doesn’t have junior water rights because they’re just CVP contractors, and the Bureau of Reclamation is governed by different rules. He undertook to explain them. Chair Jared Huffman cut him off with “You’ve made the point that this is complicated.” But Birmingham was on a roll. He got as far as different categories of Bureau contracts, and deliveries in periods of shortage to Level 4 Refuges. “Except,” Huffman interrupted, “refuges didn’t get their Level 3 and 4 water. I know too much about this. Let’s not go there.”
Speaking in opposition to the Resolution were a Contra Costa County supervisor on behalf of the five Delta Counties, who said the State should not take a stand in favor of a particular solution; and a representative of the Recreational Boaters of California, who are worried about public use restrictions of the Two-Gates project.
Huffman didn’t want language in the resolution that would accept either side’s characterization of the situation in the Delta. So the committee agreed to amend the sections referring to water rights and allocations. AJR 38 was adopted with amendments. Only Assemblymember Yamada opposed it.
When is more better?
Already behind schedule, the Committee then proceeded to hear from four panels on the subjects of the DSC and the BDCP. Leading off with “Agency Perspectives” were Natural Resources Agency Secretary Lester Snow and DSC Chair Phil Isenberg.
Snow bragged about the BDCP’s “aggressive public outreach” – 450 to 475 meetings if you count all the public meetings, scoping meetings, workshops, etc. (Lots of outreach, little real input.) He described the BDCP as an “arduous effort” to meet the high standards of an HCP/NCCP. Now they want to produce, by November, a complete draft that people can see (and, presumably, appreciate).
Huffman and Senator Wolk thought that last year’s legislation called for reduced reliance on Delta exports, not for delivering up to the full contract amounts. But Snow doesn’t think there needs to be any change in the BDCP’s Purpose and Needs Statement. A refresher: “The purpose of the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) is to promote the recovery of endangered, threatened and sensitive species and their habitats in the Delta in a way that also will protect and restore water supplies.” (Emphasis added.)
We should all be relieved to know that Snow thinks, “The Delta is a solvable problem.” (Not a place. A problem.)
Next, Isenberg gave his testimony, accompanied by DSC Vice Chair Randy Fiorini, former ACWA president and Tulare farmer. (Chuckled Isenberg, “He’s here to protect me.”)
Isenberg said that the enabling statute for the DSC called for one meeting per month, but they’ll be doing two. There’s a lot to be done, and the legislation didn’t allow much time to do it. This was a recurring theme of the day.
The short time frame justified the transfer of about 50 staff from CALFED to run the DSC. It justified staff advertising for consultants to develop the Delta Plan and the EIR, and doing it before the council itself was even seated. Isenberg suggested that to meet the January 1, 2012 deadline, they need an interim plan by August of this year and a first draft of the Delta Plan by this November. That leaves time for three turnaround drafts during the comment period. Good thing they were able to get a consultant hired right away.
(Question: Fifty contractors responded to the RFQ. But DWR received only four bids. Why did forty-six potential bidders decline to be considered?)
The DSC looked into the conflict of interest situation and decided that everything is OK, since Executive Director Joe Grindstaff and DSC council member Richard Roos-Collins have both withdrawn from the BDCP Steering Committee. As for the decision to hire CH2M Hill, the principal BDCP consultant, as the consultant to develop the Delta Plan, well, ALL the consultants who applied had had interactions with the BDCP. Hey, CH2M Hill a big company. The DSC will just ask for consultants who haven’t worked on the BDCP. They will need dozens.
Isenberg said the DSC has a “responsible agency role” with respect to the BDCP and also, maybe, an “appellate role” (quasi judicial). Does this remind you of the Water Board?
Huffman told Isenberg he was glad that Isenberg had been chosen to chair the DSC, but “We hoped this council would be independent.” If the schedule interfered with the DSC being independent, Huffman said he would like to have been informed. Huffman wanted a “firewall.” So RTD wonders, how did that make Isenberg a good choice to chair the DSC?
In response to a question, Isenberg told Senator Wolk that the DSC is not required by statute to require the BDCP to consider alternatives to conveyance. In fact, since there is no concurrent, comparable, funded alternative, alternatives automatically won’t get equal consideration. With the BDCP and the DSC on parallel courses to produce documents in November, and with CH2M Hill working on both, is there any chance that the result would be two different conclusions? No one offered a good answer to that question.
Leaving the table hungry
Panel 2 provided an opportunity for BDCP Steering Committee stakeholders to offer their perspectives on the process. North Delta Water Agency’s Melinda Terry, who also represents the Central Valley Flood Control Association, told the committee that public safety was “barely a blip on the BDCP radar.” There’s no good coordination at DWR between conveyance work and flood protection. Levees protect the co-equal goals, and levee subvention program investments have been effective in dealing with the regular occurrence of high water events. But having written off levees as vulnerable to earthquakes, despite evidence to the contrary, the BDCP is ignoring the role of levees in flood protection.
All the public outreach mentioned by Lester Snow has not, according to Terry, resulted in local support for the BDCP because there has been no “loop around”; the BDCP is still not addressing third-party impacts. In fact, looking at burdens versus benefits, there are no Delta benefits, only burdens. The Habitat Conservation Plan will need willing seller landowners, but Terry predicts that there won’t be enough willing sellers because they have been effectively shut out of the process. “If we don’t get it right,” she noted, “it [the BDCP] will be challenged.”
Terry raised the issued of reliable financing for conveyance, including for maintenance. Metropolitan Water District can’t promise to pay for facilities because their users have not yet agreed to that.
Anne Hayden of the Environmental Defense Fund expressed concern about the BDCP’s trajectory and its tight timeline. There are still no quantifiable biological objectives. The BDCP’s water supply objective still biases the plan toward increased exports, contrary to legislative direction. The current schedule doesn’t allow time to evaluate matters like flow criteria or alternative capacities.
Hayden argued for governance that would not just avoid jeopardy but would actually allow for fishery agencies to manage the system flexibly. She said no changes in operations should occur until the biological objectives have been achieved.
Speaking on behalf of the State Water Contractors, Laura King Moon said that size of conveyance, routing, operation, and amount of diversion are all still under discussion. A wide range of options are under review, but the tunnel option needs more focus. She said that the BDCP needs to coordinate with existing land uses and HCPs, including Fremont Weir. Echoing Hayden, Moon noted that fisheries agencies have suggested substantial changes in governance. And like Terry, she mentioned funding as an issue that needs to be addressed.
Panel 3 was supposed to focus on how the BDCP is being integrated with Delta Counties’ HCP/NCCPs. According to Jim Provenza, a Yolo County Supervisor, there are nine local HCP/NCCPs that could provide corridors for habitat. But Kim Delfino of Defenders of Wildlife reported that the BDCP hasn’t provided a meaningful forum for coordinating the BDCP with county efforts, and that the plan won’t be able to be permitted if coordination isn’t worked out.
Don Nottoli, a Sacramento County Supervisor, Delta Protection Commission Chair, and member of the DSC, shifted the discussion from habitat plan coordination to other matters requiring integration between different planning efforts. He said that there is no funding to meet the deadline for the Delta Protection Commission to review the primary zone as required under the recent legislation. The Delta Protection Commission is also supposed to do an economic sustainability study, but that won’t be ready in time to inform the DSC by its November deadline. Nottoli called the schedule “very ambitious.”
Assemblymember Yamada commented that it was nice to see the counties on panels for a change instead of just making statements during the public comment period.
By the time Panel 4 was called up, the hearing was running overtime and the speakers were able to make only abbreviated remarks. Barry Nelson of NRDC criticized the BDCP for focusing on a single alternative and for considering capacity but not operation. He said that he thinks the Purpose and Needs statement is a problem, described the biological objectives as “foundational,” and called for a more realistic timeline. He also called for a robust conversation about short- and mid-term actions, given that conveyance will take 20 to 25 years to implement. And he called for integrating flood management, saying that doing so would build support for the Delta Plan.
The final panelist to speak was Osha Meserve, representing Reclamation District 999 and Stone Lakes National Wildlife Refuge Association. Like earlier speakers, she said affected communities must be included in and see some benefit from the BDCP. She said the BDCP should be addressing all major stressors instead of focusing myopically on a few. She mentioned specifically the problem of selenium from San Joaquin run-off, which is not being addressed by the BDCP as a stressor.
Meserve said that oversight of the BDCP is desperately needed. She called for legislative approval authority over any conveyance over 3000 cfs or above ground; for land acquisition on a willing seller basis only; for in-lieu taxes to counties; and for specific conflict-of-interest provisions.
Huffman and Yamada were still present for the few public comments, but most of the twelve members of the oversight committee apparently had more important things to do.
Delta Flows
They’re keeping their heads down at Water, Parks, and Wildlife
The non-Delta legislators and other interests who passed last year’s comprehensive water package don’t think it can be improved upon with unimportant additions like legislative oversight or cost analysis for a peripheral canal. So they weren’t interested in AB 2304, introduced by Assemblymember Alyson Huber. On April 27, the Assembly Water, Parks, and Wildlife Committee couldn’t even come up with a second to Assemblymember Mariko Yamada’s motion to at least vote on the measure. No one had to take a stand.
Committee chair Jared Huffman thinks Huber’s proposal would have made it harder to block a large conveyance facility before the full legislature, which he insists that he intends to do. He described the measure as “too broad,” “too blunt,” and “unwise.” Yamada, the Committee’s only Delta representative, countered that the legislature had abdicated important responsibilities with regard to conveyance to the Delta Stewardship Council. She noted that if there is nothing to hide, then no one should object to continuing the discussion in a transparent way.
The most telling remark came from Assemblymember Juan Arambula of Fresno, who said he was reluctant to give the Legislature any more authority.
Yes, he really did say that.
We’re keeping an eye on the Delta Stewardship Council
Restore the Delta has filed a conflict-of-interest complaint with the Attorney General’s office regarding DSC appointees Gloria D. Gray and Richard Roos-Collins. As we reported last week, Gray is a board member for the West Basin Municipal Water District in Los Angeles, a position which also places her on the board of MWD. So she represents interests that rely on Delta water exports. Roos-Collins serves on the BDCP steering committee, an entity whose recommendations the Stewardship Council is supposed to review.
RTD has also learned that the DSC staff is recommending that CH2MHill be chosen to provide the primary support for developing the Delta Plan. CH2MHill is already heavily involved in the BDCP. This whole process is looking more and more like a game of musical chairs, with no chairs actually removed.
Magic Kingdom meets water sleight-of-hand
A trip to Disneyland is always fun, right? On May 14, you could take a working vacation to attend the 3rd Annual OC (Orange County) Water Summit at the Grand Californian Hotel at the Disneyland Resort. The title: “Capture the Flow.”
The speakers: Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez; Paul Rodriguez (“actor, comedian, and water activist”); Joel Kotkin, author of “The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050”; Robert Boller, Vice President of Sustainability for Kendall-Jackson Winery; and Curt Schmute (“expert on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Bay-Delta”).
(Mr. Schmute acquired his expertise on the Delta as the Principal Engineer and Water Resources Manager for Metropolitan Water District.)
The cost is $125. Of course, you might not want to pay $125 to hear Paul Rodriguez tell you why agri-business needs more water.
Delta Flows April 19, 2010
Delta Stewardship Council launched on April Fools Day
by Karen Medders
April 1st was more than just April Fools’ Day; it was also the seating of the Delta Stewardship Council, which happened to coincide with the West Coast Salmon Summit hosted by Congressmen George Miller and Mike Thompson. RTD had called supporters out to attend the Salmon Summit, which contributed to a glaring absence of Delta supporters at the historic seating of the Stewardship Council. The absence of Delta support in the room was noted by one of the public commentators.
The first order of business was for the Council to elect their Chair. Not surprisingly, Phil Isenberg was unanimously elected Chair. No Vice Chair was elected.
Then the appointees were introduced. Sacramento Supervisor Don Notolli holds the only seat guaranteed to represent any Delta interest on the Council by virtue of the fact that he is the Chairman of the Delta Protection Commission. Besides Supervisor Notolli, we have Hank Nordoff, Patrick Johnston, Randy Fiorini, Phil Isenberg, Gloria Gray, and Richard Roos-Collins, who was absent.
Judge Ronald Robie officiated the swearing in of the Council. Judge Robie, a former head of DWR, reads and interprets water laws, some of which he wrote years ago.
Mr. Isenberg called Judge Robie “one of the best water judges in the state; he wrote the laws.” Resources Agency Director Lester Snow told the newly sworn in Council that one of their goals should be to keep the Council’s actions out of Judge Robie’s court because “he’s not a friend of ours.” It is hard to know whose friend Snow thinks Judge Robie is, but there was chuckling in the room by those thinking the BDCP and Alternative Conveyance are done deals. Time will tell.
Conflicts of interest right from the start
Attending with Gloria Gray were friends and family and a representative of the Latino Water Coalition, along with approximately a dozen water district representatives. Gray is a board member of the West Basin Municipal Water District, a Los Angeles County water provider that depends on the Delta for a large share of its supply. That imported Delta water is distributed by the Metropolitan Water District, the largest single municipal buyer of Delta water. Gray is also a Metropolitan board member by virtue of the fact that West Basin is a Metropolitan member agency.
In fact, besides four independent Delta representatives, the auditorium was full of water exporters gloating over the fact that yet again, their millions of dollars and bullying ways have stacked yet another public entity in their favor.
Supervisor Notolli asked if the relationship of the Delta Conservancy to the Council would include more local representation and address the concerns and interests of the stakeholders living and working within the Statutory Delta.
The answer was that the Conservancy will have 11 members, is required to be located in the Statutory Delta, and will consist of 4 state appointees, 2 governor’s appointees and one appointee from each of the five surrounding counties to make up the total of 11. One would hope the Assembly and Senate would appoint representatives of greater Northern California interests. The counties have made their appointments; the state has not.
With respect to county activities, Isenberg mentioned there is inherent suspicion between local, state and federal governments; the Council should constrain, limit and contract the local-to-state plan. He also stated “local governments are not obligated to have state-wide perspectives.” (Isenberg didn’t say it, but it appears that the reverse is also true: The state government is not obligated to consider the local perspective.)
The Conservancy is expected to roll out on its own after the first fiscal year. The Conservancy is projected to be a multi-billion dollar entity within five to 10 years. (That does tend to happen when you are the “land grabber.”) It is this writer’s opinion that it will be imperative to not only follow and keep up on the machinations of the BDCP, but to actively participate in the Conservancy’s agenda. With billions and billions of dollars in land assets private and public at stake, we must ensure the Conservancy plays “fair” with stakeholders inside the Statutory Delta as well as ALL of the citizens of California.
Among several issues that were discussed or questioned at length was the Conflict of Interest Code the Council must adopt for itself. Chris Stevens, legal council for the DSC stated he would let the members know when the ex parte rules take effect so that there will be no “conflict of interest” triggers.
On that note, Restore the Delta would like to see an official letter of resignation from Gloria Gray, stepping down from her post on the Board of Directors of Metropolitan Water District to sit on the Delta Stewardship Council. In a letter dated March 26, Assemblyman Jared Huffman asked Gray to choose whether to serve the council or her local constituents.
According to the Sacramento Bee’s Matt Weiser, conflict also surrounds Richard Roos-Collins. He is an attorney for the Natural Heritage Institute and serves on the steering committee of the Bay Delta Conservation Plan. Since one of the Delta Stewardship Council’s roles is to review the BDCP, this also looks like a conflict of interest.
And then, of course, as previously reported by Restore the Delta, Phil Isenberg’s lobbying firm was representing the Irvine Water Ranch, while Mr. Isenberg was heading up the Delta Vision Blue Ribbon Task Force.
A cozy little oversight relationship
Among the DSC’s tasks as outlined in the legislation, the first five are
- To make early appointments and establish of bodies and entities;
- To establish the Delta Independent Science Board;
- To appoint the Lead Scientist;
- To consult with the SWRCB to appoint the “Water Master” and;
- To work with federal agencies to coordinate the Delta Plan, as long as there is funding to interact with same federal agencies.
Now we move on to another legislated responsibility of the Council, and that is its Appellate authority with the BDCP. This looks more and more like the fox guarding the hen house.
Joe Grindstaff slipped right over from being CALFED Director to being Acting Executive Officer of the DSC. He has been representing the California Bay-Delta Authority on the BDCP Steering Committee. Grindstaff mentioned that at the next BDCP Steering Committee meeting, he will step down due to potential conflict of interest; however he wishes to remain in an ex officio capacity.
The Council has authority to overturn any decision made by the BDCP; it also has the authority to hear appeals from all concerned entities with regard to the BDCP. But in fact, the Council was established specifically to further the BDCP process as one of the responsible entities for the permitting process. They are to comment on the Conservation Plan prior to submittal for the EIR process, yet they have appellate authority over their own decisions.
The Council must consult with the SWRCB to appoint a Water Master—a very important Council function. Another role of the SWRCB under the new Delta Plan is to determine the minimum water flow criteria upon which conveyance will be based. Chairman Isenberg asked, “If SWRCB can’t come up with the flow criteria in a timely manner, then what does the Council do?” No one seems to know.
CALFED redux?
As the DSC has officially taken over the failed CALFED program, the council has also inherited quite a bundle of preexisting conditions. For example, it inherited the appropriated funding for CALFED to apply to start-up of the Council.
It also inherited existing Delta Science Research programs totaling $23,116,000. The Executive Office Expenses total $2,411,185, of which $320,528 is payable to Metropolitan Water District of Southern California for the BDCP. What does this mean? CALFED was paying or covering MWD expenses for the BDCP?
This is taxpayer money, and if MWD can get state/federal funding for its activities on the BDCP, certainly it would only be equitable to provide the same amount of money for local, independent and, right now, volunteer efforts in the BDCP process.
CALFED receivables include $750,000 from US Bureau of Reclamation, $300,000 from USGS, and a whopping $9 million from DWR, totaling $10 million in monies owed now to the Council.
Spreck Rosekrans, of the Environmental Defense Fund, said that some critics of the new legislation believe the Council has merely inherited or taken over the failed CALFED, instead of creating something new that answers the intentions of the legislation.
The roll-over appointments from CALFED to the DSC are:
- Joe Grindstaff, Interim Executive Officer
- Keith Coolidge, Chief Deputy Executive Officer
- Clifford N. Dahm, Ph.D., Lead Scientist
- Anke Mueller-Solger, Ph.D., the Delta Stewardship Council Lead Scientist for the Bay-Delta Interagency Ecological Program.
- Lauren Hastings, Ph.D. Deputy Executive Officer for Science
- Chris Stevens, Acting Chief Counsel
- Curt Miller Assistant Director for Legislation
- Terry Macauley, P.E., Acting Deputy Executive Officer for the Delta Stewardship Council
- Livia Page, Assistant Executive Officer for Administration for the Delta Stewardship Council
One can appreciate Mr. Rosekrans’ statement regarding watching out for the same old, same old…that it is imperative new blood and perspectives on a national and international level are brought to bear on the Delta Independent Science Board and the science that will be relied upon to determine not only flow criteria, but science legitimacy of the BDCP as well. It is their science that will drive our future one way or the other. Supervisor Notolli also expressed concern that the Council will be a repeat of the failed CALFED.
Where is reduced Delta reliance in all of this?
Another point driven home at this meeting was mandated reduction of reliance upon the Delta for continued water supply. Actions undertaken by the Council should focus on issues and actions outside as well as inside the Statutory Delta.
Randy Kanouse of EBMUD spoke first, congratulating the Council on its formation. He also mentioned the Council will be forced to make “Solomon-like decisions” with very difficult tasks to accomplish. Mr. Kanouse also recommended the Council have extremely capable staff who provide written materials well before any announced meeting dates. And he advised Council members to allow themselves plenty of time to be briefed by all perspectives, and to digest all available options to the decisions to be made.
Jonas Minton of the Planning and Conservation League handed out PCL’s Eight Affordable Water Solutions to Achieve the Co-Equal Goals. Mr. Minton also pointed out that actions must occur outside the Delta, not just within. He suggested the Council consider two smaller diversions of a 5000cfs canal conveyance and a 3000cfs tunnel. Also, given the state of California’s economy at this time, he recommended withdrawing the Water Bond, waiting two years or so, and readdressing the bond issue with a smaller bond that would have a better chance of being passed.
Ron Jacobsma of Friant Water Authority commented that with the inter-relationship of the BDCP to the Council, “if the BDCP fails, the Council fails.” Not a bad idea is it?
Chairman Isenberg scolded the representative from the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) with a reminder that CDFA has a responsibility to submit a report to the Council no later than 01/01/11. This paper must allow time to be submitted to the DPC; then the DPC will submit the paper to the Council. Isenberg stated that any delay in submission of required reports from both state and federal agencies delays the Council’s decisions.
We are all concerned with the aggressive schedule of deadlines.
Gary Bobker of the Bay Institute spoke on the legislated outcomes the Council must provide:
- The Council has been tasked to define desired outcomes for the Delta;
- The Council must develop a plan that achieves those goals. However, again, the actions must take place outside the Delta more than within.
- California has been mandated to reduce further reliance on the Delta water. What is being done to reduce that reliance? There is a disconnect between proposed actions and the actual reduction of reliance on Delta water. Where is the link? That must become a priority.
As with anything related to the Delta and its water, ecosystem and culture, much is at stake here. The Council is the first step California lawmakers have enacted to address this complex issue.
For those of us that reside in or just love Northern California with all of her blessings, this Council is just another layer of government enabling an exporter water and power grab. We need to stay on top of Council activities to ensure that all requirements of the law are met.
The Delta is not an industrial water pumping facility here to make resource-depleting economic development of Southern California possible. Nor is it here to line the pockets of members of Westlands Water District pockets with billions of dollars over time, enabling them to acquire government-subsidized water for resale on the open market.
The Delta is a beautifully created, abundant ecosystem that has done a pretty darn good job of meeting all of the demands placed upon her. But she is maxed out. It is up to our collective inventiveness to find or invent those technologies that truly enable us to become more self-sufficient and responsible with the types of demands made upon our environment.
If technology actually found ways to meet our human demands without requiring those needs be met by free-flowing waters, wouldn’t that also meet the co-equal goals?
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