By TIM HEARDEN

Capital Press

June 23, 2011

YREKA, Calif. -- A tribe, a fishermen's organization and two environmental groups are siding with the California Department of Fish and Game in a lawsuit over water diversions here.

The four groups have intervened in the Siskiyou County Farm Bureau's challenge of the department 's authority to require permits for landowners' simple extractions from the Scott and Shasta rivers.

The groups -- the Karuk Tribe, the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations, Klamath Riverkeeper and Earthjustice -- assert the lawsuit's outcome could impact the recovery of depleted salmon populations in the Klamath River and its tributaries.

"The court needs to hear that there are more voices and more issues here than simply farmers versus an agency," said Glen Spain, the PCFFA's northwest regional director. "One of the issues is the health of our rivers and the fisheries that depend on those rivers.

"Fish and Game Code section 1602 set some limits on how much water anyone can take out of a river," he said. "No farmer has the right to de-water a river and put whole industries that depend on the river downstream out of business."

A hearing on the intervention motion is set for July 19 in Yreka.

The local Farm Bureau filed suit March 25 in Siskiyou County Superior Court, contending that Fish and Game is violating Scott and Shasta valley landowners' water and property rights by requiring permits for irrigators.

The California Farm Bureau Federation withdrew a similar case earlier this year after failing to get it decoupled from environmental groups' suit against the department.

That suit -- which was filed by Earthjustice, Klamath Riverkeeper and others -- was resolved this spring as San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ernest Goldsmith invalidated the department's watershed-wide permits in the two valleys.

The Siskiyou Farm Bureau's attorney, Darrin Mercier, could not immediately be reached for comment on June 23. He said in April that the earlier suit "had a much broader net with multiple issues" while this one is limited to Section 1602.

He said the later suit was filed because the 2011 irrigation season was near and members "were faced with threats of enforcement and a lot of uncertainty about their water rights."

"Some of these ranchers have been diverting water for over 100 years," he said then, adding that they've recently seen a "fundamental change" in the way the state interprets Section 1602, which governs water diversions.

The PCFFA, the Karuk Tribe and others take issue with the Farm Bureau's argument that Section 1602 should only apply when a river is physically altered, not when water is extracted.

"They're trying to redefine what this is all about," Craig Tucker, the Karuk Tribe's Klamath coordinator, said on June 23. He said the DFG has been requiring permits for things such as simple dams and pipes in a river "for 40 or 50 years."

"From our perspective, we think it's important that we have agencies like Fish and Game to make sure diversions aren't detrimental to fish," he said.

Spain said that fishing businesses downstream depend on the Klamath River and its tributaries for their livelihood.

"The Fish and Game code is designed to help balance the users and the interests between those users," he said. "The idea that the code should be knocked out entirely ... is not the way to run any watershed."

Online

Siskiyou County Farm Bureau: www.siskiyoucountyfarmbureau.com

Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations: http://www.pcffa.org/

Karuk Tribe: http://www.karuk.us/karuk2/index.php 

Earthjustice: http://earthjustice.org/

Klamath Riverkeeper: http://www.klamathriver.org/

California Department of Fish and Game: http://www.dfg.ca.gov/