Tam
Moore
Oregon Staff Writer
KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. – The Klamath River Compact
Commission, created by the states of Oregon and California and accepted by the
Congress of the United States in 1957, held what amounted to its 48th annual
meeting last week.
With $110,000 in the bank and all but ignored by the Bush administration as it
periodically jousts with imbalanced demands on Klamath waters and its
10-million-acre ecosystem, the commission did its business in less than an
hour and adjourned to the bank to change signatures on the checking account.
One of the dozen citizens who attended the meeting in the Oregon State
University Extension Auditorium asked Commission Chairman Alice Kilham, the
federal representative appointed by the Clinton administration, if it was true
she was about to resign, and should they be endorsing someone as a
replacement.
“I am the federal appointee. I am at the beck and call of the
administration,” she said.
“It’s difficult to work with the administration if you are not part of the
administration. I serve until my replacement is named. There has to be a
designated place holder. I am it.”
When the compact was negotiated, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern
California was prowling the hinterlands for projects that could send water to
the Los Angeles Basin.
Compact boosters wanted to keep Klamath water in their basin, shared by Oregon
and California, and to allocate it for local farms, towns, migrating wildlife
and hydroelectric generation.
In the aftermath of the 2001 cutoff of federal irrigation water to about 90
percent of Klamath Reclamation Project croplands during a drought, some
thought the compact would rise to the top as the way both states and federal
interests could create a restoration of resources that eluded the federal
government.
That didn’t happen. Despite much-publicized opportunities for
intergovernmental cooperation since, creation of another legal entity to
shepherd Klamath Basin resources remains elusive. A group of Cabinet
secretaries formally told by President Bush to recommend long-term federal
objectives missed a deadline in 2003 and hasn’t been heard from since.
The two big things on the commission agenda last week speak to a locally
devised work-around. One is continuation of facilitated stakeholder meetings
– the next is in October – aimed at a structure that might mesh with a
U.S. Bureau of Reclamation initiative for a Klamath conservation
implementation plan.
The other is a $1,900-a-year contract to continue placing information on the
Internet site Onebasin.org and to redesign some of the Web pages.
Dwight Russell, a California Department of Water Resources regional manager
based in Red Bluff, is California’s commissioner. He endorsed both projects.
Phil Ward, Oregon’s director of water resources, represents his state. In a
question-and-answer session after the business was over, Ward promised that
when Oregon Water Resources Commission meets in Klamath Falls Oct. 27 and 28,
it will review policy implications of BuRec’s well contracts that take water
out of the basin aquifer, apparently at the expense of domestic and farm wells
with senior water rights.
Not discussed at all by the commission was the status of the Klamath
cooperation pact that California and Oregon governors agreed to last fall,
with blessing of U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton. That group, made up of
senior advisers to the governors and Norton, has yet to hold a public meeting
within the Klamath Basin.
Ward said he’s happy to visit in September and see what began as another
very dry year turn into one with water enough for most users.
“That (spring) precipitation worked ... very successfully,” he said.
Source: http://www.capitalpress.info/main.asp?SectionID=67&SubSectionID=