Pombo's environmental claims

Contra Costa Times

January 22, 2006

Richard Pombo and environmentalists have sparred for years over whether the congressman lies or stretches the truth about the impact of land-use regulations on property owners.

Times staff members separate fact from fiction.

ALLEGATION: Pombo lied when he said people died as a result of a 2001 federal decision to cut off water supplies to Klamath Basin farmers for the benefit of endangered fish.

TRUTH: It was a serious stretch.

EXPLANATION: Specifically, Pombo said, "In the recent case of the Klamath Basin and the endangered sucker fish, for example, it was determined that the sucker needed water more than the area's farmers needed it to irrigate their crops and feed their families. The result was a devastating loss of family farms, human life and economic vitality."

The statement relies on friends' and families' interpretations rather than a doctor's opinion.

A 2001 news story quoted a farmer's widow in the Klamath Basin who said that her husband, Michael Adams of Tulelake, shot himself because he had lost hope.

Mike McKoen, a Merrill, Ore., rancher and potato farmer, died of a heart attack in summer 2001, which his wife said was brought on by stress related to the federal decision.

"I talked to (McKoen's) wife, and that's what she told me," said Klamath County Commissioner John Elliott in a recent telephone interview. He has also testified about McKoen's death before a Pombo-led field hearing in Klamath Falls two years ago.

Although it is possible that McKoen had underlying health issues that contributed to his heart attack, the loss of the water posed a severe threat to his and his family's future, Elliott said.

Environmentalist Kieran Suckling with the Center for Biological Diversity called Pombo's statement unverifiable and indefensible.

"Did the loss of water cause the farmer's heart attack? Or was it because he had an ailing heart?" Suckling said. "Or have Klamath Basin farmers experienced a measurable increase in suicide rates since the water battles? That would indicate a trend."

Pombo's argument, he continued, is "calibrated to be neither provable nor disprovable, but easily repeated."

ALLEGATION: Pombo lied when he testified in 1994 before a Senate subcommittee that his family land was stripped of its value when the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declared it critical habitat for the endangered San Joaquin kit fox.

TRUTH: The land was never officially declared federal critical habitat for the kit fox, and there was little danger that the land would become worthless. But Pombo had good reason to believe the presence of kit fox would push wildlife regulators to impose conditions on the use of the property. He just didn't know at the time how it would play out.

EXPLANATION: Pombo, his father and four brothers wanted to build a six-home family compound on land near their feedlot outside Tracy.

But according to Pombo, federal and state wildlife regulators refused to sign off on the houses unless the family made arrangements for kit fox.

Under the law, federal biologists can require landowners to mitigate the destruction of habitat used by endangered or threatened species. An official critical habitat designation is not required.

As a result, Pombo and his relatives paid a fee of several thousand dollars per house into the newly formed San Joaquin County Habitat Conservation Plan and were allowed to build their homes.

Such plans allow landowners to pay into a fund, which is used to purchase critical habitat, in exchange for development permits.

ALLEGATION: Pombo lied when he said that people died in a 1997 flood near Marysville because regulators chose to protect the habitat of the North Valley Elderberry Longhorn Beetle rather than maintain the channel and levee.

TRUTH: Three people died when a levee breached along the Cosumnes River in January 1997, but there are conflicting reports about whether a lack of maintenance contributed to the flooding.

EXPLANATION: Pombo's statement matches 1997 testimony offered by William Mosher, a local conservation district representative, to a House committee.

Mosher said his agency pleaded with government agencies to allow them to clear the channel of sand bars and other build-up prior to the flood but the request was denied because state and federal officials believed the sand bars provided habitat for the beetles, among other species.

But Interior Department officials during the Clinton administration discounted the story, saying the flooding was the result of near-record rainfall and aging levees.

More recently, a spokesman for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers repeated that point.

"Their feeling is the issue of the beetles and all is really kind of irrelevant," said corps spokesman Dave Killam. "The real issue is the levees are 100 years old. They were designed by farmers. They're just piles of dirt on top of piles of dirt. ... Any part of the levee system could have problems in a flood year."

ALLEGATION: Pombo lied when he wrote in his 1996 book, "This Land Is Our Land," that a local parks district sought to establish recreational trails through the property of his family and two dozen local ranchers.

TRUTH: Pombo sincerely believed it was a threat, but his fears were overblown and the book seems to stretch the facts. The parks district never took formal action.

EXPLANATION: Pombo's father, Ralph Pombo, owned land through which a railroad right-of-way passed. He was one of several landowners who sued Alameda County in 1985 after the county accepted the right-of-way from the Southern Pacific Railroad.

The county also accepted a rail right-of-way near Niles Canyon on an abandoned line that ran between Fremont and Sunol. Its purpose with each was to preserve the rights-of-way for future transportation needs, either highways or rail systems.

The East Bay Regional Park District had an interest in a Niles Canyon trail, which was within its jurisdiction, but not one in the Altamont, which was outside its boundaries.

Landowners from both areas -- including Pombo's father, who owned no land in Niles Canyon -- sued the county and the parks district in U.S. District Court.

Richard Pombo, in a recent interview, said the district officials had expressed preliminary interest in a trail there and there was a fear among the Altamont landowners that the county would give the right of way to the district.

Before the suit was filed, Alameda County officials said they had no intention of giving the Altamont land to the park's district and county supervisors voted 5-0 to offer to lease the Altamont land to the ranchers.

When the ranchers sued Alameda County, they made no distinction between Altamont and Niles Canyon tracts, claiming the park district wanted a trail through the Altamont property.

Hulet Hornbeck, the park district official in charge of acquiring trail lands, wrote in a declaration that was part of the district defense that Altamont was not part of the district's 1976 master plan and Livermore was outside its boundaries.

In summarily dismissing the park district from the suit, a judge agreed with the district, writing there was "absolutely no evidence" that the district "violated the plaintiffs' civil rights or participated in any conspiracy to violate those rights."