Jim Cook: Hearing concern from all sides

By LEE JUILLERAT

H&N Regional Editor

March 14, 2008

Jim Cook

   YREKA — Jim Cook is hearing it from all sides.

   Cook is the Siskiyou County supervisor for sprawling District 1, which includes people with strong and differing opinions on the proposed Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement. 

   He’s heard from everyone: Tulelake Irrigation District water users, Copco Lake property owners, Shasta and Karuk tribal members, whitewater rafters, Shasta River irrigators, and recreational fishing guides. 

   “People have been evenhanded,” he says. “They’ve been willing to understand the other guy’s point of view, but they have their own points of view. They’ve been pretty clear about ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ There’s not a whole lot of ambivalence.” 

   Fourth generation 

   Cook, 55, is a fourth-generation Siskiyou County resident (although his parents left and he grew up and lived in Southern California until moving back in 1980). He’s gained an intimate knowledge of the region through his job with Great Northern, a nonprofit corporation that assists with wastewater and economic development improvements for Siskiyou County communities. He’s in the final year of his first four-year term, and has announced plans to seek re-election. 

   “I had three pretty good years where there wasn’t a lot of controversy,” he laughs. 

   Cook, formerly a wildlife biologist, attended several of the settlement discussions but was not the county’s official representative. While he agrees that Klamath River fisheries have been hurt, he’s bothered that the talks began with a premise that dams had to be removed. 

   “I think it helps to look at this,” he says of the concerns and needs of various stakeholders.
   But he’s also concerned about Copco Lake residents who paid a premium for what would no longer be lakefront property if dams are removed. He wants to help irrigators along the Shasta and Scott rivers. They hope there will be nothing that comes back to hurt them. And he’s sympathetic with commercial whitewater rafting businesses that depend on scheduled water releases from the J.C. Boyle dam. 

   Cook hasn’t taken a stand for or against the settlement. “I just want to listen to what everybody says.”

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