|
October 20, 2005
|
SAN FRANCISCO - Environmentalists are claiming a victory for their position following the Oct. 18 Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that rejects the Bush administration's water diversion plan for the Klamath River because “it fails to protect threatened Klamath River coho salmon.”
“The ruling is hailed by Klamath River tribes and
surrounding communities dependent on a healthy fishery,” said Howard
McConnell, chairman of the Yurok Tribe. “This is an example of how the ESA
serves as the last line of defense to protect working families and tribal
culture.”
The essence of the court's ruling is that more water needs to flow down the
Klamath River in order to protect the coho salmon, declared a threatened
species in 1997. The court rejected the Bureau of Reclamation's plan to share
the water with irrigators while maintaining what it considered adequate water
for the fish.
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that the Bureau
of Reclamation's irrigation plan from 2002 to 2010 provides the coho with only
57 percent of the water it needs and fails to explain how the species will
survive. The bureau controls water flows on the Klamath from its dams and
reservoirs.
“The agency essentially asks that we take its word
that the species will be protected if its plans are followed,” said Judge
Dorothy Nelson in the 3-0 ruling. The court told a federal judge in Oakland to
order the government to take immediate steps to preserve the coho.
The Bush administration, joined by Klamath Basin farmers who depend on
irrigation water, argued to the court that the eight-year water plan was the
best estimate of the coho's survival needs in the face of conflicting
scientific reports. The plan proposed an increase in flows in 2010-11.
In spite of strong runs of coho salmon returning to the Iron Gate Hatchery on
the Klamath River, the court said the coho, which has a three-year life cycle,
might be extinct by the time the flows picked up.
Environmentalists make a genetic distinction between hatchery and stream
hatched salmon, a distinction the court accepts in its claim that the coho
salmon are near extinction. Other biologists question that claim, pointing out
that the distinction is minute and the coho population, inclusive of the
hatchery fish, is robust.
“It is pathetic we have judges making decisions based on unsubstantiated
studies,” said Deb Crisp, Executive Director of the Tulelake Growers
Association. “Either they are misinformed or some people have a preconceived
idea of what the conditions are in the Klamath River.”
Crisp said the decision is disappointing but she believes it will be appealed.
She believes the lawsuit is an attack on agriculture from people who would
like to remove all of it from the Klamath Basin.
“We have followed all the requirements,” she said. “If what we are doing
is so bad, why has there not been another fish die off. I am highly suspicious
of the one in 2002.”
The court used a government report for its decision that identified a Bureau
of Reclamation-directed low water flows as a prime reason for a major salmon
kill on the Klamath in 2002, a situation that reportedly decimated commercial
stocks of chinook salmon in addition to the coho. To protect the endangered
fish, which mingle with other species when they reach the Pacific, the
government has severely restricted commercial ocean fishing this year as far
south as Monterey.
Klamath River irrigators, however, have also contested this argument, claiming
that the lack of water flow from the Trinity River, which merges with the
Klamath River before reaching the ocean, is a contributing factor to the 2002
incident. Water is diverted from the Trinity River to feed the canal to the
Bay Area.
“Our interest is in getting fish back to the Klamath River because we depend
on it for our livelihood,” said Glen Spain, northwest regional director of
the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations, a plaintiff in the
case. He said the ruling should lead to a “better and more balanced water
plan.”
“It's always been irrigators first,'' said Earthjustice attorney Kristen
Boyles, who represented environmental and fishing organizations challenging
the Bush administration's plan. “Fishing communities and tribal communities
dependent on these fish ... have been ignored.”
Increased flows for fish probably would come at the expense of irrigation
water for farmers. Pacific Legal Foundation lawyer Robin Rivett, representing
the Klamath Water Users Association and the Tulelake Irrigation District, said
the court appears to have misunderstood the case.
“All the water that's necessary for survival of the species will be provided
in the Bureau of Reclamation's current plan,” he said.
Rivett said he was confident that the government could provide a better
explanation of its plan to U.S. District Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong in
Oakland and avoid a court ordered increase in water supplies.
Klamath Basin irrigators say there is plenty of water for both them and the
fish and wish to avoid a complete cut-off of irrigation that happened several
years ago, a situation that decimated agriculture in Northern California and
Southern Oregon causing many third generation farmers to lose their land.
A coalition of commercial fishermen and conservation groups, joined by the
Yurok and Hoopa Valley Tribes, filed the lawsuit against the National Marine
Fisheries Service and Bureau of Reclamation in September 2002, claiming that
the agency's 10-year plan “failed to leave sufficient water in the river for
salmon and relied on future, speculative actions from the states of California
and Oregon to make up for the missing water.”
The lawsuit claims that in the fall of 2002, five months after the plan was
adopted, low flows in the Klamath River caused by unbalanced irrigation
deliveries killed nearly 70,000 adult salmon. Months earlier, during the
spring of 2002, the lawsuit claims that juvenile salmon died in the river from
low water conditions. The plaintiffs claim that the loss of these juveniles is
what led to the severe commercial salmon fishing restrictions this year on the
California and Oregon coasts.
“This decision gives hope to the families that depend on Klamath River
salmon,” said Glen Spain of Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's
Associations. “This case is about restoring balance to the basin so that
fishermen, Native Americans, and irrigators can all receive a fair share of
the water. We will continue to work on a new vision for the basin.” PCFFA is
the west coast's largest organization of commercial fishing families.
The environmentalist's concept of fair share is contested by the irrigators
who claim that the 2002 plan is a fair share. The irrigators also believe that
the science used by these special interest groups is skewed and their real
agenda is to pressure for the removal of the hydroelectric dams on the Klamath
River.
The dam removal concept, in fact, was mentioned in the Yurok Tribe press
release announcing its successful lawsuit decision by the Ninth Circuit Court
of Appeals.
The Yurok Tribe press release stated: “The Klamath was once the third
mightiest salmon-producing river in the continental US, behind only the
Columbia and Sacramento in productivity. The river has been reduced to a
shadow of its former self largely as a result of the Bureau of Reclamation's
re-plumbing of its headwaters to maximize irrigation in the arid upper basin
desert along with hydroelectric development. The long-term answer may include
buying back some of the agricultural land in the Klamath Basin to reduce water
demand, as well as decommissioning all or part of the hydroelectric project
owned by Portland based PacifiCorp.”
Some speculate that the recent attention relating to blue-green algae, an
issue driven by environmental and tribal interests, also relates to an agenda
promoting the removal of the dams, which are up for relicensing.
Salmon hatcheries were built on the Klamath River mitigating the impact of the
dams when they were constructed. For decades these effectively provided for
the fishing industry and water for the irrigators, who point out that water
flows are regulated and have not changed and say that not all the factors
relating to claimed declining fish populations are being considered.
The appeal was filed by Earthjustice on behalf of PCFFA, Institute for
Fisheries Resources, The Wilderness Society, WaterWatch of Oregon, Northcoast
Environmental Center, Oregon Natural Resources Council, Defenders of Wildlife,
Klamath Forest Alliance, and Headwaters. In the district court, these groups
were joined by Congressman Mike Thompson (D-Napa) and the Yurok and Hoopa
Valley Tribes; amicus briefs supporting the plaintiffs were filed by the
Cities of Arcata and Eureka, Del Norte, Humboldt, and Trinity Counties, and
the Humboldt Bay, Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District.
Note: AP contributed to this report from an article written by Bob Egelko with
the San Francisco Chronicle.
Source: http://www.siskiyoudaily.com/articles/2005/10/20/news/news2.txt