[env-trinity] Fresno Bee September 21 San Joaquin River Decision

[Byron]

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Bill McEwen




 <mailto:bmcewen at fresnobee.com> E-Mail Bill

Battle cry on water rings hollow 

Bill McEwen / The Fresno Bee 

(Updated Tuesday, September 21, 2004, 5:30 AM)

The sky fell -- again -- the other day. 

Farmers and politicians played Chicken Little after a federal judge ruled in
favor of more water in the San Joaquin River and less in canals irrigating
east-side farms.

I should've brought a hard hat. 

Instead of offering a strategy that makes river restoration work for
everyone, the big people gathered at Fresno's City Hall talked the same
tired talk.


 


Salmon vs. people. This is the end of San Joaquin Valley life as we know it.


Let's fight these know-nothing judges and environmentalists until our dying
breath.

If you listened closely, you could hear the sounds of "Yesterday."

That special time when a farmer's troubles seemed so far away, and cheap
water was here to stay.

Ag has sung "Yesterday" so many times, it just might be the fifth Beatle.

Instead of living in the past and waging more legal battles, the Friant
Water Users Authority ought to face reality.

Although irrigation water diverted from the San Joaquin has made the desert
bloom, it also has brought surplus crops, a Third World economy and decades
of double-digit unemployment.

Now is the time for small towns such as Lindsay and Orange Cove to diversify
their economies. It's also time for politicians representing these towns to
deliver legislation that will retrain and educate farmworkers who lose their
jobs.

Instead of pandering for votes by saying salmon shouldn't come at the
expense of farm jobs, these same politicians ought to lead efforts to
increase water storage on the river.

There are two problems with Friant Dam: It wasn't built high enough, and it
was built in the wrong location. Storing more water in heavy rain and snow
years would provide extra water for farms and fish.

Among the possibilities is constructing a large reservoir at Temperance Flat
above Friant. Critics say it would cost too much. Given the demand for water
in California, the reservoir would be a bargain.

If I were on the payroll at Friant Water Users Authority, I'd push a whole
different message than the one last week.

I'd resume negotiations with the Natural Resources Defense Council, lead
plaintiff in the 16-year-old lawsuit about the river's future. Farmers and
environmentalists worked out agreements on water releases from the Kings
River long ago. Why not the San Joaquin?

I'd tell the public that east-side farmers want a healthy, fish-filled San
Joaquin flowing from the Sierra uninterrupted to the delta. And I'd point
out that keeping more water in the river benefits farmers along the river.

For east-side farmers, it's all about the future now.

To keep the water flowing to their liking, they need a bigger reservoir on
the San Joaquin.

That requires a new tone and a new way of selling themselves.

You don't rally public support for such a huge project with the stale cry of
fish vs. farms.

You can't pretend it's OK to destroy a great and scenic river that is the
heart of the Valley.

You can't keep trotting out Manuel Cunha and Victor Lopez to say the sky is
falling on farms and farmworkers.

The future is here.

Wake up and deal with it.

 

 

 

Byron Leydecker

Chair, Friends of Trinity River

Consultant, California Trout, Inc.

PO Box 2327

Mill Valley, CA 94942-2327

415 383 4810 ph

415 519 4810 ce

415 383 9562 fx

bwl3 at comcast.net

 <mailto:bleydecker at stanfordalumni.org> bleydecker at stanfordalumni.org
(secondary)

http://www.fotr.org

 

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