[env-trinity] Times-Standard -Healdsburg opts out of Trinity suit

[Tom Stokely]

Eureka Times-Standard 
http://www.times-standard.com/Stories/0,1413,127~2896~2454559,00.html# 
Healdsburg opts out of Trinity suit 

Friday, October 08, 2004 - The Times-Standard 

Yet another city has bailed out of a suit that aims to block the full 
restoration of the Trinity River. 

The Healdsburg City Council on Monday unanimously decided to send a letter 
to the Northern California Power Association asking the group to drop out 
of the litigation. The vice mayor of the city, Jason Liles, is also 
chairman of the association's legislative committee. 

The move follows several other entities that have opted out of the suit 
brought against the restoration plan for the river. The Sacramento 
Municipal Utilities District, the Port of Oakland, Palo Alto and Alameda 
have all withdrawn their support for the suit waged by the power 
association and Westlands Water District, the Central Valley irrigation 
interest that benefits the most from the diversion of most of the Trinity's 
water from above Lewiston Dam. 

Up to 90 percent of the river's flow has been diverted since the project 
was completed in the 1960s. In 2000, former U.S. Interior Secretary Bruce 
Babbitt signed a decision leaving nearly half the Trinity's water in the 
river. Westlands and the power association sued, and the Hoopa Valley Tribe 
intervened in the suit against Interior. The river bisects the Hoopa 
Reservation. 

In July, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cleared the way for 
increased flows on the Trinity. Westlands and the power association have 
appealed. 

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