[env-trinity] Times-Standard- Trinity River management council approves restoration work, with caveats based on fishing guides' concerns

Tom Stokely tstokely at att.net
Fri Jan 6 08:41:37 PST 2012


Trinity River management council approves restoration work, with caveats based on fishing guides' concerns

Donna Tam/The Times-Standard
Posted: 01/06/2012 02:00:10 AM PST

Following weeks of tension between Trinity River fishing guides and the Trinity Management Council over scheduled restoration projects, the council has cautiously approved moving forward on a portion of the work.
Trinity Management Council Chair Brian Person said the council voted Wednesday to move forward with pursuing the Trinity River Restoration Program's work on two sites, with some caveats.
He said staff will review the design and continue working with stakeholders before asking for final approval on one phase of the upper Junction City site. The council also held off on the second phase of another site -- the lower Steiner Flat -- in light of concerns. The phase won't move forward until the review of the first round of projects is completed.
Bill Dickens, a member of the Trinity River Guides Association, said the organization was not 100 percent satisfied with the outcome.
”They didn't meet some of our concerns as well as the land owners' (concerns) for gravel injections into the river,” he said, adding that his group will regroup and discuss the council's decision.
California Water Impact Network (C-WIN) spokesman Tom Stokely echoed Dickens' concerns and said several land owners expressed “strong dissatisfaction” and said they have filed claims over the alleged damage to their property.
    
”There remains great public concern that additional harm will be done to remaining fishing holes and private land from continued spawning gravel placement and use of heavy equipment on the banks of the Trinity River in 2012 and beyond" Stokely said in a statement.
The Trinity River Restoration Program, or TRRP, is set up to carry out a series of restoration projects aiming to mange water flows, construct channel rehabilitation sites, add gravel to encourage fish spawning and control fine sediments. Roughly half of the 47 projects are completed.
The Trinity River Guides Association and C-WIN have said the program is doing more harm than good and is moving forward on the second phase of projects before the first phase has been properly evaluated. A study on the effects of the first phase is expected this spring.
Person said designers met with stakeholders following a December meeting to see if a consensus could be reached.
”They made some significant alterations to the designs of both sites, and we believed we had reached a consensus with the guides that day,” he said. “It turned out later that there was some confusion there on that position, and the guides expressed that they weren't in a position yet to support the two sites.”
As a result, the council split the action of the two sites into several phases in hopes of compromising on some. Person said the program needs to finalize designs before March to meet permitting deadlines.

Donna Tam can be reached at 441-0532 or dtam at times-standard.com.

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