[env-trinity] Times Standard Guest Opinion- Restoration pact offers Klamath Basin hope

[Tom Stokely]

http://www.times-standard.com/guest_opinion/ci_20379287/restoration-pact-offers-klamath-basin-hope 
Restoration pact offers Klamath Basin hope
Erik Bergren/For the Times-Standard Eureka Times Standard
Posted:
Times-Standard.com
Over 10,000 waterfowl have died in the Lower Klamath and Tule Lake National Wildlife Refuges in the last couple of weeks due to an avian cholera outbreak exacerbated by low water conditions. This is one of the largest drought-related die-offs the refuges have seen in their 100-year history.
During years of low precipitation, water allocations in the Klamath Basin are stretched. The refuges are dependent on water deliveries from the Bureau of Reclamation's Klamath Project and it can be difficult to balance water needs among fisheries, wildlife refuges, tribes and irrigators.

While not a perfect solution, implementation of the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement would help Klamath basin wildlife refuges by allowing refuge managers flexibility in allocating a set amount of water to support spring and fall waterfowl migrations. Refuges would be on equal footing with irrigation deliveries for the first time.

The agreement represents local, community derived solutions to the Klamath Basin's water needs. If the agreement had been implemented, the magnitude of disease outbreak on the refuges would have been lessened because more flooded habitat would have been present. Currently, it is the only viable option to ensuring more reliable water deliveries to the refuge over the long term.

With the struggle to balance water between farms and fish, the refuges are often overlooked. Of all the wetlands within the Pacific Flyway, no area provides more important staging habitats, both in the fall and spring, for migratory waterfowl than the marshes and lakes of the Klamath Basin. This spring, the refuge has been one of the driest on record. According to refuge managers, only 50 percent of the wetlands on the refuge contain water. That is 15,000 acres of wetlands flooded out of about 31,000 acres on the Lower Klamath refuge.

Legislation authorizing the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement is now before Congress and is an example of a locally developed plan that would solve many of the water-balancing issues that these communities face after dry winters like the one we just experienced. It is time for Congress to act.

Erik Bergren is a communications administrator with California Waterfowl. Find more information online at www.calwaterfowl.org.
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