[env-trinity] Boxer slams water bill rider backed by Feinstein

[Tom Stokely]

http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Boxer-slams-water-bill-rider-backed-by-Feinstein-10699564.php
Also more articles at: http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-me-drought-bill-20161205-story.html

http://www.sacbee.com/news/state/california/article119062888.html 

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/top-dem-threatens-to-block-mccarthy-drought-deal/article/2608907?custom_click=rss

http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/308810-senator-blasts-gop-push-for-california-drought-language-in-water-bill 

https://www.bna.com/water-bill-faces-n73014448125/


Boxer slams water bill rider backed by Feinstein
By Carolyn Lochhead 

Published 4:27 pm, Monday, December 5, 2016
WASHINGTON — Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, teamed up Monday to slip a legislative rider into a giant end-of-year water infrastructure bill that would override endangered species protections for native California fish for the purpose of sending water to San Joaquin Valley farmers.Retiring Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., angrily denounced the rider as a “poison pill,” calling a late-afternoon news conference, during which she lashed out against McCarthy, saying he lied by calling the more than 80-page provision a “little, small agreement.”“This is so wrong it is shocking,” Boxer said of the provision, saying it would authorize water pumping from the state’s rivers beyond what is allowed under the biological opinions for fish protection. She said the legislation also would transfer from Congress to the incoming Trump administration the power to approve big dam projects in the West.Boxer vowed to use every tool at her disposal to block the legislation.
It was the first time in recent memory that Boxer confronted Feinstein, her colleague of more than two decades, on California water policy, saying the provision clearly overrides the Endangered Species Act, despite Feinstein’s insistence to the contrary.Feinstein’s move was a clear affront to Boxer, trampling over Boxer’s legislative turf as the top Democrat on the Environmental and Public Works Committee. Boxer is a co-author of the Water Resources and Development Act, a massive bill with broad bipartisan support. Boxer noted that the bill that Feinstein and McCarthy want to add their provision to, includes many projects that Feinstein herself wrote. Among them are restoration of Lake Tahoe and the San Francisco Bay shoreline.The rider was negotiated behind closed doors without legislative hearings or public input, and suddenly attached Monday afternoon in the House to the larger water bill. McCarthy hinted at the legislation to reporters Monday morning, referring to the “little, small agreement.” Boxer said it was hatched “in the dead of night” just before the bill is about to be taken up.The rider came out of more than three years of attempts by Feinstein and House Republicans to respond to California’s five-year drought with provisions that would loosen environmental protections. Earlier efforts had failed time and again over the opposition of Boxer, the Obama administration and nearly every Democrat in the Bay Area delegation, mainly over provisions that allow more water to be pumped from rivers to farmers during the spring.State water authorities have said that more water needs to remain in rivers to prevent the extinction of several native fish species, including salmon and the delta smelt.Feinstein’s office claimed that the legislation does not violate the Endangered Species Act, because it contains a “savings clause” that dictates that nothing in the provision shall violate the act. House Democratic aides countered that the courts have ruled that direct instructions from Congress, in this case on how much water can be pumped from rivers, always supersede more general clauses declaring that nothing in the legislation violate bedrock environmental law.McCarthy praised Feinstein’s cooperation. The legislation could not have been achieved without her help, he said, adding that the legislation “will bring more water to our communities and supports critical storage projects.” He said it was critical to pass the legislation now to allow water authorities to capture more of this season’s rains.He also indicated that more drought legislation will come next year, as well, when Republicans will maintain their control of the House and Senate but no longer face President Obama’s veto. President-elect Donald Trump promised during the campaign at a rally in Fresno that he would turn on the pumps for farmers.Feinstein in a statement touted the provision’s more than half billion dollars in authorizations to “help California develop a new water infrastructure,” and said it calls only for “short-term operational improvements to help us hold more water in a way that does not negatively affect fish or the environment.”Boxer said the larger water infrastructure bill contains nearly everything for California’s water infrastructure that Feinstein claims will be in the new legislation, including money for desalination, water recycling and groundwater recharge.She vowed that she would not end her Senate career by allowing the Feinstein/McCarthy provision to stand.Boxer promised to play “hardball” by filibustering every piece of legislation, including her own, that is pending in the Senate in the current lame-duck session, scheduled to end this week. Noting that many of her Republican colleagues have big stakes in all of it, she speculated that they will not be inclined to see their own projects filibustered over a contentious California water bill that she said would inevitably wind up in court.The broader water infrastructure legislation contains authorizations to fix the lead problem in the water supply in Flint, Mich., as well as similar problems in municipal water systems across the country.Feinstein has long supported San Joaquin Valley farmers on water issues and in return received big political support from the valley. She has not yet announced whether she will be running for re-election when her term expires in 2018.

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