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<P class=MsoNormal><B><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Tahoma','sans-serif'">Farm
baron gets high-level help<o:p></o:p></SPAN></B></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><B><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Tahoma','sans-serif'">Contra
Costa Times-9/19/09<o:p></o:p></SPAN></B></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><B><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Tahoma','sans-serif'">By Mike
Taugher <o:p></o:p></SPAN></B></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Acting at the request of Beverly Hills billionaire and Kern
County water baron Stewart Resnick, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein is seeking a
high-level scientific review of new endangered-species permits that farmers and
others blame for water shortages.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The Sept. 11 request to two members of President Barack
Obama's Cabinet carries striking parallels to a 2001 gambit, reportedly
initiated by former Vice President Dick Cheney, to seek a similar review in
hopes of relieving pressure on water supplies for farmers in the Klamath River
basin. That review sowed initial doubt about the environmental permits on the
Klamath and led to a temporary, and controversial, increase in water
supplies.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Critics say Resnick is trying to use the science review
process to expose potential flaws that can be used to challenge the Delta
permits, known as "biological opinions," in court, or the court of public
opinion, as part of a campaign to loosen permit conditions and increase the flow
of Delta water to San Joaquin Valley farmers.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"Part of what he's asking is questions that will give him
leverage to overturn the biological opinions," said Glen Spain, northwest
regional director for the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Association, a
commercial salmon group. "We're not afraid of a science review. But you have to
ask the questions that have to be asked but never have been answered — how much
water do we have to leave in the Delta, not how much water do we take
out."<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The request, which follows the Obama administration's refusal
to rewrite the two biological opinions that regulate water deliveries from the
Delta, specifically tells Cabinet secretaries of Resnick's desire to complete an
initial study within six months and encloses his team's ideas on how a series of
three studies could be designed. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>In addition to being one of the state's most influential
individual farmers, Resnick is a major campaign contributor and owns the largest
share of the Kern Water Bank, an underground storage facility that the state
Department of Water Resources turned over to Resnick and other Kern County water
interests in the mid-1990s.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Resnick has a huge stake in the outcome of numerous lawsuits
swirling over environmental regulations in the Delta. One group that has filed
some of those lawsuits, the Coalition for a Sustainable Delta, is housed in
Resnick's Bakersfield offices.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"He's an individual with very deep ties to a number of
politicians, and obviously he's using those connections to get something he
wants," said Dave Levinthal, a spokesman for the Center of Responsive Politics,
which monitors money in politics. "It's a lot easier for you to do what's being
done here because you have status, and you've purchased that
status."<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>In a letter forwarded by Feinstein to the Obama
administration, Resnick accuses the agencies of using "sloppy science" to
inappropriately attribute the Delta's environmental problems to state and
federal water projects.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"I believe that the (National Research Council) is the only
body that has the reputation, credibility and expertise to conduct a truly
independent science review in the requisite time frame," Resnick
wrote.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The research council's reputation for credibility, rigor,
integrity and independence is hardly in question, but several experts raised
concerns about the advisability of a research council review. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"It's a completely reasonable thing to do, but we've done
it," said Bruce Herbold, a fisheries biologist with the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency, who was on a panel of scientists that reviewed the Delta
smelt permit issued in December.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Convening another science panel would either take Delta
experts away from important ongoing work or would take a long time to bring
outside scientists up to speed on a highly complex problem, Herbold
said.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The new Delta permits were issued last December and in June
after previous versions were invalidated by a federal court because they failed
to protect Delta smelt, salmon and other fish from extinction. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Despite claims to the contrary, those permits have had
relatively little impact this year, having cost water users several hundred
thousand acre-feet of water in a year when their overall supply is down more
than 1 million acre-feet.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The bigger problem this year is a run of three dry years.
Still, the permits will cut deeper into water supplies in average years and wet
years and will, over the long term, substantially reduce water supplies to
California's farms and cities.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>A panel of the National Research Council would likely hold
the permits to a higher standard than is required by endangered species laws,
something farmers say is a good idea given the potential economic impact they
carry.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Endangered-species laws require the "best available" science
be used, while a research council review could demand more certainty in any
conclusions that are reached. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"If every decision made under the Endangered Species Act had
to withstand that rigorous level of review, there would be no decisions under
the Endangered Species Act," said J.B. Ruhl, a Florida State University law
professor who was part of the research council committee that studied the
Klamath permits.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"The Endangered Species Act would grind to a complete halt,"
he added.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Before issuing the permits in December and in June, federal
agency managers went beyond the law's requirements by seeking outside peer
reviews, at least in part because of the certainty that any decision they
reached would be challenged in court. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Like the conflict in the Delta, the Klamath was the scene of
massive farmer protests in the early 2000s after endangered species permits for
salmon and suckers cut into farmers' water supplies by requiring, on one hand,
that water be kept in storage to benefit one kind of fish and, on the other,
that river flows be increased for other kinds of fish. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Either of those requirements can affect water supply, but in
the Klamath and in the Delta both of them are in play, further cutting into how
much water goes to farms.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Lacking options to get around the Klamath permits' conditions
and increase water deliveries to farms, Cheney opted in 2001 to get an outside
scientific review, The Washington Post reported six years later.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>It paid off in increased farm deliveries in 2002.
<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>In the Klamath, the research council made an initial finding
in 2002 that the regulations were too focused on the level of river flows, a
conclusion that water managers interpreted to mean they could reduce river flows
further. That decision was blamed for a salmon kill-off later that
year.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"The Bureau of Reclamation did not faithfully apply .... the
NRC's conclusions," Ruhl said.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Courts have since been running the river.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"The genius of the Klamath thing was the way they asked the
questions," said Jeff Mount, a UC Davis geologist who also was on the NRC
committee. "Someone who is clever can design the questions in a way they can get
the answer they're looking for, or that they're hoping for."<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"I hate it that I feel like we were manipulated for political
reasons," Mount said, adding that the panel's final report was
comprehensive.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Mount and others praised the NRC's independence, but he said
a study that relied on scientists not familiar with the Delta would take too
long. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>A critical scientific review could find flaws, but there is
little opportunity in the Delta for "advocacy science" to creep into permits as
it did in the Klamath because Delta science takes place is a more rigorous
environment, Mount said"I believe that <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>A Feinstein spokesman said there was nothing unusual about
forwarding Resnick's concerns and recommendations for a study design because he
"has been acting as a spokesman for many of the farmers here."<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Feinstein is seeking $750,000 in next year's budget for the
study, but she asked Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Commerce Secretary Gary
Locke to begin work on a study now.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>"She thinks it's good to have an independent study," said Gil
Duran, the Feinstein spokesman. He rejected any comparisons to the Klamath or
Cheney's involvement.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The final report on the Klamath by the National Research
Council concluded, among other things, that endangered fish could not recover
unless regulators broadened their focus to include other environmental
threats.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>That is exactly the case that many of the Delta's largest
water users have been making — that they are bearing the brunt of regulators'
rules even though there are plenty of other problems to deal
with.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>They might be right. The Delta is under assault by many
environmental threats.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>But the permits acknowledge that water deliveries from the
federal Central Valley Project and the state-owned State Water Project are not
the sole cause of the Delta's decline. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>And the Delta smelt permit makes the case that the projects
worsen other environmental problems, like pollution and invasive species, by
reducing and altering flows.<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>Still, relatively little attention is paid to upstream water
diverters. <o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal>The projects cranked about 6 million acre-feet of water a
year out of the Delta in a series of record-breaking years recently that
coincided with the collapse of fish populations, but about 9 million acre-feet
of water is taken out each year before it ever reaches the Delta by San
Francisco, the East Bay Municipal Utility District, Sacramento and upstream farm
districts, all of which have so far remained unaffected by the Delta's
crisis.#<o:p></o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></P>
<P class=MsoNormal><A href=""><FONT
color=#0000ff>http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_13377530?nclick_check=1</FONT></A></FONT><FONT
face=Arial size=2><A
href="http://www.c-win.org/">http://www.c-win.org/</A></FONT></P></DIV></BODY></HTML>