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<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>Water report
offers estimate, misses real effect</span></b><b><span style='font-size:14.0pt;
font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>S.F.
Chronicle-8/18/10<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>By Laura
King Moon <o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>Opinion<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>The State Water Board's recent report suggesting that much
of Northern California's water supply should be redirected to benefit fish
underscores the importance of addressing the ecological crisis in the
Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. But as the State Water Board itself
cautioned, this report does not explain how to restore the delta ecosystem
while meeting human water needs, nor how much water fish need if other factors
affecting the ecosystem are addressed.<span style='font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>Today's delta is nothing like that before the Gold Rush.
Levees have eliminated 95 percent of the estuary's original wetlands.
Non-native species now comprise 95 percent of the delta's living plants and
species. Food supplies for fish are a fraction of those in other estuaries
because of rock-walled levees and the lack of suitable habitat. Pushing more
water through the barren delta channels will not make for a better ecosystem. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>When the State Water Board released this non-binding report
to consider new flow criteria for fish, it cautioned against misuse of the
information because of the limited focus of the analysis. The report explicitly
does not consider, for example, the competing needs of different types of fish,
such as how depleting reservoirs upstream of the delta could endanger salmon in
the rivers during dry years.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>The report also does not address how flow needs would be
affected by pollution reduction or creation of new marsh and floodplain
habitat. Because scientists don't know exactly how much water is needed to
restore fish populations, the report uses a simplistic assumption that flows
should be restored to patterns that existed in the 1920s, and does not consider
how restoring flows to this level would affect 25 million Californians and
millions of acres of agriculture that rely on supplies from the watershed. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>The draft report provided estimates of the water supply
impacts in an appendix, showing that water users up and down the state would
have their current supplies reduced by as much as 67 percent. The final report
does not include the appendix, and more careful analysis is needed. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>But our preliminary analysis suggests tremendous hardship
for many water districts throughout the state, including the Bay Area, where
more than 70 percent of supplies comes from somewhere in the Sacramento-San
Joaquin Delta watershed. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>The delta needs a more thorough and balanced solution, based
on hard facts about real-world impacts and the best available science.
Necessary elements will include more habitat, less pollution and a better
water-conveyance system that can separate the movement of water supplies from
the natural movements of the tidal estuary. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal>Water districts, environmentalists and federal and state
agencies are seeking such a balanced approach through the Bay Delta
Conservation Plan. Within this comprehensive plan, flows represent one
important piece of a much larger challenge to put the delta on a path to
sustainability.#<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i>Laura King Moon is the assistant general manager of the
State Water Contractors.<o:p></o:p></i></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><a
href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/08/18/ED651EUV1G.DTL">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/08/18/ED651EUV1G.DTL</a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Byron
Leydecker, JcT</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Chair, Friends
of Trinity River</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>PO Box 2327</span></i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>Mill Valley, CA
94942-2327</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 383 4810
land/fax</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'>415 519 4810
mobile</span></i><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><a href="mailto:bwl3@comcast.net"><b><i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:blue'>bwl3@comcast.net</span></i></b></a><b><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><a href="mailto:bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org"><b><i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:blue'>bleydecker@stanfordalumni.org</span></i></b></a><b><i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'> </span></i></b><i><span style='font-size:
12.0pt;color:gray'>(secondary)</span></i><b><span style='font-size:12.0pt;
font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><a href="http://fotr.org/"><b><i><span style='font-size:
12.0pt;color:blue'>http://www.fotr.org</span></i></b></a><b><i><span
style='font-size:12.0pt;color:gray'> </span></i></b><b><span style='font-size:
12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"'><o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal> <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal> <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
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