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<P class=contenttag>Environmental Working Group News Release</P>
<H1>Throwing Good Money at Bad Land</H1>
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<H2>Related EWG Content</H2>
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<LI class=reportItem><A href="">Throwing Good Money at Bad Land</A><BR><SPAN
class=date>September 28, 2010</SPAN></LI></UL></DIV></DIV>
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<DIV class=content><A href="">Water Subsidies</A><BR><A href="">Natural
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<LI><STRONG>CONTACT:</STRONG> Contact EWG Public Affairs: 202.667.6982.
alex@ewg.org</LI>
<LI><STRONG>FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:</STRONG> October 20, 2010</LI></UL>
<P>Oakland, Calif. -- A new Environmental Working Group (EWG) <A
href="">analysis</A> has found that a federal Bureau of Reclamation proposal to
continue farming on a vast swath of selenium-tainted acreage in the Central
Valley’s giant Westlands Water District would cause a taxpayer boondoggle.</P>
<P>“There is only one solution that makes sense for the great majority of
Americans: retire all of the selenium-laced land from farming and transition it
to other uses that would be less costly to taxpayers and the environment and
provide the nation more benefit,” said Renee Sharp, director of EWG’s California
office. </P>
<P>“Instead of ending irrigation of this toxic land, the federal government
plans to build a drainage system to nowhere that will cost many more times more
than the land is worth,” said Tom Stokely of the California Water Impact
Network, a Santa Barbara-Based non-profit organization allied with EWG.</P>
<P>EWG has determined that between 2005 and 2009, $54 million dollars in crop
subsidy checks went to Westlands farms with high selenium concentrations. The
Bureau of Reclamation has consistently ignored these crop subsidies – which are
direct costs to taxpayers – whenever it has calculated the costs and benefits of
its plan. </P>
<P>The Westlands acreage at issue is so loaded with selenium and other salts
that when it is irrigated, the water must be drained away to avoid poisoning the
crops. The fate of this area has been the subject of repeated lawsuits ever
since the 1980s, when Westlands water draining into the Kesterson National
Wildlife Refuge caused an environmental disaster. In 1983, scientists reported
that record numbers of migratory birds at Kesterson were hatching with massive
deformities, including grossly misshapen beaks, twisted legs, missing wings and
malformed skulls. More than 1,000 waterfowl died before the drain from Westlands
into the refuge was closed down. </P>
<P>Bureau of Reclamation commissioner Michael Connor outlined the latest plan in
a September 1, 2010, letter to U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. </P>
<P>Unfortunately, the agency’s latest plan is just as problematic as the
previous one. Among other things, it would:</P>
<UL>
<LI>Require the federal government to pay to build drainage and treatment
facilities for a subsection of the selenium tainted land within Westlands,
with the District itself footing the bill for additional drainage and
treatment facilities to service acres remaining in production; </LI>
<LI>Forgive some or all of Westlands’ $497 million debt to taxpayers; </LI>
<LI>Transfer ownership of “appropriate” elements of San Luis Unit, a
federal-state water infrastructure complex of dams, reservoirs, canals,
pumping plants and a power generation station, to Westlands if requested.
(According to the <A href="">Bureau of Reclamation website</A>, the federal
government owns the San Luis Drain, the O`Neill Pumping Plant and Intake
Canal, Coalinga Canal and Pleasant Valley Pumping Plant. The federal and
California state governments jointly and operate O`Neill Dam and Forebay, B.F.
Sisk San Luis Dam, San Luis Reservoir, William R. Gianelli Pumping-Generating
Plant, Dos Amigos Pumping Plant, Los Banos and Little Panoche Reservoirs, and
San Luis Canal from O`Neill Forebay to Kettleman City, with switchyard
facilities (USBR 2010b).) </LI>
<LI>Extend Westlands’ water contract length beyond the standard 25 years;
</LI>
<LI>Provide federal incentives for renewable energy development within
Westlands; </LI>
<LI>Require Westlands to retire 200,000 acres of selenium-tainted land (it is
unclear from the proposal whether this figure would include or would be in
addition to already retired land);</LI>
<LI>Reduce Westlands’ water deliveries proportional to the amount of land
retired, but only in years with very high rainfall. </LI></UL>
<P>Interior’s proposal was not accompanied by an economic analysis. It is
impossible to see how this project would end up anywhere but deep in the
red.</P>
<P>The true cost to the American people of farming in this area becomes even
more exorbitant when millions of dollars in crop subsidies for these farmlands
are taken into account. </P>
<P>“It is simply inappropriate to exclude crop subsidies when considering the
potential economic costs and benefits of various alternatives in Westlands,”
said Sharp. “Subsidy payments are real cost outlays by the federal government
and are easy to calculate since they have hard numbers attached. ” </P>
<P>Federal agencies and Congress must soon settle on a long-term solution for
Westlands’ toxic lands. The stakes are high: untold millions of taxpayer
dollars; hundreds of thousands of acre-feet of water in the drought-prone West;
the health of the fragile San Francisco-San Joaquin Bay/Delta; the potential for
a second Kesterson disaster; and future litigation costs to taxpayers. </P>
<P><A href="">The EWG report concludes:</A></P>
<P>The true costs of farming on Westlands’ toxic lands cannot be justified by
any measure – economic or environmental. The time has come to fix the Bureau of
Reclamation’s costly mistake and retire all of the selenium-tainted land in
Westlands. <STRONG></STRONG></P>
<P># # # </P>
<P>EWG is a nonprofit research organization with offices in Washington, DC,
Oakland CA, and Ames IA, that uses the power of information to protect human
health and the environment.<A
href="">http://www.ewg.org</A></P></DIV></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Tom Stokely<BR>Water Policy Analyst/Media
Contact<BR>California Water Impact Network<BR>V/FAX 530-926-9727<BR>Cell
530-524-0315<BR><A href="mailto:tstokely@att.net">tstokely@att.net</A><BR><A
href="http://www.c-win.org/">http://www.c-win.org/</A></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>