[Water_news] 3. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS: WATERSHEDS - 4/26/07

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment

 

April 26, 2007

 

3. Watersheds

 

SALTON SEA:

Attorney: QSA won’t save sea - Imperial Valley Press

 

STEELHEAD:

Steelhead recovery roadmap set; Plan would preserve, expand spawning areas - Monterey Herald

 

 

SALTON SEA:

Attorney: QSA won’t save sea

Imperial Valley Press – 4/26/07

By Darren Simon, staff writer

 

If any effort to restore the Salton Sea either fails or doesn’t serve the Imperial Valley’s best interest, can the Imperial Irrigation District break from a controversial 75-year water pact?

That was a question raised this week during an IID board meeting by a consultant, Craig Morgan of South Lake Tahoe, who said he represents IID Director Mike Abatti and his brother, farmer Jim Abatti, on water issues.

A lead water attorney for the IID, David Osias of San Diego, said whether the sea is restored will not impact the district’s commitments on the QSA and water transfer to San Diego.

“For those of you who have spread the myth that in exchange for the water transfer, not only would we get money but a recreational lake in the form of the Salton Sea, that myth is not grounded in any facts I know of,” Osias said.

MORGAN’S RESPONSE

 

 

Morgan told the IID board if Osias is right, those who negotiated the water pact — including Osias — failed to serve the best interests of the Valley.

“What are IID’s rights under the contracts of the QSA?” Morgan asked.

At the center of the debate is the QSA, a water pact approved by IID and other parties in 2003. The QSA was designed to prevent future water wars between water agencies across the states that depend on the Colorado River.

The pact reduces California and IID’s supply of Colorado River, which in turn has impacted the amount of water available to sustain the Salton Sea.

The state’s largest inland lake is dying under its own high salt content, which will be made worse as the sea shrinks, and there is an effort under way now to find a sea restoration plan.

One plan the state has proposed would cost $6 billion and there are some who say there will never be enough money to restore the sea at that price.

2003 DECISION

Osias told the IID board this week that when in 2003 the board sitting at the time approved the QSA, it voted to move forward with contracts associated with the pact from the day forward.

Those contracts include the IID transferring water to other Southern California water agencies. The largest transfer moves up to 200,000 acre-feet of water per year — enough to serve hundreds of thousands of homes — to San Diego for 75 years.

Morgan said IID shouldn’t have a commitment to transfer water to San Diego if there is no Salton Sea restoration.

Osias said the issues with the sea, high salt content and declining water levels existed before the QSA was drafted.

He said after the first 15 years of the transfer — where a farm-fallowing program will conserve water and help maintain the Salton Sea — the sea will become saltier at a faster pace and decline at a faster pace.

The QSA, Osias said, provides $30 million in seed money for any sea restoration effort.

It also dictates that the state cover any environmental mitigation costs in relation to the QSA that go above the $133 million IID, Coachella Valley Water District and the San Diego County Water Authority agreed to pay.

The QSA also set the stage for legislation that called on the state to study whether the sea can be restored.

But Osias said of the sea’s future: “The problem doesn’t have to be solved by the transfer and it won’t be solved by the transfer. It was already here.”

Morgan responded: “That’s what David Osias just told us; there’s no requirement that they come and restore the Salton Sea,” Morgan said.

“You need to go find an attorney who is willing to represent the IID.” #

http://www.ivpressonline.com/articles/2007/04/26/news/news02.txt

 

 

STEELHEAD:

Steelhead recovery roadmap set; Plan would preserve, expand spawning areas

Monterey Herald – 4/26/07

By Kevin Howe, staff writer

 

Making California's threatened steelhead trout "extinction proof" will require policies that preserve spawning areas and expand both the fish population and its range, according to scientists of the National Marine Fisheries Service.

 

Scientists spoke at the opening day of a two-day public workshop in Carmel on a steelhead trout recovery program aimed at saving the fish who swim and spawn along the California coast from San Francisco to the Mexican border.

 

A recovery plan "is not a regulatory document," said Craig Wingert of the fisheries service, but "a roadmap to recovery."

 

However, federal agencies are obliged to assure that actions they take are consistent with recovery plans, he said.

 

The recovery plan, Wingert said, should promote an abundant, fecund and biologically diverse population spread over a wide area to allow continued reproduction of the fish and make them invulnerable to catastrophes, such as wildfires, flooding or landslides, that might disrupt their spawning runs.

 

These measures should achieve "a low risk of extinction," said fisheries service scientists David Boughton.

 

The fisheries service has designated nine distinct habitat areas — "biogeographic groups" — including the Carmel River and three small coastal basins. Steelhead off the Monterey County coast are listed as "threatened" and those south as "endangered," Boughton said, and there appears to be evidence that the southern steelhead populations rely on "immigrant" fish from the northern areas.

 

Rainbow trout and steelhead are believed to be the same species, he said, though "there is conflicting evidence about the relationship between rainbow and steelhead."

 

Rainbow trout spend their whole life cycles in fresh water, while steelhead are spawned in fresh water and migrate to the ocean, then return to lay eggs again in freshwater streams. Boughton said young steelhead that spend time in estuaries or lagoons like Carmel River Lagoon before going on out to sea stand a better chance of survival than those fish that migrate directly to the ocean.

 

The recovery study, he said, will attempt to identify the best factors for recovery of the salmon and promote regular spawning runs.

 

The workshop is part of a series being held by the fisheries service in the state to gather information for developing a federal recovery plan for steelhead in Central and Southern California. The fish are listed under the federal Endangered Species Act.

 

Previous workshops have been held in Ventura, Carlsbad and Arroyo Grande.

 

Today's session is from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in Carpenter Hall of Carmel's Sunset Center.

 

A brief overview on the recovery planning and the threats assessment processes will be presented, and attendees will then organize into small groups to discuss threats to steelhead in specific watershed areas, including the Pajaro, Galiban, Arroyo Seco, Salinas and Carmel rivers, as well as streams along the Big Sur coast and the San Luis Obispo Terrace. #

http://www.montereyherald.com/search/ci_5754144

#####