Fish Sniffer On Demand Digital Edition Issue 3818 August 16-30 | Page 28
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August 16-30, 2019
VOL.38 • ISS. 18
Court Halts Westlands Water District’s
Participation in Plan to Raise Shasta Dam
SACRAMENTO – On July 31, Shasta
County Superior Court Judge Dennis J.
Buckley granted a preliminary injunction
halting Westlands Water District’s participa-
tion in a Bureau of Reclamation project to
raise Shasta Dam.
The injunction enjoins Westlands from
“taking any action that constitutes planning
for or construction of” the Shasta Dam raise.
“The court has stopped Westlands Water
District from moving forward with a project
that would hurt the people and environ-
ment in our state,” said California Attorney
General Xavier Becerra in a statement.
“Maybe others believe they’re above the law
and can get away with it. But, in California,
we’re prepared to prove otherwise.”
Attorney General Becerra filed the
lawsuiton May 13, 2019 to block Westlands
from taking an unlawful action to assist in
the planning and construction of a project to
raise the height of the Shasta Dam, a project
that is strongly opposed by the Winnemem
Wintu Tribe, fishing groups and environ-
mental organizations.
Becerra said the project poses “significant
adverse effects on the free-flowing condition
of the McCloud River and on its wild trout
fishery, both of which have special statutory
protections under the California Wild and
Scenic Rivers Act.” The Act prohibits any
agency of the State of California, such as
Westlands, from assisting or cooperating
with actions to raise the Shasta Dam.
In addition to the lawsuit filed by Attorney
General Becerra, a coalition of fishing
and environmental groups represented
by Earthjustice has filed a separate
suit. The coalition includes Friends of
the River, Pacific Coast Federation of
Fishermen’s Associations, Institute for
Fisheries Resources, Natural Resources
Defense Council, Defenders of Wildlife,
Sierra Club, and Golden Gate Salmon
Association.
The Pacific Coast Federation of Fisher-
men’s Associations (PCFFA) reported that
the injunction was a “huge win for salmon
in California today as the Westlands
Water District is ordered to stop aiding
and abetting the illegal, fishing job killing
Shasta dam raise project pending trial next
year.”
“The project would have inundated a
California Wild and Scenic River, but
most importantly for fishermen, would
have resulted in a 100% contained Sacra-
mento River, its flows trapped behind
concrete and managed by policy (not
nature) forever. We will beat Westlands,
and we will kill this project,” the group
vowed.
The dam raise would inundate many
of the remaining sacred sites of the
Winnemem Wintu Tribe that weren’t
inundated by the completion of Shasta
Dam in the 1940s.
The Winnemem Wintu, who have led
the fight against the Shasta Dam raise for
many years, commented in a Facebook
post after the Attorney General filed the
lawsuit: “Finally, a California state agency
is pushing back
against Westlands’
dam raise scam.
Hopefully, the
extent of this
corrupt scene will
*Trolling
be revealed and
Motors
rejected.”
*Fishfinders
Caleen Sisk, Chief
*GPS
and Spiritual Leader
*VHF
of the Winnemem
Radios
Wintu Tribe,
*Radar
commented after
the court decision,
*Batteries
“However, this
and
does not STOP the
Chargers
work to raise Shasta
Dam! The Gover-
Largest Service
nor’s Department
Center
of Water Resources
in the West!
was absent at the
BOR comment
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meetings in Sacramento and Chico this week.
Will the Governor now sue the BOR or just
wait until the April trial against Westlands?”
“The BOR is approving the ROD in
January on the new hand picked Trump
scientists’ Biological Opinion that will not
require the restoration of Salmon to include
access to rivers above the rim dams. While it
looks like a WIN, it will not STOP the Shasta
DAM raise! What is the real game here?”
Sisk asked.
The Golden Gate Salmon Association also
applauded the court ruling: “GGSA and
allies, and the State of CA joined forces in
court to stop the Westlands Water District
from illegally acting to seize more water from
the Sacramento Valley. Yesterday a court
ruled in our favor. Big thanks to state AG
Xavier Becerra and his team for great work to
help salmon.”
In an email to Courthouse News, Reclama-
tion spokesperson Jeffrey Hawk said, “We
have not reviewed the ruling, however such
a ruling would not prevent Reclamation from
moving forward with the Shasta Dam and
Reservoir Enlargement Project.”
I have requested a response to the ruling
from the Westlands Water District, but
haven’t received one yet.
Yurok Tribe and Commercial Fishing Group
File Lawsuit to Save Klamath Salmon!
starting to rebound from previous disease
outbreaks.”
“The Yurok people depend on the
Klamath’s salmon runs for survival and
we should not have to bear the brunt of the
agency’s poor decision-making. During
the course of the water year, the Yurok
Tribe repeatedly sought modification of
the Plan to provide higher May-June flows,
or barring that, at least the provision of an
additional 20,000 acre-feet of water for
emergency disease management flows,”
stated James.
“Stronger protections are needed for
Klamath salmon to safeguard against deadly
parasites,” said Patti Goldman, managing
attorney for Earthjustice’s Northwest
regional office. “Infection rates among the
young salmon have been especially high
recently and we cannot afford to allow this
trend to continue.”
“Our folks in the commercial fishing
industry also have no choice except to
challenge this new Biological Opinion. It
does not provide enough water, or enough
protection, to prevent the extinction of
salmon in the Klamath River that our
coastal communities depend upon for their
livelihoods,” said Glen Spain, NW Regional
Director of the Pacific Coast Federation of
Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA), which
represents commercial salmon fishing
families coastwide. “In short, the new
BiOp is based on flawed science, unproven
models and worst of all it jettisons key
disease prevention flows the Courts have
already determined are necessary. This is
unacceptable.”
“In March 2017 and again in April 2018,
United States District Court Judge William
H. Orrick, in response to a different lawsuit
filed by the Tribe, Earthjustice and PCFFA,
ordered the Bureau to release more water
to curtail another disease outbreak from C.
shasta,” according to the statement. “There
is no provision for additional flows in the
current BiOp to address the escalation in
infection rates that took place earlier this
year. One solution would be the reinstate-
ment of the 2018 ruling, which would make
more water available to prevent further
damage to the coho and Chinook salmon
populations. Increased water releases during
disease outbreaks reduce disease transmis-
sion to fish, speed outmigration away from
infection zones, and generally improve
water quality.”
The Yurok Tribe, the largest Indian Tribe
in California, and the Pacific Coast Federa-
tion of Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA)
on July 31 filed a lawsuit against the Bureau
of Reclamation and the National Marine
Fisheries Service in response to low flows
and high salmon disease rates under the
federal agency’s new management plan
for the Klamath River. The groups are
represented by the environmental law firm
Earthjustice.
“The recently implemented Klamath
Biological Opinion (BiOp) created environ-
mental conditions that worsened an outbreak
of the lethal pathogen Ceratonova shasta (C.
shasta), infecting an observed majority of this
year’s juvenile salmon,” according to a joint
statement from the Tribe and PCFFA. “The
Biological Opinion, issued by the National
Marine Fisheries Service, is intended to
ensure that the Bureau’s operations plan for
the 225,000-acre Klamath Irrigation Project
does not jeopardize the survival of federally
listed fish and mammal species, such as coho
salmon and southern resident killer whales.”
“However, for several days in May, the
Biological Opinion had the river flows for
salmon at or near
drought minimum at
the same time Upper
Klamath Lake was
within one half of
an inch of flooding.
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