WASHINGTON DESK - Fourteen large, long-term water contracts for San Joaquin Valley growers are void and must be renegotiated after environmental reviews, the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday.
The opinion in No. 97-16173 Natural Resources Defense Council v. Houston upheld and even broadened, somewhat, a 1997 ruling by U.S. District Judge Lawrence Karlton of Sacramento in favor of 15 conservation and fishing groups that challenged the 40-year contracts. In additional to a formal environmental impact study under federal law, the contracts may also be subject to a state law that requires dams to release enough water to protect fish downstream, the court said. This case involves the Friant Dam, which dried up 20 miles of the San Joaquin River when it was built in the 1940s.
Prior to construction of the Friant dam, the San Joaquin River supported a variety of fish species, including the chinook salmon. The annual spring floods also fed the surrounding wetlands with fresh water.
After the Friant dam was built, the San Joaquin River terminated at the dam, and water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is exported upstream to water users below the dam through a process of pumping and reverse flows.
This situation has adversely affected both wetlands and river fish, including the winter-run chinook salmon. The salmon, which was listed as threatened in August, 1989, and is now endangered, is under the protective jurisdiction of the National Marine Fisheries Service. Other listed species under the jurisdiction of the Fish and Wildlife Service are also located in the Friant Service Area.
Various irrigation and water districts, that rely on water from the Friant dam, appealed the district court' s summary judgment decision that the Bureau of Reclamation, violated the Endangered Species Act by renewing water contracts prior to completing required endangered species consultations and mandated by Section 8 of the Reclamation Act, requiring compliance with the California Fish and Game Code.
The Central Valley Project (CVP) is a multi-unit reclamation project administered by the Bureau. The Friant dam unit of the CVP was built on the San Joaquin River by the Bureau in the 1940s. Prior to construction of the dam, the San Joaquin River met the Sacramento River at the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, where they then flowed out to the Pacific Ocean. Since the time that the dam was completed, the Friant unit has impounded the San Joaquin River water behind the Friant dam and diverted the water to surrounding irrigation districts. This impoundment and diversion leaves a dry stretch of San Joaquin riverbed.
The plaintiff conservationist organizations on the law suit include Trout Unlimited of California, California Sport Fishing Alliance, Sierra Club, Stanislaus Audobon Society, and others.
Defendants water districts in the San Joaquin Valley included the Friant Water Users Authority, Madera Irrigation, Dist.,Chowchilla Water Dis., Orange Cove Irrigation Dist., Delano-Earlimart Irrigation Dist., Lindsay-Strathmore Irrigation Dist., Tulare Irrigation Dist., and many others.
The legal effect of the Court's opinon is that all the water contracts have to now be subjected to public hearings and review as to environmental impacts and remedial action to restore the river habitat for certain and specific endangered species including some fish, and birds before the water contracts can be renegotiated.
