NEW YORK TIMES 1/7/03
By DEAN E. MURPHY
SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 6 .. A new state report on the
Klamath
River supports contentions by fishermen,
environmentalists and
several American Indian tribes that 33,000 fish died
on the lower
river last fall because the Bush administration
allowed too much
water to be diverted to farmers.
The report by biologists at the California Department
of Fish and
Game is expected to figure prominently in a lawsuit
against the
federal government that seeks to reduce water supplies
to farmers
before the spring irrigation season, which begins in
April.
Lawyers for both sides are scheduled to appear on
Thursday in federal
court in Oakland, Calif. A similar legal challenge
against the
Department of the Interior, which regulates the
river’s flows, failed
last year, but the extensive die-off has given
opponents of the federal
policy new resolve.
“This time around, Exhibit A will be 33,000 dead
spawners,” said
Glen H. Spain, the Northwest regional director of the
Pacific Coast
Federation of Fishermen’s Associations. “The water has
been
overcommitted and the demand has to be brought back
into balance
with the supply.”
The state report, which was released on Friday, warns
that if
conditions on the river remain the same and water
flows are not
increased, the Klamath could experience another major
fish kill. Last
year’s die-off was the largest ever in California of
adult chinook
salmon, which accounted for about 95 percent of the
dead fish. A
smaller number of coho salmon and steelhead trout also
died.
One author of the report, Neil Manji, a fish biologist
in Redding,
Calif., said the study was not intended “to point
fingers” at the Bush
administration. Instead, he said, it was meant to make
the case for
having more water in the river as “a common sense
approach” to
managing the fisheries’ needs.
The report says that of all the factors that
contributed to the die-off,
from the large number of fish to the presence of
bacterial pathogens
in the water, “flow is the only factor that can be
controlled to any
degree.”
“Man can only do so much at this particular time,” Mr.
Manji said. “I
think every scientist would agree that increased flows
would reduce
the potential for a big kill.”
Last March, in a reversal of a curtailment the year
before, Interior
Secretary Gale A. Norton presided over a ceremony at
Klamath Falls,
Ore., in which water was released to farmers that had
been held back
because of concern about endangered fish. The policy
switch was
denounced by fishermen, Indian tribes and many
environmentalists,
who vowed to fight it and a new 10-year management
plan for the
river that would keep water flowing to the
farmers.
Kristen Boyles, a lawyer with Earthjustice, an
environmental legal
group that represents the opponents of the
administration’s policy,
said the state report contributes to a growing
consensus among
scientists that diversions from the river for
agriculture are harmful.
The 230-mile Klamath River, which flows from Oregon to
the Pacific
Ocean near Redwood National Park in California,
supplies irrigation
water to about 200,000 acres of farmland through the
federal
Klamath Reclamation Project.
Last October, a biologist with the National Marine
Fisheries Service
sought federal whistle-blower protection after
claiming his agency
was pressured by the Bush administration to accept
water flows in
the 10-year plan that were too low to support fish.
The biologist,
Michael Kelly, said the low flows threatened coho
salmon, which are
protected by the Endangered Species Act.
Jeffrey S. McCracken, a spokesman for the Bureau of
Reclamation,
the Interior Department agency that administers
federal water
policies, defended the decision last year to divert
more water to
farmers, saying it was based on advice from federal
biologists. He said
a decision about this year’s flows would not be made
until studies of
the fish die-off are completed by the United States
Fish and Wildlife
Service and the National Academy of Sciences.
Mr. McCracken questioned the objectivity of the new
report by the
California biologists, since state officials began
blaming the federal
government for the fish kill last September, when the
fish were still
dying.
“The conclusions really aren’t a surprise to us, given
they arrived at
these same conclusions even before they did the
study,” he said. “It is
nothing that they haven’t already said.”
Jonathan Birdsong, a spokesman for Representative Mike
Thompson
of California, who in October introduced legislation
to block the Bush
administration plan for the river, denounced the
bureau’s attitude
toward the state report.
“This administration has always said the best science
is in the states,
that the states are closer to the people,” Mr.
Birdsong said. “The fact
that they are discounting the state experts is a
little disheartening. It
is more than that. It is hypocritical.”
But Dave Solem, manager of the Klamath Irrigation
District, whose
members farm about 40,000 acres of land irrigated with
Klamath
water, said he also viewed the state report with deep
suspicion.
“All of these things are focused on one thing: to be
used as evidence in
court,” Mr. Solem said. “I can guarantee this will be
regurgitated
many times over and over. It becomes scientific fact
just because
they put it out.”
