<DOC>
[107th Congress House Hearings]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access]
[DOCID: f:77682.wais]
OPERATIONS OF THE WATER DELIVERY SYSTEM: THE CALFED RECORD OF DECISION
AND ANTICIPATED WATER DELIVERIES FOR 2002
=======================================================================
OVERSIGHT HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON WATER AND POWER
of the
COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SEVENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
February 14, 2002
__________
Serial No. 107-87
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Resources
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/
house
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COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES
JAMES V. HANSEN, Utah, Chairman
NICK J. RAHALL II, West Virginia, Ranking Democrat Member
Don Young, Alaska, George Miller, California
Vice Chairman Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts
W.J. ``Billy'' Tauzin, Louisiana Dale E. Kildee, Michigan
Jim Saxton, New Jersey Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
Elton Gallegly, California Eni F.H. Faleomavaega, American
John J. Duncan, Jr., Tennessee Samoa
Joel Hefley, Colorado Neil Abercrombie, Hawaii
Wayne T. Gilchrest, Maryland Solomon P. Ortiz, Texas
Ken Calvert, California Frank Pallone, Jr., New Jersey
Scott McInnis, Colorado Calvin M. Dooley, California
Richard W. Pombo, California Robert A. Underwood, Guam
Barbara Cubin, Wyoming Adam Smith, Washington
George Radanovich, California Donna M. Christensen, Virgin
Walter B. Jones, Jr., North Islands
Carolina Ron Kind, Wisconsin
Mac Thornberry, Texas Jay Inslee, Washington
Chris Cannon, Utah Grace F. Napolitano, California
John E. Peterson, Pennsylvania Tom Udall, New Mexico
Bob Schaffer, Colorado Mark Udall, Colorado
Jim Gibbons, Nevada Rush D. Holt, New Jersey
Mark E. Souder, Indiana James P. McGovern, Massachusetts
Greg Walden, Oregon Anibal Acevedo-Vila, Puerto Rico
Michael K. Simpson, Idaho Hilda L. Solis, California
Thomas G. Tancredo, Colorado Brad Carson, Oklahoma
J.D. Hayworth, Arizona Betty McCollum, Minnesota
C.L. ``Butch'' Otter, Idaho
Tom Osborne, Nebraska
Jeff Flake, Arizona
Dennis R. Rehberg, Montana
Tim Stewart, Chief of Staff
Lisa Pittman, Chief Counsel/Deputy Chief of Staff
Steven T. Petersen, Deputy Chief Counsel
Michael S. Twinchek, Chief Clerk
James H. Zoia, Democrat Staff Director
Jeffrey P. Petrich, Democrat Chief Counsel
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON WATER AND POWER
KEN CALVERT, California, Chairman
ADAM SMITH, Washington, Ranking Democrat Member
Richard W. Pombo, California George Miller, California
George Radanovich, California Peter A. DeFazio, Oregon
Greg Walden, Oregon, Calvin M. Dooley, California
Vice Chairman Grace F. Napolitano, California
Michael K. Simpson, Idaho James P. McGovern, Massachusetts
J.D. Hayworth, Arizona Hilda L. Solis, California
C.L. ``Butch'' Otter, Idaho Brad Carson, Oklahoma
Tom Osborne, Nebraska
Jeff Flake, Arizona
------
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on February 14, 2002................................ 1
Statement of Members:
Calvert, Hon. Ken, a Representative in Congress from the
State of California........................................ 1
Prepared statement of.................................... 2
Statement of Witnesses:
Bishop, Walter J., General Manager, Contra Costa Water
District, Concord, California.............................. 51
Prepared statement of.................................... 53
Osann, Edward R., Consultant representing the National
Resources Defense Council.................................. 57
Prepared statement of.................................... 58
Macaulay, Steve, Chief Deputy Director, California Department
of Water Resources......................................... 11
Prepared statement of.................................... 13
Nelson, Daniel, Executive Director, San Luis & Delta-Mendota
Water Authority............................................ 44
Prepared statement of.................................... 45
Quinn, Timothy, Vice President, State Water Project
Resources, Metropolitan Water District..................... 71
Prepared statement of.................................... 73
Raley, Bennett W., Assistant Secretary, Water and Science,
U.S. Department of the Interior............................ 6
Prepared statement of.................................... 8
Stovall, John F., General Counsel, Kern County Water Agency.. 66
Prepared statement of.................................... 67
Wright, Patrick, Director, CALFED Bay-Delta Program.......... 30
Prepared statement of.................................... 32
Additional materials supplied:
Guy, David J., Executive Director, Northern California Water
Association, Statement submitted for the record............ 3
Nelson, Barry, Senior Policy Analyst, Natural Resources
Defense Council, Response to Chairman Calvert's request for
NRDC's position, Letter submitted for the record........... 93
OVERSIGHT HEARING ON THE OPERATIONS OF THE WATER DELIVERY SYSTEM: THE
CALFED RECORD OF DECISION AND ANTICIPATED WATER DELIVERIES FOR 2002
----------
Thursday, February 14, 2002
U.S. House of Representatives
Subcommittee on Water and Power
Committee on Resources
Washington, DC
----------
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to other business, at 10:25
a.m., in room 1334, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Ken
Calvert [Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. KEN CALVERT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Mr. Calvert. Now the Subcommittee on Water and Power will
come to order for a hearing. The Subcommittee is meeting today
to hear testimony on the operations of the California water
delivery system: the CALFED Record of Decision and anticipated
water deliveries for 2002.
Under Rule 4(b) of the Committee rules, any oral opening
statements at hearings are limited to the Chairman and the
ranking minority member. This will allow us to hear from our
witnesses sooner and help members to keep to their schedules.
If other members have statements today, they can be included in
the hearing record under unanimous consent. And obviously Mr.
Dooley will be giving the opening statement for the minority.
The hearing today will focus on the operations of the
Central Valley Project, CVP, and the State water project
delivery systems and how they interrelate to the CALFED Record
of Decision. People often say that timing is everything, and in
this particular case I couldn't agree more. It is pure
coincidence this hearing comes at this time, in light of three
major happenings in the world of water:
One, the recent Federal court decision regarding the
appropriate accounting of water for environmental purposes;
two, an independent study released by the National Academy of
Sciences, indicating no substantial scientific justification to
maintain higher water levels in the Klamath Basin; and, three,
projected water deliveries by the Bureau of Reclamation of less
than 50 percent in certain cases.
I would like to address these three issues prior to
receiving testimony from our witnesses. To begin with, on
January 25, 2002, the Bureau of Reclamation released its
initial water supply outlook for 2002 that estimated CVP
agricultural water deliveries south of the delta will be 45
percent of the contracted amount.
The CALFED Framework for Action indicated that in a normal
water year, agricultural water service contractors could
anticipate at least 65 to 70 percent of their contracted
amount. To date, this allocation has not been achieved. I look
forward to hearing from each witness today as to what are the
statutory, legal, and regulatory requirements shaping the
current water supply forecast and/or what can be done to meet
the identified goal.
Second, the National Academy of Science interim report on
the Klamath Basin maintains there is no substantial scientific
justification to maintain higher water levels in the Klamath
Basin for fish. Several members see a potential correlation
between the data interpretation by the fishery agencies and the
Klamath Project to the way data has been utilized in developing
biological opinions for the Central Valley Project. Members of
the Subcommittee have expressed interest in a similar study
being conducted within the Central Valley Project.
And, last, February 5, 2002, United States District Judge
Oliver W. Wanger issued a summary judgment motion on offset/
reset, how the 800,000 acre-feet of water is being dedicated.
Specifically, the judge said the Interior Department was
wrongly credited the amount of water used for environmental
purposes. Proponents of the decision have indicated this could
mean boosts of water deliveries by 5 to 20 percent annually for
west side farmers. I would be interested to know how this may
affect the environmental baseline built into the CALFED Record
of Decision.
I believe the current administration has the obligation to
provide to Congress how it plans to use its afforded discretion
pursuant to the Federal and State law to implement the CVPIA
and ESA in a more balanced manner. We have already had a
previous administration that I believe abused its discretionary
power to implement Federal statutes by relying on inadequate
science that led to junk decisions. It is time for the Federal
Government to choose to implement these laws in a less punitive
manner, without imposing enormous costs with little or no
scientific benefit for the environment.
I look forward to hearing from today's witnesses, but
before that, I would like to recognize Mr. Dooley for his
opening statement.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Calvert follows:]
Statement of The Honorable Ken Calvert, a Representative in Congress
from the State of California
The hearing today will focus on the Operations of the Central
Valley Project (CVP) and the State Water Project (SWP) delivery systems
and how they interrelate to the CALFED Record of Decision.
People often say that timing is everything and in this particular
case I couldn't agree more. It is by pure coincidence this hearing
comes at this time, in light of three major happenings in the world of
water;
<bullet> Lthe recent Federal court decision regarding the
appropriate accounting of water for environmental purposes,
<bullet> Lan independent study released by the National Academy of
Sciences indicating no substantial scientific justification to maintain
higher water levels in the Klamath Basin, and
<bullet> Lprojected water deliveries by the Bureau of Reclamation
of less than 50% in certain cases.
I would like to address these three issues prior to receiving
testimony from our witnesses.
To begin with, on January 25th, 2002, the Bureau of Reclamation
released its initial water supply outlook for 2002 that estimated CVP
agricultural water deliveries south-of-the-delta will be 45% of the
contracted amount. The CALFED Framework for Action indicated that in a
normal water year, agricultural water service contractors could
anticipate at least 65 to70% of their contracted amount. To date, this
allocation has not been achieved. I look forward to hearing from each
witness today to what the statutory, legal, and regulatory requirements
shaping the current water supply forecast are and what can be done to
meet the identified goal.
Secondly, the National Academy of Science (NAS) Interim Report on
the Klamath Basin maintains there is no substantial scientific
justification to maintain higher water levels in the Klamath Basin for
fish. Several members see a potential correlation between the data
interpretation by the fishery agencies in the Klamath Project to the
way data has been utilized in developing biological opinions for the
Central Valley Project. Members of the Subcommittee have expressed
interest in a similar study being conducted within the Central Valley
Project.
And Lastly, on February 5, 2002, United States District Judge
Oliver W. Wanger issued a Summary Judgement Motion on Offset/Reset [how
the 800,000 acre-feet of water is to be dedicated]. Specifically, the
judge said the Interior Department has wrongly credited the amount used
for environmental purposes. Proponents of the decision have indicated
that this could mean boosts of water deliveries by 5% to 20% annually
for west side farmers. I would be interested to know how this may
affect the environmental baseline built into the CALFED Record of
Decision.
I believe the current Administration has the obligation to provide
to Congress how it plans to use its afforded discretion, pursuant to
Federal and state law, to implement the CVPIA and ESA in a more
balanced manner. We've already had a previous administration that has
abused its discretionary power to implement Federal statutes by relying
on inadequate science that led to junk decisions. It is time for the
Federal Government to choose to implement these laws in a less punitive
manner, without imposing enormous costs with little or no scientific
benefit for the environment.
I look forward to hearing from today's witnesses.
______
Mr. Dooley. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I will not have an
opening statement at this time. I just appreciate you calling
this hearing, and also appreciate all of the witnesses that
will testify for their taking time and putting their energies
into providing some insight into these issues.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
I would like to submit for the record the written testimony
of David Guy, Executive Director of the Northern California
Water Association, regarding the operations of the California
water delivery system. If there is no objection, so ordered.
[The statement of Mr. Guy follows:]
Statement of David J. Guy, Executive Director, Northern California
Water Association
Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, my name is David Guy.
I am the Executive Director of the Northern California Water
Association (NCWA). NCWA is a geographically diverse organization,
extending from California's Coast Range to the Sierra Nevada foothills,
and nearly 180 miles from Redding to Sacramento. Our members are
located within the area of origin for significant part of the state's
water where they rely on the waters of the Sacramento, Feather, Yuba
and American Rivers, smaller tributaries and groundwater to irrigate
nearly 870,000 acres that produce every type of food and fiber grown in
the region. Many of our members in Northern California have water right
settlement contracts or water service contracts with the Bureau of
Reclamation as the operator of the Federal Central Valley Project
(CVP); many others have water rights settlement contracts with the
Department of Water Resources (DWR) as the operator of the State Water
Project (SWP). Our members also provide water supplies to state and
Federal wildlife refuges, and much of this land serves as important
seasonal wetlands for migrating waterfowl, shorebirds and other
wildlife.
We welcome the opportunity to provide the Sacramento Valley
perspective on the administrative and operational efforts that are
necessary to meet the water supply and environmental goals in the
CALFED Record of Decision (ROD). We recognize that the primary purpose
of the hearing is to focus on the efforts necessary to improve water
supply reliability for the CVP and SWP in the export service areas,
including the Environmental Water Account (EWA), increased deliveries
(15%) to south of Delta CVP agricultural water service contractors and
increased SWP operational flexibility at the Banks pumping plant.
Rather than focus on the export provisions in the ROD, our testimony
today will instead concentrate on the efforts that are necessary to
meet the water supply and environmental goals in the Sacramento Valley
upstream of the Bay-Delta. If we are successful in meeting our water
supply and environmental goals in the Sacramento Valley, we in turn can
be more constructive in assisting the export interests address their
water supply needs and environmental goals.
For many years, the Sacramento Valley (the northern part of the
Great Central Valley) has been targeted as the primary source of water
to meet California's burgeoning demands. The cornerstones for both the
Federal Central Valley Project (CVP) and the State Water Project (SWP),
Lakes Shasta and Oroville, are located in Northern California and
provide water to the Bay-Delta and millions of Californians.
Water users and landowners in the Sacramento Valley have also faced
restrictions under the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act (CVPIA) and other environmental legislation and
regulations. These actions have posed many challenges for Sacramento
Valley water users and their ability to provide reliable and affordable
water supplies for the farms, cities and wildlife refuges in the
Sacramento Valley. For example, the Glenn-Colusa Irrigation District in
the early 1990's was ordered to cease diversions through a faulty fish
screen on the Sacramento River. CVP water service contractors in the
Sacramento Valley, despite receiving 100% supplies this year, have
received as little as 25% of their contract supplies in 1991 and 1992
and only 60% last year.
Rather than dwell on how we have dealt with and continue to deal
with these challenges, we believe it is more constructive to focus on
the exciting solutions to a variety of problems that are currently
being advanced by those within the Sacramento Valley. These solutions,
including the integrated water management program described below, can
help the Department of Interior (DOI) and other CALFED agencies meet
the water supply goals in the CALFED ROD. However, this can only occur
if: (1) there are no redirected impacts to areas upstream of the Bay-
Delta in the Sacramento Valley, (2) the DOI and other CALFED agencies
exercise their full administrative authority to help local agencies
implement the integrated water management program for the Sacramento
Valley, including commitments in the ROD for Northern California such
as Sites reservoir; and (3) the CALFED regulatory process is
streamlined and reformed.
NO REDIRECTED IMPACTS TO NORTHERN CALIFORNIA
A fundamental tenet of the CALFED program is that there will be no
redirected impacts to areas upstream of the Bay-Delta. Sacramento
Valley interests recognize the importance to California's future of
restoring the environmental health of the Bay-Delta and providing high
quality and reliable water supplies for all beneficial uses. We
generally support the CALFED program objectives and we have been
willing to play a constructive role in implementing a successful CALFED
program.
It is essential, however, for the CALFED agencies to deal with the
Sacramento Valley interests as full partners, honoring the commitments
that were and are the essence of the area of origin protection laws
and, in that regard, refrain from imposing on the Sacramento Valley any
burden for mitigating impacts to the Bay-Delta that result from the
operation of the CVP, SWP, EWA or any other CALFED program.
Future partnership and cooperation between the Sacramento Valley
and CALFED is possible and, indeed, desirable. However, it must advance
based upon a framework where CALFED agency actions are undertaken in a
manner that insures that solutions implemented to resolve problems
within the Bay-Delta would not redirect negative impacts to the
Sacramento Valley (ROD, page 9.) Additionally, CALFED must provide
acceptable assurances that Sacramento Valley water rights and
entitlements will not be sacrificed in favor of other CALFED
objectives. CALFED agencies must work with, not against, Sacramento
Valley water users in meeting their mutual water supply needs. The
bottom line is that CALFED agencies, including the Department of
Interior, must not use their regulatory authority to reallocate area of
origin water supplies for export or to meet Delta water quality
standards and other environmental objectives in the Bay-Delta system.
AN INTEGRATED WATER MANAGEMENT PROGRAM FOR THE SACRAMENTO VALLEY WILL
IMPROVE WATER SUPPLY, QUALITY AND RELIABILITY
Sacramento Valley water users have committed to help improve water
supply reliability, water quality and environmental benefits. The
Sacramento Valley's initiative and effort to help protect salmon and
other aquatic species is unprecedented and is now recognized as one of
the most exciting and progressive voluntary salmon restoration efforts
in the United States. Today, more than twenty NCWA members,
representing over 500,000 acres of irrigable land, have either
completed or are in various stages of developing fish screens to
prevent fish entrainment at their diversions. Many NCWA members have
also initiated far-reaching efforts to refurbish fish ladders,
construct siphons, remove dams, create habitat conservation plans and
implement other habitat improvement projects to enhance the
environment, while at the same time improving water supply reliability.
Additionally, NCWA and the Sacramento Valley water users have
embarked on an integrated water management program that has broad
support from water suppliers and local governments throughout the
Sacramento Valley. This integrated program includes:
<bullet> Lfish passage improvements (fish screens, siphons and
habitat improvements, ROD, page 35);
<bullet> Lgroundwater management (ROD, page 46);
<bullet> Ljoining local partners in evaluating the Sites off-stream
reservoir (ROD, page 45);
<bullet> Lwater use efficiency programs (ROD, page 59);
<bullet> Lpotential expanded storage in Lake Shasta (ROD, page 44);
<bullet> Lintra-regional water transfers and exchanges within the
Sacramento Valley (ROD, page 71); and
<bullet> Lflood protection (ROD, page 74);
<bullet> Lwatershed management (ROD page 39).
During the past year this integrated program led to an
unprecedented water rights settlement among water users throughout
California. This settlement, now known as the Sacramento Valley Water
Management Agreement, and the ensuing integrated water management
program, avoided the extremely contentious Phase 8 Bay-Delta water
rights proceedings before the State Water Resources Control Board. The
parties to the initial agreement include NCWA, the Bureau of
Reclamation (BOR), the Department of Water Resources (DWR), the Federal
contractors in the San Luis and Delta-Mendota Water Authority, the
State Water Contractors, and the Contra Costa Water District. We are
also working closely with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the
California Department of Fish and Game. The Phase 8 proceeding would
have pitted these parties from throughout the state against each other.
This integrated program will now serve as the heart of a regional
strategy for the Sacramento Valley.
The Sacramento Valley Water Management Program and the integrated
water management program focus on meeting 100% of the water supply
demands within the Sacramento Valley during all year types, both now
and into the future. Sacramento Valley water users believe that, once
the full demands within the Sacramento Valley are met, this integrated
program will help make water supplies available for use in and beyond
the Bay-Delta to meet water quality standards, and provide for export
water users in the San Joaquin Valley, Southern California, the Central
Coast, and as assets for the Environmental Water Account (EWA) and
other environmental programs.
The parties to the agreement are currently developing a short-term
agreement that is scheduled to be completed by March 15, 2002. This
agreement, if successful, will not only dismiss the Phase proceedings,
it will facilitate the implementation of this integrated water
management program for the Sacramento Valley.
THE REGULATORY PROCESS MUST BE STREAMLINED AND REFORMED
With nearly 18 Federal and state agencies under the respective
executive branches that dictate California water policy, it is critical
to coordinate and ultimately streamline the plethora of agencies with
jurisdiction over water resources in California.
The framework to create CALFED in June 1994 called for cooperation
and collaboration between the Federal and state agencies that oversee
water in California. It is essential that these agencies continue to
work together in this manner. Over the past 7 years, CALFED has evolved
from a concept to streamline agency efforts to a massive bureaucratic
program. For CALFED to be successful as it transitions from a planning
program to an implementation agency, it must move from a top-down
bureaucratic organization to an organization that facilitates and
fosters a series of regional strategies with local control and
governance. Most notably, it must streamline the regulatory process to
assure that these programs will be implemented. Specific examples
include the facilitation of intra-regional water transfers and
exchanges and expedited permitting by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
and Environmental Protection Agency.
Significantly, this means that CALFED and its member agencies will
serve in a more limited, albeit more effective, role to advance water
and environmental policy in the state. It is also means that CALFED
will serve a critical role to coordinate regional strategies to ensure
that they fit together in a manner that provides statewide benefits,
and also provide a broad-based governance strategy and oversight
capability to ensure appropriate, balanced and efficient implementation
of all CALFED program elements.
Much work was done by CALFED during the last seven years in terms
of intensive environmental and engineering evaluation and in
preparation of the ROD. That progress should not be lost. As a
consequence, CALFED and its agencies should clarify that the project
alternative screening process provided for in the ROD will be adhered
to and that one CALFED program element will not be treated as an
alternative to another CALFED program element. Again, among other
things, this will allow the full integration of all water supply
alternatives, maximizing the full utilization of the water resources
available within the Sacramento Valley.
In conclusion, thank you for the opportunity to provide our
perspective on the operational and administrative efforts that are
necessary to meet the water supply and environmental goals in the ROD.
If you have any questions, please call me at 916.442.8333.
______
Mr. Calvert. Before I introduce our first panel, or while I
introduce the first panel, why don't we have them come on up.
Mr. Bennett Raley, the Assistant Secretary of Water and
Science, Department of Interior; and Mr. Steve Macaulay, the
Chief Deputy Director, California Department of Water
Resources.
It seems that every year, and it doesn't matter which
administration, but I am disappointed and concerned that we
have not had the opportunity to review the administration's
testimony in a timely manner. Being provided testimony within
an hour of the hearing is unacceptable.
Under the rules of the Committee, and in a letter addressed
to the Secretary, we asked specifically that written testimony
must be filed at least two working days before the appearance.
Failure to comply with this requirement may result in the
exclusion of the written testimony from the original hearing
record, or the barring of the oral presentation of the
testimony.
I will accept the testimony, allow the administration to
provide testimony. However, I want to reiterate that we expect
all witnesses to adhere to the rules of the Committee, and I
would hope in the future that we don't have this reoccurrence.
And with that, I would be happy to recognize Mr. Raley for
his opening statement.
STATEMENT OF BENNETT W. RALEY, ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR WATER
AND SCIENCE, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Mr. Raley. Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, thank
you for inviting me here. And, Mr. Chairman, I personally take
responsibility for the late delivery of the testimony. It is
unacceptable, and I offer no defense and simply take
responsibility for that.
Today we are here to talk about an issue that is of vital
importance to the Secretary and the department, as well as
other agencies within the administration, the State of
California and our constituents there. Mr. Chairman, with your
permission I would ask that my written testimony, albeit late,
be submitted for the record so that I can confine my oral
comments to a summary.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection, so ordered.
Mr. Raley. Thank you, sir.
We all face decisions, the need to make decisions that will
improve water supplies and the environment in the Central
Valley and generate the positive results that we expect from
the CALFED process.
I would like to take the Subcommittee back to what
Secretary Norton said in July 2001 in her appearance before the
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. She called the
CALFED process ``a new approach to reaching a common vision of
actions needed for progress.'' The Secretary also pledged that
the Department would ``continue to work through the CALFED
process to improve the environment and increase the system's
water management flexibility.''
Let me reiterate that sentiment, that commitment, today.
The department is committed to making CALFED work for the long
term. The fundamental tenet of balanced progress which guides
and underlies the CALFED program can be achieved by undertaking
actions that simultaneously improve project operations while
accomplishing our environmental objectives. Much work is needed
to meet the long-term challenges that both the Department of
Interior and the citizens of California and the State of
California face in satisfying the growing demands for water and
other benefits created by the water management infrastructure
in California.
As you are aware, increasing demand and hydrologic
conditions, as well as implementation of the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act, Endangered Species Act, Clean Water
Act, and other legal requirements have impacted the ability of
the project to meet its contractual obligations. Long-term
operations of the project, as displayed in the CVPIA
Programmatic Environmental Impact Assessment and described in
the related Record of Decision, will result in shortages across
all service areas and all types of water service provided by
this project.
Mr. Chairman, you have started out with appropriately a
reminder of the statement in the ROD about expectations for
south-of-the-delta delivery obligations in normal to wet years,
so I won't repeat that. We are intensely aware of that and all
aspects of the commitment in the ROD.
The Mid-Pacific Region of the Bureau of Reclamation, in its
preliminary analysis, determined that in a median precipitation
year the south-of-delta agricultural contractors should only
expect a 45 percent water supply, which is less than was the
target that was identified in the CALFED ROD for a normal year.
Concern with this analysis prompted Reclamation to launch
an intensive effort to match deliveries in 2002 with those
targeted in the ROD. Additional staff have been put on this
issue. There have been extensive discussions within the Federal
family and with constituents that care about this issue, and
there will be tomorrow a formal announcement by the Bureau of
Reclamation of the delivery expectations for the coming year.
I offer some hope today that it will be more favorable than
the preliminary projection of 45 percent. The bureau is working
very hard right now with the other agencies involved, Federal
and State, to take into account recent hydrologic information
as the water year has progressed, as well as to assimilate and
implement as appropriate the court's decisions in the past few
months with respect to Section (b)(2) of CVPIA and the
accounting structure.
In short, the department will comply with the judge's
decision in its implementation of operations plans for the CVP
in 2002, but we are not satisfied with the current situation in
the Central Valley Project. We know that much work needs to be
done.
We know that the past methodology--and I offer this with no
criticism--has simply been a function of the complexity of all
of the legal and physical factors associated with this
enormously complex project; that the solutions to the annual
debate at this time of year, in February, about whether or not
there would be an appropriate level of delivery south of the
delta, in the past those answers have been provided by Mother
Nature in the form of precipitation. We believe that waiting
and relying on the vagaries of late season snow and rainfall is
not an acceptable management path, and are working to correct
that.
We have to do that in a cooperative manner. We know that
regardless of how close we may come to the targeted deliveries
for 2002 for south of the delta, much work needs to be done.
And therefore Mary Nichols, the California Secretary of
Resources, and I will be convening a multiday meeting of the
CALFED leadership to complete the operating plan for 2002 by
mid-March. We intend to resolve issues, make decisions, and
move this progress forward. We will keep this Committee
informed of our progress.
I want to reiterate that this administration is committed
to the concepts of the ROD. There is much, much value in
preserving the hard work by everyone involved in fashioning
this solution to these complex needs, and those who have
speculated that this administration wishes to move from the
concept of the ROD are simply inaccurate.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to conclude my oral remarks and
make myself available for questions from the Committee. Thank
you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Raley follows:]
Statement of Bennett Raley, Assistant Secretary for Water and Science,
U.S. Department of the Interior
Chairman Calvert, members of the Subcommittee, I appreciate the
opportunity to appear before you to discuss the operation of the
Central Valley Project (CVP) in 2002. Mr. Chairman, my testimony will
focus on the challenge we all face of making decisions that will
improve water supplies and the environment, and generate the positive
results that we expect from the CALFED program. I look forward to
working with this Committee and all our fellow CALFED agencies to
achieve our goals.
Before I discuss these challenges, I would like to remind the
Subcommittee what Secretary Norton said in a July, 2001 appearance
before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. She called
the CALFED process ``a new approach to reaching a common vision of
actions needed for progress.'' The Secretary also pledged that the
Department would ``continue to work through the CALFED process to
improve the environment and increase the system's water management
flexibility.'' Let me reiterate that sentiment today and clarify that
the Department is committed to making CALFED work for the long term.
The fundamental tenet of Balanced Progress which guides the CALFED
program can be achieved by undertaking actions that can improve project
operations while accomplishing our environmental objectives
simultaneously. Much work is needed to meet the long-term challenges
that both the Department of the Interior and the citizens of California
face in satisfying the growing demands for water and other benefits
created by the water management infrastructure in California.
Background
CVP operations have been altered dramatically in the last decade.
Considerable new demands were placed on the system and significant
adverse consequences occurred in a major portion of the project. The
challenges we face are clear. As you are aware, increasing demand and
hydrologic conditions, as well as implementation of the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act (CVPIA), the Endangered Species Act (ESA), and
the Clean Water Act, impact the ability of the project to meet its
contractual obligations. Long-term operations of the project, as
displayed in the CVPIA Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement and
described in the related Record of Decision (ROD), will result in
shortages across all service areas and all types of water service
provided by this project.
The CALFED Objective
The CALFED Record of Decision states in part:
``It is also anticipated that implementation of Joint Point of
Diversion, operational flexibility, interagency cooperation,
EWA implementation, and other cooperative water management
actions......will result in normal years in an increase to CVP
south-of-delta agricultural water service contractors of 15
percent (or greater) of existing contract totals to 65 to 70
percent.''
Fundamentally, the CALFED Framework Agreement and ROD recognized
the disproportionate impacts of the current operating regime on south
of Delta contractors and established operational goals for the CALFED
agencies, the State water project, and the CVP, in particular, to meet.
We are now tasked with implementing these goals, and I believe their
implementation has the potential to be as challenging as the
development of these goals. The special challenges that we face today
in meeting the needs of the Californians who rely on the CVP in the
delta export service area will be the focus of my comments.
Current Forecast
The Mid-Pacific Region of the Bureau of Reclamation, in its
preliminary analysis determined that in a median precipitation year,
the south-of-delta agricultural contractors should expect only a 45
percent water supply--which is 15-20 percent less than was the target
which was identified in the CALFED ROD for a ``normal'' year.
Concern with the results of this analysis prompted Reclamation to
launch an intensive effort to match deliveries in 2002 with those
targeted in the ROD. Additional staff have been committed to assist the
Central Valley Operations Office in analyzing the preliminary
operations plan and to develop actions which may increase the water
supply south of the Delta. In addition, extensive discussions are
ongoing in California between the Bureau and the other key CALFED
agencies (USFWS, NMFS, DWR and CA Fish and Game).
Reclamation has assessed possible actions to address the situation:
<bullet> LActions for which Interior could exercise discretion
<bullet> LState or other entity actions that may facilitate
improved CVP operations (State and CALFED actions)
<bullet> LActions available at significant cost (actions that have
a higher cost associated with them)
Reclamation is looking at all the possible actions, but is
concentrating on those that have the greatest promise for 2002. For
example, Reclamation staff are working with the contractors to better
forecast demands and delivery scheduling and to better forecast storage
in San Luis Reservoir at the low point.
Reclamation has also been meeting with the San Luis and Delta
Mendota Water Authority to investigate installing a temporary intertie
between the Delta Mendota Canal and the State Aqueduct to increase
export capability at the Tracy Pumping Plant to its permitted capacity.
In investigating the intertie, the parties identified and are pursuing
an alternative of raising the lining of a 2,500 foot reach of the Delta
Mendota Canal to recover freeboard and capacity in the canal at a
fraction of the cost of constructing the intertie. Other actions
involving water acquisition, demand source shifting by third parties,
and use of non-project storage that are not being pursued at this time
because of the high cost.
The Department is developing its approach to implementing the
recent ruling of the Federal Court on the Department's responsibilities
under the CVPIA and will adhere to the Court's decision in developing
operational plans for 2002.
When Reclamation can assign certainty to the actions and include
them in the 2002 operations plan, the resulting water supply
improvements will be reflected in the CVP allocations. Although much
more work remains to be done, even if we are successful in implementing
all of the actions identified above, the best it appears we will be
able to do is achieve water delivery increases 10 or 15 percent more
south of the Delta. We are not satisfied with the current situation in
the CVP. We know the customers are frustrated with the shortages and
uncertainty over how the project will be operated. We are hopeful that
the measures taken to improve the ecosystem ($390 million CVPIA and
CALFED restoration funds spent to date) and the significant redirection
of water to improve fish and wildlife will in fact work. Although, the
results we are all looking for may take years if not decades to attain.
Tomorrow, February 15, 2002, Reclamation will announce the initial
allocations of CVP water supply to its contractors for the 2002
contract year. I understand that CVP contractors north of the Delta
will receive a full supply and that CVP contractors south of the Delta
will experience shortages due to legal and technical restrictions on
the operation of the export pumps. This problem must be solved. And it
must be done in a cooperative effort by all Federal and State agencies
involved in the CALFED Program as well as through working with the
contractors and other stakeholders whose cooperation was so
instrumental in getting agreement on the ROD and other progress to
date. Interior will continue to work through the CALFED process to
increase the system's water management flexibility while we work to
improve the environment. We will also pursue actions on our own and
with our contractors, to the extent practicable, to achieve CALFED
goals.
Next Steps: Operations Decisions
Mr. Chairman, the situation we face today is nearly identical to
that which we have faced in every mid-February for the past five or
more years. However, in most years, it was mother nature that provided
the solution in the form of wet conditions. That may or may not happen
this year. We recognize that waiting for adequate rainfall is not an
acceptable management approach.
Therefore, Mary Nichols, the California Secretary of Resources and
I will be convening a multi-day meeting of the CALFED leadership to
complete the operating plan for 2002 by mid March. We intend to resolve
issues, make decisions and move this process forward. We will keep this
committee informed of our progress.
In my few months on the job, I have encountered a number of
inconsistent or conflicting views on what this language means. Some of
the views I have heard include:
<bullet> L``The Federal Government made a commitment to reach the
65-70 percent delivery levels.''
<bullet> L``There is no way these levels can be met because the
objective was based on modeling and real world conditions are not
conducive to optimized models.''
<bullet> L``The modeling assumed the aggressive exercise of
discretion to reach the delivery levels.''
<bullet> L``Supply objectives can not be realized without
significant changes to the CALFED environmental baseline, particularly
changes in how the 800,000 acre feet of CVPIA (B2) water for the
environment are managed.''
<bullet> L``If changes are made in the CALFED environmental
baseline, reconsultation will be required on the Biological Opinions.''
<bullet> L``We were told the supply objective could be met without
altering the B2 accounting methodology.''
<bullet> L``Interior must use its administrative discretion to meet
the ROD objective.''
Based on what I have heard and read to date, here are my
conclusions:
<bullet> LThe Bureau of Reclamation and the CALFED agencies must
strive to meet the south-of-delta supply objectives in the ROD.
<bullet> LIt may not be possible to achieve the supply objectives
south of the Delta with the existing operating restrictions.
<bullet> LFailure to achieve this goal could have widespread
adverse consequences on the future of the CALFED Program.
<bullet> LThe long term certainty that communities and customers
had hoped for has yet to be realized and short term water supply needs
have not been fully satisfied. Simply put, there is no certainty that
either the reliability or productivity of the water infrastructure has
increased.
<bullet> LWhen both reservoir storage and snowpack levels are above
average, and the initial forecast projects a 55% shortage for more than
1 million acres of farmland, the commonly heard refrain that
California's water system is broken appears accurate.
Mr. Chairman, the challenges that confront us in the immediate
issue of 2002 project operations are similar in nature to the broader
set of issues we face as we evolve the CALFED program from one of
planning to one of implementation. We have the Implementation
Memorandum of Understanding in place that will guide our actions. By
working together, we are putting work programs into action that I
believe will lead to the realization of the long term benefits and
expectations of the CALFED program.
Long-Range Planning
Mr. Chairman, we continue to believe the long-term answers to the
challenges of adequate water supplies and effective environmental
improvement can best be found through the CALFED Program. Everyone's
interest is served by the success of CALFED. At the same time, we
realize that a significant amount of work, work that is fully
compatible with CALFED, needs to be accomplished. The most significant
opportunities for yield increases are associated with storage and
conveyance projects identified in the CALFED ROD.
On a parallel track to identifying and implementing tools to
improve 2002 allocations, Reclamation is also supplementing the
analysis in the CVP Least-Cost Yield Increase Plan which focuses on
opportunities to increase the yield of the CVP that was dedicated to
fish and wildlife purposes under the CVPIA. Reclamation is also working
directly with CVP south-of-Delta contractors on an Integrated Resources
Plan, which looks at locally implementable water supply and
conservation projects, socio-economic analyses associated with water
supply, and the impacts of proposed water supply projects on drainage
in the region. Finally, we are reinitiating our work to consider the
possibility of a large scale land retirement program that could yield
water supply, reliability and improved water quality along with
environmental benefits throughout the San Joaquin Valley.
That concludes my testimony. I would be pleased to answer any
questions you may have.
______
Mr. Calvert. I appreciate your testimony.
Next, Mr. Steve Macaulay, Chief Deputy Director, California
Department of Water Resources. Sir, you are recognized for your
opening statement.
STATEMENT OF STEVE MACAULAY, CHIEF DEPUTY DIRECTOR, DEPARTMENT
OF WATER RESOURCES, STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Mr. Macaulay. Thank you very much. I appreciate the
opportunity to be here today on behalf of California Resources
Secretary Mary Nichols and my director, Tom Hannigan. I
provided copies of my more detailed testimony, which also
addresses State water project water allocations for the current
year. I ask that you accept my written testimony, which I will
quickly summarize.
The Subcommittee has invited testimony on the two points
that the Chair has indicated. These are topics that are being
addressed both by the CALFED Bay-Delta Program and the
Department of Water Resources. I wanted to make a clear
statement that Governor Davis stands strongly for a successful
CALFED implementation in all of its components.
On the first issue, the Department of Water Resources
updates the California Water Plan every 5 years. This is a road
map about how to address future water needs. We are on track to
produce the next update next year. We have undertaken a
fundamentally new approach to updating the California Water
Plan which is indicated in an attachment to my written
testimony. The update is being prepared with an unprecedented
level of input from stakeholders.
Meeting future water needs, and in fact meeting present
water needs in dry years, requires a full range of efforts.
While CALFED programs are at the center of much of what is
being done in California to meet water needs, other activities
are underway as well.
Certainly there has been a great deal of focus by members
of the Committee on the Colorado River Water Use Plan, which
requires California to reduce its water use, historical water
use, by some 800,000 acre-feet of water, and we are clearly
aware that the interim surplus criteria are directly linked to
implementation of the plan. The components certainly include
transfer of conserved ag water and lining of canals, and to
that end, California voters have provided $235 million to help
in that effort, as well as development of Metropolitan's
Hayfield groundwater storage project.
Another aspect of meeting future demands is regional
leadership in project development. We no longer have quite the
top-down system we had back in the '50's and '60's. Local and
regional water agencies are working aggressively to diversify
their water supplies and use them far more efficiently. This is
a clear long-term trend, and I would like to mention a couple
of examples.
First, and you will hear this from Tim Quinn and others,
Metropolitan Water District's Diamond Valley Reservoir and
Inland Feeder projects, multiple billions of dollar
investments; and local pursuit of reclaimed water, much more
aggressive conservation. Much of this is being funded,
certainly the latter, the smaller projects, are being funded by
money provided by California voters in the passage of both
Proposition 204 and Proposition 13.
The Subcommittee's second issue deals with the CALFED ROD
water supply reliability. To that end, our actions include
Joint Point of Diversion, which I will touch on; the south
delta improvements program; temporary barriers program; and a
range of other actions on which we are working with the bureau,
which is detailed in Interior Assistant Secretary Bennett
Raley's written testimony.
I will also address four related issues: the CALFED Science
Program; the Environmental Water Account; certainly passage of
Federal legislation to authorize CALFED; and responses to court
decisions in a manner consistent with the CALFED program.
On Joint Point, I think most of the Committee members are
aware that this is essentially the use of State Water Project
pumping and conveyance facilities to help out the CVP and other
water users. We have significant actions underway to implement
Joint Point this year which are detailed in my written
testimony. And again, that is something that has to be approved
by a regulatory agency, in California the Water Resources
Control Board. The written testimony again includes specific
actions we are taking.
One point I wanted to make, and that is that we have used
Joint Point for more than the last 20 years to help out the
CVP. Over the last 20 years we have pumped some 5 million acre-
feet for the Federal water project. This amounts to annual
average pumping of about a quarter of a million acre-feet, with
a high ranging as high as a half a million acre-feet a year for
the CVP, and we certainly intend to continue and expand this as
our pumping abilities expand over time.
More permanent South Delta water management facilities
include facilities in the channels in the Delta, as well as an
increased fish screening capability and investment in a great
deal of permanent infrastructure, including some South Delta
specific ecosystem restoration components. Part of what we are
doing in the near term is constructing those barriers on an
interim basis to protect south delta farmers, while allowing us
to pump additional water for the CVP and the Environmental
Water Account, and water users who need a dry-year supply when
we implement a drought water bank or something similar.
On the CALFED Science Program there are three points I
would like to make. First, we are making huge investments in
ecosystem restoration, new fish screen technology, and
operational changes.
The second point is, the science needs to address what is
needed to help endangered species populations and get away from
the historical principal focus on so-called take limits at the
export pumps.
And third is what we need more of, and I think CALFED has
already gotten us underway, is science in action, science
oriented toward the management actions that need to be taken
nearly immediately, in real time, to more efficiently use the
operation of our existing facilities.
I have written comments on the Environmental Water Account
which I will not summarize. I certainly wanted to thank the
Chairman and Senator Feinstein for the leadership they continue
to show in moving forward with CALFED authorizing legislation.
I wanted to make a quick comment about response to court
decisions. This doesn't have to be a zero sum game. We
recognize that Judge Wanger's decision last week moves us a
long way forward toward the 65 to 70 percent goal, and the
judge's decisions, very clear decisions on reset and offset,
and the prior decision on the 450 cap.
That could spawn another fight. Again, we would like to
view this as not a zero sum game. We need to use CALFED's--it
is a trite term, but it has relevance here, and that is
adaptive management. We don't want to have this successful
conclusion to this fight spawn another fight over ESA
assurances, for example, for water project operations in 2002.
This is something we are pledged to work with Secretary Nichols
and Assistant Secretary Bennett Raley on over the next month.
So with that, I will conclude my testimony and be available
for questions. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Macaulay follows:]
Statement of Steve Macaulay, Chief Deputy Director, California
Department of Water Resources
The Subcommittee has invited testimony on two related points:
meeting California's urban, agricultural, and environmental water needs
in the 21st Century, and the administrative, operational, and
legislative changes that would help meet the goals of water supply and
reliability set forth in the CALFED Record of Decision. These are
topics that are being addressed by the CALFED Program and the
Department of Water Resources. Governor Davis stands strongly for a
successful CALFED implementation in all its components.
Issue 1: Given that present and future demands of urban,
agricultural, and environmental needs exceed the capacity of the
project, where do we find solutions to reliably meet these needs in the
21st Century?
The first issue identified by the Subcommittee mentions limitations
of ``the project.'' My responses address the issue in the context of
the entire State, with of course significant implications to the future
of the Federal Central Valley Project (CVP) and the California State
Water Project (SWP).
The Department of Water Resources (DWR) has the statutory
requirement to update the California Water Plan every five years. Our
last update was in 1998, and we are on track to produce the next update
in 2003. DWR has embarked on a fundamentally new approach, scope, and
process for preparing the California Water Plan Update 2003 (Bulletin
160-03). The update will be California's plan to meet the State's
future water needs, a useful reference for water planners and decision-
makers, and a living document that integrates statewide and local
planning initiatives. The update is being prepared with an
unprecedented level of input from stakeholders. Attached to our
testimony is a short status report on this effort.
As indicated in CALFED Executive Director Patrick Wright's
testimony, meeting future water needs--and in fact meeting present
water needs in dry years--will require a wide range of efforts in
addition to developing new water supplies. While CALFED programs are at
the center of much being done in California to meet future needs, other
activities are underway as well. One of these addresses Colorado River
issues. California's draft Colorado River Water Use Plan is intended to
demonstrate how California will reduce its use of river water over time
to the State's basic apportionment, in response to the increased
reliance upon the Colorado by its neighboring Lower Basin states. The
availability of water formerly unused by Nevada and Arizona, as well as
hydrologic surplus conditions, has historically allowed California to
use some 800 thousand acre-feet annually in excess of its basic
apportionment.
The U. S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBR) Interim Surplus Criteria for
river operation are designed to reduce the risk of shortages to
California's urban water users while initial elements of the draft Plan
are being implemented. These elements include transfers of conserved
agricultural water to urban areas (such as the existing transfer
between the Imperial Irrigation District and the Metropolitan Water
District of Southern California, and the proposed IID-San Diego
transfer), canal lining programs to conserve water now lost to seepage,
and groundwater storage programs. The State of California has executed
agreements providing $235 million in financial assistance to local
water users for lining the remaining unlined portions of the Coachella
and All American Canal, and for MWD's Hayfield groundwater storage
project.
In addition there are initiatives being undertaken at the local
level to develop more regional self-sufficiency and more local control.
For example, MWD has developed the multi-billion dollar Diamond Valley
Reservoir and Inland Feeder projects which allow them to much more
efficiently use their water supplies from both the Delta and the
Colorado River. We and local agencies are also aggressively pursuing
water conservation and reclamation to use existing water supplies much
more efficiently. The funding, leadership and public focus provided
through the CALFED Bay-Delta Program has greatly advanced efforts in
the area of water use efficiency. California voters have provided very
strong monetary support.
Issue 2: In your opinion what administrative or operational
changes, consistent with existing law, or legislative changes can be
made to meet the goals of water supply and reliability set forth in the
CALFED Record of Decision?
There are many elements of the CALFED long-term plan that will
increase water supply reliability, including new or expanded water
storage and a strong water use efficiency program. There are also near-
term actions related to facilities and operations that the State of
California is taking to improve water supply reliability, including
benefits for the Central Valley Project. I will describe these
operational tools as well as some longer-term actions that are not
directly related to water project operations, but which are essential
to maintaining and improving water supply reliability in California.
Some of the near-term actions relate to an arrangement between the
State Water Project and the Central Valley Project called ``Joint Point
of Diversion'' (JPOD, or ``Joint Point''). Under California water
rights law, each water project is permitted to draw water from the
Delta at its own pumping facility. There are times when it is
advantageous for one project to draw water from the Delta using the
pumping plant of the other project. This is physically possible because
the projects' distribution systems are joined ``downstream'' from the
two pumping plants. In fact, we share the capacity of the San Luis
Reservoir south of the Delta, where Delta water is pumped into storage
for later delivery to water users in the San Joaquin Valley and
southern California. Joint Point is an institutional arrangement,
permitted by the California State Water Resources Control Board, that
allows the projects to use the two separate pumping plants as if they
were jointly-held facilities. However, this arrangement comes with
conditions requiring that actions be taken to prevent the use of Joint
Point from incrementally affecting the water supply capabilities of
water users in the south Delta or fish and wildlife. We have developed
the response plans for the use of Joint Point. Once these plans have
been approved by the SWRCB, the use of Joint Point for this year will
be in place.
In theory, either project may pump water for the other. In
practice, it is the State Water Project that more often pumps water for
the Central Valley Project since our project has greater pumping and
conveyance capacity than the CVP. The two projects have used Joint
Point for many years to increase water deliveries for CVP customers and
to facilitate other water transfers across the Delta. Over the past 20
years, the SWP has pumped more than 4.9 million acre-feet for the CVP.
This is water that would otherwise not have been available to CVP
contractors and other users south of the Delta. During this 20-year
period, annual pumping at SWP facilities for the CVP has averaged
nearly 250 thousand acre-feet, and ranged up to a high of 499 thousand
acre-feet.
NEAR-TERM ACTIONS RELATED TO FACILITIES AND OPERATIONS
Clearly, use of Joint Point is very beneficial to the CVP. The
benefits are likely to increase over time, because the SWP is working
on projects in the Delta that will provide increasing water supply
benefits throughout the first stage of CALFED implementation by
increasing our pumping capabilities. These include the South Delta
Improvements Program and the Temporary Barriers Program.
The South Delta Improvements Program
The South Delta Improvements Program (SDIP) proposes 1) facilities
in the channels of the south Delta to improve local farmers' ability to
divert water, and 2) improvements to the State Water Project which will
increase the reliability and quantity of water supply pumped from the
Delta. It is the first CALFED project implemented to increase water
supply exported from the Delta.
The first action under the SDIP will be taken next year and will
increase the Delta export limit of the SWP to 8500 cfs, an increase of
almost 30% at some times of the year. The SWP will not be the only
beneficiary of this action. There will be increased opportunity for the
CVP and CALFED's Environmental Water Account (EWA) to use the SWP
facilities either to transfer water from upstream storage or capture
excess water in the system. Preliminary studies of the potential water
supply benefit indicate the CVP will receive an annual average benefit
of 35,000 acre-feet. This is about 20% of the total preliminary benefit
estimate. The opportunity for private parties to transfer water across
the Delta will also increase. Finally, increasing the export limit
improves the ability to protect fish by providing more opportunities to
recover pumping reductions conducted for fish protection. Of course
this is in addition to the additional fish protective measures that
will be developed as part of our work in the Delta.
The next step of the SDIP to increase Delta water supply is to
raise the export limit to the maximum amount the SWP can convey: 10,300
cubic feet per second. This will match our pumping capabilities with
the capacity of the California Aqueduct. This increase would begin as
new, screened export facilities become operational, possibly as early
as 2006. Once again, the CVP will benefit from the increase due to the
improved opportunity to transfer water from upstream storage or capture
excess water in the system. Opportunities for the EWA (or an equivalent
type of account), flexing operations to protect fish, and private-party
water transfers are also expected to increase.
The Temporary Barriers Program
The SWP has and continues to help the CVP delivery reliability by
improving conditions for local diverters in the south Delta. SWP and
CVP exports contribute to low water levels in south Delta channels,
reducing or preventing agricultural diversions from the channels. Due
to the restricted ability of the CVP to adjust the export rate at its
pumping plant, the CVP has a much greater impact upon water levels than
the SWP.
Low water levels can prevent the use of Joint Point. DWR is the
principal agency taking action to improve these conditions. The actions
include extensive dredging of channels surrounding the CVP export
facility in the south Delta to improve recreational navigation
completed in 2000 and site specific improvements to local diversions
taken in 2001 at a total cost of $3.7 million. DWR has committed
$400,000 per year to continue site-specific diversion improvements. The
USBR has no such program, although they provided land for dredge
disposal last year.
Water Allocations for 2002
As water managers, we strive to meet our customers' needs every
year, but weather and hydrology do not always allow us to deliver the
full amount that our customers request. The last water year was a
challenging one for the SWP. Due to water storage conditions, SWP
percentage allocations last year were even less than the CVP.
For water year 2002, the initial allocations we made in December
2001 were significantly lower than the past few years, primarily due to
preceding dry conditions. Runoff in 2001 was significantly below normal
for the first time in the past seven years. Last month we were able to
increase the SWP allocations from 20% to 45% due to the above average
rain and snow during December. Since then, we have had dry conditions.
Our ability to deliver any more than 45% to our contractors this year
will depend largely on the weather in the next two months.
As water managers, we realize that our ability to meet our
customers' needs is based partly on our water supply infrastructure,
partly on our ability to operate our facilities in creative and
collaborative ways, and partly on what nature gives us.
Additional Actions
CALFED provides a forum for State and Federal agencies to work
together collaboratively to find ways to meet our various objectives.
We are working with the USBR to identify and implement actions that
will help meet water supply goals in the ROD, consistent with other
aspects of the CALFED program.
LONGER-TERM ACTIONS ESSENTIAL TO WATER SUPPLY RELIABILITY
Finally, I would like to describe a few elements of the CALFED
program that are not part of the bricks-and-mortar water supply
infrastructure, but are nevertheless essential to improved water supply
reliability in California. These are CALFED elements that will improve
our ability to operate our facilities in creative and collaborative
ways. They include:
<bullet> Lthe CALFED Science Program which will allow us to learn
more about the system and rapidly apply what we learn,
<bullet> Lthe Environmental Water Account that is identified in the
ROD as an essential component of meeting the water supply goals
expressed in that document,
<bullet> Lpassage of Federal authorizing legislation and secure
funding for the CALFED program, and
<bullet> Lresponse to court decisions in a manner consistent with
the CALFED program and its approach.
I will address each separately.
The CALFED Science Program
The CALFED Science Program is integrating objective science and
unbiased peer review into every aspect of the CALFED program,
developing the best scientific information possible to guide decisions
and evaluate actions. DWR is committed to rapidly integrate into real-
time operations the better science we are getting through CALFED. At a
basic level, this means conducting exhaustive real-time monitoring of
Delta channels for fish species of concern, particularly during the
spring months when the potential for conflict between water operations
and fish protection is the greatest. When fish will be harmed by our
operations, we can use some of the new tools that CALFED provides, such
as the Environmental Water Account, to protect fish and water users.
Water supply reliability in the Delta is directly linked to our
knowledge of endangered species population dynamics. The so-called
``take limits'' are based in some cases on generalized understandings
or theories on how fish losses at the export pumps affect species
populations. The SWP and CVP are doing their part to develop the best
possible screens and fish handling facilities. There is a Federal test
facility under development at Tracy and plans to apply the knowledge we
gain from that facility to the design and construction of screens that
are subsequently installed as part of the South Delta Improvements
Program. With better fish screens also needs to come refinement in our
understanding of the effect that our facilities have on Delta fish
species at the population level. The bottom line is we all need to work
together to achieve the CALFED goal of recovery of at-risk species
dependent on the Delta, and we need to have better ways of prioritizing
actions and measuring success.
The Environmental Water Account
The Environmental Water Account is included in the CALFED ROD as a
four-year experiment. We need to continually ask ourselves how well the
EWA is doing its job, so that at the end of four years we can make an
informed science-based decision on whether the EWA should be a long-
term part of the CALFED Program. To help assess the success of the EWA,
CALFED has pledged to convene an independent science panel each year
during the four-year experiment. The panel has reviewed the first year
of EWA operations and offered positive findings and constructive
suggestions for improvement.
The CALFED ROD correctly observed that there would be almost no
``bricks and mortar'' improvements in our water supply infrastructure
during the first few years of the program, so implementation of the EWA
is essential to improve water supply. To that end, California has
provided over $87 million for the first two years of EWA operation,
about 80% of the total EWA funding.
Under the CALFED ROD the combined actions taken under Central
Valley Project Improvement Act (CVPIA) Section 3406 (b)(2) and the EWA
together secure commitments from the State and Federal fishery
agencies. These commitments are that additional measures to protect
fish at the expense of the water supplies of both the CVP and SWP will
not be taken under the State or Federal endangered species acts unless
truly unforeseeable events occur. (A third tier of protection involving
actions needed to prevent immediate jeopardy to the continued existence
the species could be invoked in such circumstances.) Neither b2 nor EWA
alone is sufficient to secure the CALFED ROD commitments to water
supply reliability of the CVP and SWP. Without EWA the water supplies
of both the CVP and SWP will be affected. The EWA deserves strong
support from the Congress, since it ties directly to the water supply
reliability focus of this oversight hearing.
Authorizing Legislation and Secure Funding
During CALFED's planning stage it was possible for the program to
function effectively as an informal, cooperative interagency effort. As
we begin to implement the long-term plan, various State or Federal
agencies have taken the lead on various CALFED programs and projects.
As we do so, we run the risk of narrowing our focus too much on
specific actions or objectives of the CALFED Program. I remember
history very well, and we do not want to repeat it: CALFED exists
because State and Federal agencies all wore institutional blinders back
in the early 1990's, and that single-focus mentality caused us all to
fail in meeting our objectives.
That is why we need CALFED as a permanent entity to draw us
together and balance the range of objectives that we individually
strive to achieve. In order to play that role, and keep us on the road
to success, CALFED needs to be a real entity with a secure funding
stream. These are areas where Congressional action is essential.
Responding to Court Decisions
As always, the courts play a role in water issues. The Federal
District Court in Fresno has played a role the past few years regarding
litigation over implementation of Section 3406(b)(2) of the CVPIA. On
February 5 Judge Wanger ruled on several issues which will have
significant implications on CVP water operations beginning this year,
likely firming up water supply reliability which has been a major issue
confronted by the Subcommittee.
Arguments in court, as we understand them, pit water supply
reliability against fish protection. This does not have to be a ``zero
sum game'' as some will represent. To provide both water supply
reliability and fisheries protection, it will be critical to employ the
``adaptive management'' tool in the CALFED arsenal. While the issue is
not yet settled, a first challenge will be how to deal with Endangered
Species Act ``assurances'' for water project operations during 2002.
Whenever there is court ruling that affects our ability to meet
water needs, or there is a dry year, or a conflict between water
delivery and fish protection, we will be at a crossroads where our
previous approaches may no longer serve us well. At these times we need
to adapt our actions in ways that allow us to meet all the CALFED
objectives. Failing in any of the objectives just invites further
litigation by one side or another.
To summarize, California is moving vigorously to expand our ability
to use Joint Point to benefit the CVP, the Environmental Water Account
as well as overall water transfers. Our efforts include short-term
actions that maintain our ability to use Joint Point, and improvements
that would allow us to pump more water using this tool. We must do this
responsibly and in compliance with specific provisions of State law. We
are ready to work collaboratively with our peers at USBR to help
implement other short-term actions that will improve water supply
consistent with the CALFED Program. In the longer term, water supply
reliability depends not only on new facilities and improved efficiency,
but on the application of sound science to the process, new tools such
as the Environmental Water Account with the assets needed to do its
job, a permanent CALFED entity with secure funding, and an unwavering
commitment to the balanced implementation of the entire CALFED
program--especially in the face of the inevitable litigation.
I would be glad to answer questions from the Subcommittee.
______
[An attachment to Mr. Macaulay's statement follows:]
California Water Plan--Update 2003
2001 Status Report
(submitted to the house subcommittee on water and power, february 2002)
The Department of Water Resources (DWR) is updating the California
Water Plan for release in 2003. Our goal is for Update 2003 to meet
Water Code requirements, receive broad support among those
participating in California's water planning, and be a useful document
for the public, water planners throughout the state, legislators and
other decision-makers. The goal and new approach are articulated in the
California Water Code.
DWR has fundamentally reformulated and expanded the process and
content of Update 2003 in response to new requirements of State law,
and significant public comment. We are developing Update 2003 using an
open and collaborative process with a 65-member public Advisory
Committee, a 260-person Extended Review Forum, and an outside
facilitation team.
During the preparation of Update 2003, DWR will fairly evaluate a
reasonable range of options advanced by the Advisory Committee. And
while we don't know now what will ultimately emerge from this
collaboration, we are hopeful that the committee will reach significant
consensus that we can reflect in Update 2003. In addition, by viewing
the Water Plan Update as an ongoing strategic planning process, DWR and
stakeholders can continue working on ideas and options that cannot be
sufficiently explored in Update 2003 because of resource and time
limitations.
Since January 2001, we have worked with the Advisory Committee to
shape the new framework and strategic planning process for this update
of the Water Plan. As a result of nine full-day meetings and over two-
dozen work group meetings, Advisory Committee members have concurred on
the following key features of Update 2003:
<bullet> LCreate detailed state and regional ``water portfolios''
to more comprehensively describe water supplies, water uses, and water
management decisions, while identifying underutilized opportunities and
unmet challenges for all beneficial uses;
<bullet> LDescribe current conditions of water supply, use and
management with actual data and detailed narratives for three recent
years having varying amounts of precipitation, namely 1998 (wet), 2000
(above normal), and 2001 (dry). In past updates we had used averaged
and ``normalized'' data to represent a typical average and a typical
dry year;
<bullet> LIdentify multiple ranges for key factors affecting water
supply and use, as well as for water management options, that can be
combined in different ways as ``building blocks'' to produce different
versions of the state's water future or ``Study Plans'';
<bullet> LAssemble multiple ``Study Plans'' to consider alternative
futures and a variety of management options for the state and its
individual regions;
<bullet> LConsider, as project resources and time permit, multiple
hydrologies and planning horizons when forecasting alternative futures,
such as 2010, 2020, 2030, and 2050;
In addition, the Advisory Committee has identified global climate
change as one of the factors we should consider in Update 2003. The
California Water Plan will include a comprehensive discussion on the
potential impacts and implications of global climate change on
California's water system infrastructure and future water supply,
quality, and management, including short and long term recommendations.
The key features listed above are the outcome of our work with the
Advisory Committee. DWR encourages additional review and suggestions.
Early in 2002, we will hold several workshops across the State to
receive comments from the Extended Review Forum and other members of
the public on these draft assumptions and estimates. In addition, we
will continue to work with the Advisory Committee to refine the
assumptions and estimates. DWR will maintain and update the Assumptions
& Estimates website (www.waterplan.water.ca.gov/AandE/) as a ``living
document'' throughout the preparation of Update 2003. The information
on this website will ultimately become the Water Plan's technical
reference guide.
DWR and the Advisory Committee are just beginning to address
several other key elements of Update 2003. These include: (1)
addressing how regional water management efforts for improving water
supplies and minimizing imports from other regions will be incorporated
into Update 2003 pursuant to Senate Bill 672 (Machado), (2) developing
goals and management options (``where we want to be''), (3) discussing
how to select, evaluate, and compare Study Plans (using modeling tools
and evaluation criteria), and (4) identifying indicators and ongoing
efforts to monitor and track progress toward implementing the
recommendations of Update 2003. As these elements are better defined
with the input of the Advisory Committee, we will periodically update
the Assumptions & Estimates website.
______
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman for his testimony.
Mr. Raley, I am going to ask a series of questions, some of
which you have already addressed in your testimony, but just to
reassure the record for various reasons.
What is your evaluation of the Federal court actions
relative to the 800,000 acre-feet litigation?
Mr. Raley. Mr. Chairman, certainly it is relevant. We have
asked attorneys and staff for the primary agencies to provide a
report to us on exactly what the legal ramifications of that
decision are with respect to CALFED in general and the '02
operations plan in particular. We are also coordinating with
the State of California to make sure that we understand what it
believes the implications of those decisions are on the
parallel California laws that the project operates under. I
have asked for a report on that as quickly as possible, and
know that it is essential that we all have some answers so that
we can figure out how we are going to proceed with the
operating plan for 2002.
Mr. Calvert. So you would believe, based upon hopefully the
examination of that record and that court decision, that (b)(2)
policy by the previous administration is in need of revision?
Mr. Raley. I believe that it is accurate to say that the
court found that at least three aspects of the (b)(2)
accounting, as defined in the August '99 definition, are not
within the authority of the Secretary, and so as a consequence
there has to be some consideration of that reality. We can no
longer operate under those assumptions.
Mr. Calvert. Do you believe that if there is normal
rainfall for the remainder of the water year, that the CVP will
be able to deliver 65 to 70 percent called for in the Record of
Decision to south-of-the-delta water users?
Mr. Raley. Mr. Chairman, I am disappointed to say that I
have not been yet provided with a basis to conclude that in a
normal year the delivery south of the delta will be in the 65
to 70 percent range.
Mr. Calvert. The environmental baseline built in in the
Record of Decision may have to be reevaluated, as you
mentioned. In the light of Judge Wanger's recent decision, will
that require reconsultation with the biological opinions?
Mr. Raley. That is the very question that we have asked the
responsible agencies to provide us with their position on.
Mr. Calvert. Where has the department identified
opportunities for more flexible operation of the CVP so that
water supplies can be increased and made more reliable, while
still providing appropriate ecological protection and
improvement?
And more specific, with the Klamath biological as a model,
will the department draft new and revised biological
assessments to reflect these opportunities and reinitiate
consultation with Fish and Wildlife Service and other
appropriate agencies?
Mr. Raley. If I may take your, what I perceive to be the
second part of your question first, with regard to the role of
science and the implication of the NAS study in the Klamath
Basin, going back to the Secretary's first statements on these
issues in general and her testimony before Congress last summer
on CVP and CALFED, she has been and remains committed to full
utilization of science in the process.
In the context of CALFED, it is a different situation than
existed in the Klamath Basin. CALFED has a Science Committee.
There has been a greater attempt to have a more disciplined
approach to studies, to integration of science in the
decisionmaking process, as a result of having that structure.
I have also suggested at the December CALFED meeting that
it seemed appropriate, given everyone's commitment to science,
that there be three components of that question that are
considered in the future, the first component being, I have
heard repeatedly that certain assumptions underlying CALFED,
scientific assumptions, are ``off the table'' and not subject
to being considered. I am certain that those statements were
not made by scientists because the very nature of science is
the need to continually reassess the validity of prior
assumptions, and that is also the nature of adaptive
management.
So I am hopeful that CALFED will move forward, and we have
some preliminary thoughts on how to do that, with an
examination of those assumptions to make sure that they are
still supported. And then the second part is to make adaptive
management work, so that as we continually learn, we get
better, smarter. And then finally we need to find a way to
embed that science process into the entire CALFED fabric in a
way that it is not a ministerial or a routine act satisfied by
checking some boxes. it needs to be an active engagement in a
structured way.
We have not made a decision with respect to a request for a
formal National Academy of Sciences review. That has been one
of the options, but we have not made a decision on that.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mr. Dooley?
Mr. Dooley. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I thank both of you for your testimony and also for what I
know is your very sincere efforts to try to find a way that we
can provide greater certainty in water deliveries as well as
maintaining our commitment to providing for environmental
enhancements.
I just want to clarify, Mr. Raley. Did you say that the
department is going to be reconsidering the allocations of
water in the 2002 year in a manner that is consistent with
Judge Wanger's recent rulings?
Mr. Raley. The department will respect and implement the
judge's ruling with respect to (b)(2) accounting. However, I
need to point out that that legal proceeding is not completed
and there are various alternative paths that we don't have
control over, that may affect how the department complies with
the court's order.
Mr. Dooley. I am not quite sure. Are you alluding to the
fact that there might be an appeal filed, or I am not quite
sure what--
Mr. Raley. There may be an appeal. There may be a request
for stay. Those options are there as a matter of law, and we
just want to recognize that there are potentially yet
additional chapters to be played out in the decision regarding
(b)(2).
Mr. Dooley. But today we have a court ruling that, you
know, has some pretty clear decisions that are embodied in it.
Has there been a directive to the bureau to comply with those
rulings?
Mr. Raley. There has, yes, orally.
Mr. Dooley. OK. Thank you. There has been a lot of
attention given in terms of the legislation that Mr. Calvert
and I and others have introduced, and we passed through the
Interior Committee, on how we can best assure that we will be
able to see to the greatest extent practical compliance with
what was provided in the Record of Decision, in particular to
contractors south of the delta.
This is an issue that obviously has some controversy,
because there are water users that are concerned about this
having an adverse impact by our efforts to meet the 65 to 75
percent target. Now, that is something that I recognize and Mr.
Calvert recognized, and we made efforts to try to give the
Secretary the flexibility that they would need to meet these
targets, and also provided direction to the Secretary that in
their efforts to meet these targets, that they would not harm
other water users.
And I don't know if you have had a chance to review the
legislation, but I just want to go over it a little bit with
you, in terms of this would be the discretionary authority, so
it wouldn't be mandatory, where we state the Secretary shall
use the discretion of the Secretary to the maximum extent
practical to accomplish the goal, during a normal water year,
of making available to south-of-the-delta Central Valley
Project agricultural water service contractors at least 70
percent of their water supplies.
Now, would you interpret that language, when we used the
words ``use the discretion...to the maximum extent practical''
as not a mandate or a requirement that you meet this, but a
direction to whatever is practical to hit these targets?
Mr. Raley. Congressman, what I need to do is go back to
Secretary Norton's testimony of last summer, because that is
the only official administration position on legislative
language on the assurances, and that was that the Department
was not comfortable with that form of assurances language. We
look forward to working with you and all concerned to resolve
that issue.
Mr. Dooley. I would just state, you know, that this is not
the same language that Secretary Norton testified. And what I
will then ask is that the department review this new language
that has been in place since we had the markup and give us, you
know, what their current assessment would be, because we are
not talking about the same language obviously at that time,
because at that time the language said ``direct the Secretary''
and this language, I think we would all agree, is much
different.
In terms of the language that deals with trying to hold
other water users or trying to assure that we are holding them
harmless from meeting this target, we say ``shall be
accomplished in a manner consistent with California water
laws,'' to ensure that we are respecting State water rights.
Obviously we would also have to comply with all existing State
and Federal environmental laws, and then we also further go on
to state that it provides that the restoration of water
supplies for south-of-the-delta Central Valley Project
agricultural water service contractors shall be accomplished
without reducing deliveries, increasing the cost of, or
otherwise adversely affecting other water suppliers and water
users that rely on water diverted from watercourses,
tributaries to the delta and in the delta.
With that specific language, is that not clear enough or
provide direction to you that in meeting the 65 to 70 percent
target, that you could not harm any other contractor, or do we
need to have even more language in there that would be
specific?
Mr. Raley. Congressman, let me take both of your requests
back to the department, and we will discuss them further and be
back to you.
Mr. Dooley. OK. Thank you. I have a chart that I would like
to--is it going up? This, you know, this year quite frankly a
lot of the people I represent are very frustrated because of
the initial allocations that only got us to the 45 percent,
which we contend is clearly inconsistent with the Record of
Decision. And to my knowledge these figures are accurate, that
we, our 45 percent gives us the 900,000 acre-feet of our
deliveries.
And this is in a year where the Bureau of Reclamation said
on October 1 we were going to have capacity or water storage in
Shasta of 3.5 million acre-feet on October 1. This is 300,000
acre-feet above the maximum carryover that is allowed for flood
control purposes. So you are going, with your numbers that you
provide us, you are going to have to release 300,000 acre-feet
after the water year in order to even get in compliance with
your flood control mandates.
And what many of us are concerned with is, it appears that
there should have been the ability to have the discretion, if
nothing else, to allocate this 300,000 acre-feet, which would
have provided for another 15 percent of our deliveries to get
us up closer to this 65 to 70 percent. And, furthermore, we
point out that 3.2 million acre-feet is the maximum amount that
you can carry over.
You know, the biological opinion in 1992 on salmon requires
only a minimum carryover of 1.9 million acre-feet, and I have a
hard time understanding why there couldn't have been the
discretion used that we thought was embodied in the Record of
Decision, that could have allowed only 10 percent of that
amount, between the 1.9 and the 3.2, to be provided, which
could have got us to the 65 or 70 percent.
And I guess it is based on this history and, you know,
these examples that doesn't give me a lot of confidence that
unless we have some type of language in here that provides
greater encouragement to the Secretary to exercise their
discretion, in what is an above-average rainfall year, to get
our numbers up to above 45 percent. And, you know, what is your
response to that?
Mr. Raley. Well, first, Congressman, both on behalf of the
department and personally, we are frustrated as well at the
inability so far to meet the dual goals of achieving the
environmental benefits and meeting the targets for water
deliveries. There are a specific, as I am understanding this,
suite of issues. Various parts of them, there are specific
positions or factors that have prevented something that happens
north of the delta from translating into additional deliveries
south of the delta, for example, restrictions on pumping
operations and others.
And the bureau has been aggressively going back through all
of these issues and sitting down with its sister agencies and
the State to relook at prior interpretations and assumptions,
to see if progress can be made on these very sort of issues
that the Congressman is right to be perplexed and frustrated
by.
Mr. Calvert. Mr. Radanovich?
Mr. Radanovich. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good morning,
Mr. Raley. Welcome. Good to see you again, and thank you for
your work on California water, a real simple subject and very
easy to come to agreement on many things.
I just have a couple of questions for you, and need to get
something into the record, if I may. Do you know at this time
what the water supply allocations would be in percentages for
the Friant Water Users Authority, as pertains to Class 1 and
Class 2, and the supply for the Cross Valley Canal? I
understand that may be announced in a couple of days, but do
you know that now?
Mr. Raley. I understand what it is supposed to be by
tomorrow, but as with any Federal decision, there are factors
being considered up to the last minute, and I do not want to
create expectations that are not met, in part because recent
events have caused the bureau to have to go back and reassess
many aspects of CVP operation. I would very much like to be
able to give you those numbers, but I would like to defer until
tomorrow.
Mr. Radanovich. OK. If you can send them to me as soon as
you are able to do so, I would appreciate it.
Mr. Raley. If you would like, Congressman, I will call you.
Mr. Radanovich. Terrific. I appreciate it.
A couple of other questions. When there is the discussion
regarding assurance, especially for the west side farmers, can
you tell me whether or not that you will be able to meet the
assurances that they are requesting without this being, that
requirement being put into law at this time?
Mr. Raley. What I can tell you is, the experience to date
and the information that I have available to me now is that, as
I believe I said earlier, I am disappointed to say that I do
not foresee in a normal year reaching 65 to 70 percent.
Mr. Radanovich. Even with the recent court decision on the
(b)(2) allocation, if that hold up through the appeal process?
Mr. Raley. That is correct.
Mr. Radanovich. That is correct? Are you aware--you know, I
have never hear of an MOA before. I have always heard of MOUs,
memorandums of understanding. I guess what we are hearing about
is a memorandum of acceptance between Westlands and Friant
Water Districts regarding the issues that keep that area in
conflict, a withdrawal of the permit, meeting of land
retirement in Westlands, attaining, you know, the assurance
requirements, those types of things. You are aware that there
is a memorandum of understanding out there right now?
Mr. Raley. Congressman, the department, like Members of
this body, strongly prefer when their constituents work out
their differences between themselves, and I am aware that there
are efforts moving forward to have those discussions. I am not
aware that they are at a level where there is a document that
has been agreed to or finalized.
Mr. Radanovich. OK. To my knowledge, and I have met with
Westlands and the assurance was given to me, and we should
probably have the document today, that there is a memorandum of
I think acknowledgement or acceptance or something that they
are proposing for Friant to sign as a means of resolving the
conflicts between the two water regions.
To my knowledge, and I haven't met with Friant yet, and I
am not sure that Friant is in the room and I know that they are
not on the panel to testify, but if there is such a memorandum
of acceptance, I would like to know, if it is at Friant's
doorstep, whether Friant has considered it yet and, if so, what
is their answer to that memorandum, but also whether or not
they have even received it. And I don't know if there is a way
to ask somebody from Friant. I mean, I am not even sure that
anybody from Friant is here, but I do know that they are not
scheduled to testify, but I would like to get the answer to
that information.
Mr. Calvert. Well, we can certainly keep the record open
and have them put in a written response to that question.
Mr. Radanovich. OK, because I would like to know the answer
to that. My desire is to resolve that conflict before this
legislation gets passed, as you know.
Mr. Raley. Ours, too, Congressman, and so we are very
excited about discussions, and we believe that in some cases
the best thing for the Federal Government to do is stay out of
the way of productive work by the people on the ground.
Mr. Radanovich. If there is an agreement or a possibility
of agreement out there in some type of form or document, I
would request that you become familiar with it, if you don't
mind, and also contact both Friant and Westlands just to see
what their intentions are regarding that.
Mr. Raley. I will anxiously do so, because I hope it will
allow us to move forward on some of the complex issues that you
know better than I, but that I have become familiar with in the
preceding 8 months.
Mr. Radanovich. OK. Thank you. I do have one other
question. It may be premature, but I am wondering if the
administration has a viewpoint established between the two
versions of bills, the one in the House and the one in the
Senate, with regard to their position on water storage.
To my knowledge, the Senate version would set actually a
water project further off into the future by requiring more
studies before there is implementation of the project. This
bill is a little more aggressive in getting those sites
established. And knowing the difference between the two, does
the administration have a viewpoint as to which one that they
would prefer to see at their desk?
Mr. Raley. The administration's position on this issue in
general is limited to that articulated by the Secretary last
summer, but I can also say that we are committed to the
principle of balance, as I alluded to in my opening remarks,
balance amongst the many goals, including storage and
environmental restoration.
Mr. Radanovich. I would request the administration to side
in favor of a bill that is more aggressive in water storage. I
think the administration is going to have to weigh in on this
because California has proven itself, on both electricity and
water, to stick its head in the sand and ignore reality until
we have emergencies. And it is my desire to get a bill that is
very aggressive on getting water storage in as soon as
possible, and I wish--I would like to see the administration
weigh in on that and be an influence in making sure that we end
up with a bill like that.
Mr. Raley. I will take that personally to the Secretary.
Mr. Radanovich. Thank you, sir. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
Ms. Solis?
Ms. Solis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have two questions.
Mr. Raley--what are the implications of the recent (b)(2)
court decision for the State water project and for the urban
Southern California Water Project, and will that in effect
result in some major revisions, if you could elaborate?
Mr. Raley. Congresswoman, I am not trying to evade your
question, but given that your focus is its effect on the State
side of it, I prefer to defer to my colleague from the State of
California, because I can address the efforts we are proceeding
with to address that issue to the Federal agencies, but the
State agencies have a separate role and I don't want to impinge
on their prerogatives. If that is--maybe I misunderstood your
question.
Ms. Solis. That is fine, but I also want to touch on the
fact that you do have a responsibility for implementation in
urban areas, so it isn't just specifically to Southern
California, but can you shed any light on that?
Mr. Raley. Well, I apologize for misunderstanding the
question. We very acutely understand that responsibility, and
that is the very reason that we had a meeting, and with the
responsible agencies, to ensure that they report to us on what
their position is on this critical issue of the impacts, if
any, of the court's (b)(2) decisions on the operations of State
and Federal components of the water supply for the Central
Valley.
Ms. Solis. I want to go back and also ask, for my own
clarification here, if the administration will be appealing the
court ruling and taking steps to uphold the decision.
Mr. Raley. The administration has not made a decision on
any aspect of future legal proceedings or options for the
court's ruling. However, it is my understanding that it is a
final court order and that absent additional steps, we need to
comply with it.
Ms. Solis. And will your department collaborate with the
Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs to ensure that Native
American rights and interests are also protected?
Mr. Raley. We have had specific discussions, I have
personally had discussions with Assistant Secretary McCaleb and
his staff about CALFED in general and specific issues that have
arisen as time has progressed, and we will continue to do so.
Ms. Solis. One of my concerns deals more with the
restoration aspect and how we are still going to continue to
meet the intent of the law and environmental issues and
Endangered Species Act requirements. How we are going to
continue to meet the intent of the law, the 800,000 requirement
that we still have to abide by.
Mr. Raley. My understanding is, and I may not be aware of
something, but Section (b)(2) of CVPIA and the remainder of
CVPIA remain in full force and effect. What the court has done
is concluded that the implementation and the accounting system
for certain aspects of that wasn't within the scope of the law,
but the 800,000 acre-foot component of CVP, I am not aware of
any basis for concluding that that does not remain to be one of
the many legal requirements applicable to the Central Valley
Project.
Ms. Solis. So you will continue to move down that path, see
that we do stay on course and meet the parameters of the law?
Mr. Raley. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Solis. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady.
Mr. Walden?
Mr. Walden. Mr. Chairman, I have no questions for the
witness. I just hope that you resolve the CALFED situation so
that Mr. Raley can solve the Klamath Basin situation.
[Laughter.]
He has been most helpful in that endeavor. Thank you.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mrs. Napolitano?
Mrs. Napolitano. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
There are several questions that I had that have already
been addressed, but one of the major areas of concern is, how
is Judge Wanger's decision going to affect Southern
California's ability to meet the 4.4 plan, which was a
requirement of the Department of the Interior agreement with
the State?
Mr. Raley. Congresswoman, I am not aware that any aspect of
the court's decision will adversely affect the State of
California's ability and need to comply with the deadlines and
components of that suite of agreements, but then the
decisions--
Mrs. Napolitano. I am not speaking of the agreements. I am
speaking of the water supply to Southern California.
Mr. Raley. I am not aware of any negative impacts, but then
we are still studying and trying to understand the implications
of the judge's decision. We are going to follow it. We just,
with something as complex as CVP, it takes some time to
understand how that translates into deliveries and other
operational decisions on the ground.
Mrs. Napolitano. I certainly would want to make sure that
that is not forgotten when you are doing the review and the
translation of what it actually will affect.
Mr. Raley. I can assure you that both issues are at the
forefront of our list of priorities.
Mrs. Napolitano. And then to what extent is the
administration prepared to commit to solving this issue, and
what timeframe do you have in mind?
Mr. Raley. I am sorry, Congresswoman, which issue? The
California 4.4 issue or the--
Mrs. Napolitano. No, no, no. The (b)(2) decision of the
judge.
Mr. Raley. We have engaged multiple agencies that have
responsibility with respect to (b)(2) accounting, and as well
as the entire CALFED ROD, to develop an administration position
on what the implications of that decision are. We have
communicated with the State of California. In fact, the very
evening that I heard about the decision, I talked to
representatives from the State to commit to working through
this with them, and we are just simply going to proceed and not
allow anything to take us from the course of staying with the
concepts of the ROD.
Mrs. Napolitano. That is great, and given the fact that we
are going to be facing time constraints in the State of
California in regards to water, what timeframe do you have in
mind? What can you guesstimate, if you will, even if it is--is
it several months? Is it a year? Is it--
Mr. Raley. Well, there are two operative dates. The first
is, tomorrow the bureau will announce its decision with respect
to allocations, which obviously has implications, some
implications for the State and the State project.
Second, Secretary Nichols and I are working to clear our
calendars and find a time so that we can have a multiday
working session in California to make some decisions and move
on.
Mrs. Napolitano. So, in other words, it is immediate. It is
pending. It will be in a mode of moving forward immediately.
Mr. Raley. Yes, ma'am.
Mrs. Napolitano. OK. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentlelady.
Mr. Macaulay, I have a couple of questions and then we can
move on.
What is the State of California willing to do to help the
Central Valley Project meet its obligations for water supply
south of the delta to CVP water users?
Mr. Macaulay. Mr. Chairman, we are working with the bureau
on a number of ventures. First is the Joint Point of Diversion,
which I detailed in my written and oral testimony, which is
simply getting permission from a regulatory agency in
California for our project to pump water for the Federal
project. We are also moving forward aggressively to help South
Delta farmers continue to divert from South Delta channels, so
that the lower water levels which are caused by the additional
pumping won't hurt them.
The second thing we are doing is certainly supporting the
bureau in a number of separate efforts they are working on,
which are detailed in Mr. Raley's testimony, such as
surcharging San Luis Reservoir this year, an idea the San Luis
and Delta-Mendota Water Authority has come up with to raise the
lining in the Delta-Mendota Canal for about a half a mile, and
a number of other specific issues.
Mr. Calvert. Please explain how the State identified
opportunities for a more flexible operation of the State Water
Project, so that water supplies can be increased and made more
reliable while still providing appropriate ecological
protection and improvement. And do you believe the methods
could have application to the CVP? And maybe follow up on some
of the comments that Mr. Raley made in relation to that.
Mr. Macaulay. Well, I would say two points. Near term, we
are continuing to work on Joint Point. And again, as I
indicated in my testimony, we have pumped more than 5 million
acre-feet for the bureau, averaging a quarter of a million
acre-feet a year. We are going to continue to do that, and as
much as we possibly can beyond that.
Second thing, long term, is we are making large
investments, hundreds of millions of dollars of investments in
new facilities in the southern delta, to be able to more
efficiently use our own pumping plant, which allow us to pump
more water for our customers and to pump more water for bureau
customers.
Congressman Dooley's chart I think really does make the
case for why these South Delta long-term facilities are needed.
That 300,000 acre-feet in Shasta could move south of the Delta
in the fall, later on this year, if we had the capability of
pumping that water through the Delta. That requires better fish
screens, permanent operable barriers to protect South Delta
farmers as a result of the impacts of pumping more water, and
some separate on-the-ground ecosystem restoration measures in
and around the pumping plant.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you.
Mr. Dooley, you have any follow-up questions?
Mr. Dooley. Yes, I do.
Mr. Macaulay, when you--in your oral statement I thought I
understood you to say that you were hoping that we could
initiate some scientific investigation that could aid us in our
operation enhancements. Is that basically what you said,
something of that nature?
Mr. Macaulay. Yes, but if I may add to that, science has
been an underpinning of the CALFED program since its inception,
and perhaps Executive Director Patrick Wright will speak to
that. So it is nothing new. I mean, that aspect of science,
aggressive science, is new to us in California only in the last
year and a half since the ROD. We need stronger support for
that science program, and again, real world science where you
have a better understanding of what makes fish populations
react. It is not just, as we all have heard for many years,
``take at the pumps.''
Mr. Dooley. And that leads to, I guess, my next question,
where you were talking about we could have utilized perhaps
some of that water if we could increase the capacity at the
pumps.
And I guess, Mr. Raley, what I am concerned is, we have--
the most recent 50 percent forecast shows that in June exports
will be reduced to approximately 36,000 acre-feet, and this
rate of exports is nearly 200,000 acre-feet below the
permissible level. And has Interior done an analysis of the
benefit to the fishery resulting from this export reduction? I
mean, it is really on--I mean, if I hear Mr. Macaulay right, we
don't have some of this information that is allowing us to make
some of these decisions as well as we would like.
Mr. Raley. I think I would prefer to characterize it as
that we believe that we may now have better information that
existed at the time those decisions were made, and that is the
reason why I had suggested to CALFED that we consider a review
of those assumptions and an implementation of not only the term
but the practice of adaptive management, so we can make better
decisions and learn from the science we have developed in the
interim. So we are going to be pursuing that effort to make
sure that we are using the right science.
Mr. Dooley. And I guess, you know, and, you know, I have
requested the Secretary request NAS to do a study, similar to
what they did in Klamath, because what we found in Klamath is
that when they had researched and assessed some of the
decisions that were being made there in terms of water
allocation in order to protect fish, they found out that they
weren't based on really sound science.
And that is my concern here, is that if we would increase
the pumping capacity just in June, that would provide another
10 to 15 percent of water allocation south of the delta. And,
again, this, you know, is what some of us think, you know,
where we can get into the discretionary authority.
And I guess one other point I want to make, just to clarify
where the administration's position is on the assurances
language--and you might not be able to answer this point--but I
met recently with some people that were representing a Friant
irrigation district, that said that there were bureau officials
who stated that they could not--or they implemented the
assurances language in the CVP, that Friant would lose water to
Westlands. Is that a department position?
Mr. Raley. It is not.
Mr. Dooley. Thank you. One other issue is, in terms of--on
the Record of Decision, there was a lot of attention given to
the Environmental Water Account and how this could be coupled
with (b)(2) to be used to meet the 65 to 70 percent water
delivery south of the delta. And my question is, is the
Interior--do they anticipate using the EWA account to increase
allocations south of the delta to ag contractors?
Mr. Raley. We want to use all the tools available to reach
the target of 65 to 70, including the Environmental Water
Account and some of the other issues that you pointed out and
others have pointed out to us in the preceding months.
Mr. Dooley. So at this point the bureau has not--I mean,
the bureau does not--does the bureau intend to provide, to
utilize EWA to meet this 65 to 70 percent? I mean, you made an
allocation, you know, just recently that was at 45 percent. I
mean, we have, you know, CALFED participating in an EWA. I
mean, is there--you know, is it not department policy to
provide that, you know, to use some of that water to meet that
65 to 70 percent?
Mr. Raley. From the department's perspective, we want that
Environmental Water Account used most efficiently, but in terms
of it being--this is one of those issues that the department
does not have the final or the only say on the management of
the Environmental Water Account. That is managed through the
structure of CALFED, and so we don't have the ability,
Congressman, to simply say, ``This is how the Environmental
Water Account will be used.'' We have to work with our
partners.
Mr. Dooley. To your knowledge, last year was any EWA used
to get up to, to try to get to the 65 to 70 percent for south-
of-delta ag contractors?
Mr. Raley. There were certainly attempts. I have had
incomplete--just simply they have not had the opportunity to
complete the analysis of the actual benefits to south-of-the-
delta deliveries resulting from the operation of the EWA, and
that is an issue that was brought to my attention several
months ago, and it is one that we are pursuing.
Mr. Dooley. I guess, you know, and this is just a closing
statement, that, you know, I mean, we sat through numerous
hearings on the Record of Decision and how that was going to
provide greater assurances and certainly water deliveries. We
were told that the department is going to have the regulatory
discretion at the 65 to 70 percent. They were promoting the
Environmental Water Account as another tool that was going to
provide water south of the delta.
Now, the record to date is, is that we haven't seen the
discretion to get to the 65 to 70 percent. The record to date
also doesn't demonstrate there has been any EWA water that has
been provided south-of-delta to ag contractors. And so, you
know, it is--you know, this is creating, you know, just an
environment of distrust among a lot of my constituents on
whether or not there is a real commitment, you know, to
implement this Record of Decision in a manner that does, you
know, provide greater certainty to a lot of the folks that I
represent in the San Joaquin Valley.
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
If there are no further questions for this panel, we will
have a list of questions that will be submitted to you, and if
you could answer those in writing, I would like to get to the
second panel in the interests of time.
Mr. Raley. Mr. Chairman, I would be happy to do so, and
will try to do so in a timely fashion.
Mr. Calvert. We thank both of you for your time, and look
forward to working with you in the future.
Next we have our next panel: Mr. Patrick Wright, the
Director of the CALFED Bay-Delta Program; Mr. Dan Nelson, the
Executive Director of the San Luis and Delta-Mendota Water
Authority; Mr. Walter J. Bishop, the General Manager of the
Contra Costa Water District; Mr. Edward R. Osann, consultant
representing the National Resources Defense Council; and Mr.
John Stovall, General Counsel, Kern County Water Agency; and
Timothy Quinn, Vice President, State Water Project Resources,
Metropolitan Water District.
If everybody is situated, we will start off with Mr.
Wright. You can begin your testimony when you are able. Thank
you.
STATEMENT OF PATRICK WRIGHT, DIRECTOR, CALFED BAY-DELTA PROGRAM
Mr. Wright. Thank you, Chairman Calvert, and thank you all
for inviting me to testify here today with my State and Federal
colleagues and stakeholders on the CALFED Bay-Delta Program,
and more specifically on water project operations in
California. I have included in my written testimony a summary
of the Bay-Delta Program's approach to meeting the State's
long-term water needs, and you have heard a great deal of
testimony already from my State and Federal colleagues with
respect to their specific plans on water project operations
this year.
As you know, the CALFED Bay-Delta Program has launched the
largest and most comprehensive water management plan in the
Nation. The framework for California's water future we believe
is a balanced and integrated approach to reducing conflicts
over our limited supplies and to address the State's long-term
water needs.
The key to its success, as you will hear today, is we need
the leadership of the State and Federal agencies. We need
Federal, State and local funds. And, most importantly, we need
to continue to meet the ambitious deadlines and commitments
that are in the plan.
As the plan was being put together, the greatest challenge
in retrospect was not developing the long-term plan, as
contentious as that was. We concluded early on that the key to
meeting the State's long-term water needs was to develop a
diversified set of water sources, as many of the local agencies
in California are doing: everything from surface storage to
ground water storage to recycling to water conservation, every
tool that we have at our disposal.
The biggest challenge was dealing with conflicts over our
existing supplies until those investments begin to pay off. In
each of the 2 years, actually several years before the CALFED
plan was adopted, we had major crises annually over water
project operations: A Delta smelt crisis 1 year, a Delta Cross
Channel crisis with salmon the next year. We simply do not have
the flexibility in our current system to meet all the competing
needs.
And so, again, we are confident that in the long term we
can meet those needs, but we recognize increasingly that if we
can't meet the immediate commitments in the plan, we are not
going to have the credibility of the stakeholders and the
Congress and the legislature to develop those long-term
solutions.
So the CALFED plan included several short-term commitments
to try to deal with that problem, first by investing heavily in
infrastructure improvements. We invested, in each of the last 2
years, over $300 million for water quality, water supply
projects. We developed a drought contingency plan and
facilitated the transfer of over 300,000 acre-feet last year to
areas in need. We developed an innovative Environmental Water
Account that for the first time ever provided assurances to all
south-of-delta water users that their supplies would not be
further reduced because of Endangered Species Act requirements.
And, finally, and what I hope will be most important is, by
hiring elite scientists and developing an independent science
program, we are going to make sure that we have independent
science attached to all elements of the program. We have
already conducted independent reviews of workshops on Delta
smelt, on salmon, on splittail; a 3-day workshop on the
Environmental Water Account and how the agencies are allocating
that water.
These and several other workshops underway are leading to
fairly fundamental changes in how the system is likely to be
operated. And as Secretary or Assistant Secretary Raley
described, we are planning a series of workshops in April to
specifically focus on water project operations and the science
that underlies them.
The key, as he said, is to integrate science into our
regulatory programs, not have panels come in later and second
guess decisions after they are made. That process is well
underway, and hopefully it will be accelerated.
We have not been successful, however, in meeting the goal
of increasing supplies to south-of-delta CVP contractors. We
understand that this target is going to be difficult to reach.
In the last several weeks and months we have had a number of
discussions with the agencies and the stakeholders on how to do
that.
I think, to sum it up, the general consensus is, everyone
supports meeting the goal but no one wants to share the risk,
from the Santa Clara Water District that is worried about its
quality and supply, to the State water contractors that are
concerned about the impacts on having them provide too much
flexibility, to the south-of-delta farmers who are worried
about increasing pumping and the impacts it is going to have on
them, and all round the table folks are concerned about the
risk that is out there.
It is clear to me, then, as you heard from Secretary Raley,
that we need to pull together the leadership of the agencies
fast and put together and operations plan, a new plan that puts
us back on track toward meeting the commitments that are in the
plan while minimizing impacts to the other users.
Our goal should be to meet three objectives: One, we have
got to protect fish. Two, we have got to meet the 65 to 70
target. And, three, we have got to maintain water supply
reliability assurances for the rest of the contractors south of
the delta. Unless we achieve all three goals, we are simply
trading instability in one area for instability in another.
I am confident that we have got the tools and we have got
the energy and the resources to do it. We simply need to get
the leadership together to put together a plan that gets us
there. To put it simply, the credibility of the program, and
certainly the reauthorization and our other funding requests
depend upon us showing that we are serious about meeting the
commitments that are in the plan.
Thank you again for hearing my testimony.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Wright follows:]
Statement of Patrick Wright, Director, CALFED Bay-Delta Program
Thank you for inviting me to testify on the CALFED Bay-Delta
Program and water project operations in California. I have attached to
my testimony a summary of the CALFED Bay-Delta Program's approach to
meeting the state's long-term water needs, and will defer to the
testimony of my state and Federal colleagues to provide you with more
detail on water project operations this year.
In summary, the CALFED Bay-Delta Program has launched the largest
and most comprehensive water management plan in the nation. The
Framework for California's Water Future is a balanced and integrated
approach to reduce conflicts over our limited supplies and to address
the state's long-term water needs.
It calls for the most aggressive water conservation program in the
nation, together with specific timetables for developing over six
million acre feet of new water storage projects the biggest investment
in the state's water infrastructure in 40 years.
The key to its success will be maintaining and strengthening the
leadership of the agencies and stakeholders; securing Federal, state,
and local funds; and meeting the ambitious deadlines and commitments in
the plan.
Our greatest challenge in putting the plan together came in
developing short-term strategies to increase the reliability of
supplies while the long-term infrastructure investments are being made.
In each of the years preceding adoption of the CALFED plan, we had
major crises over water project operations that undermined public
confidence in the Program.
The CALFED Program addressed this challenge in several ways:
<bullet> LBy investing in short-term improvements in water supply
reliability and water quality. Last year, we allocated over $300
million to water districts throughout the state.
<bullet> LBy developing a drought contingency plan, and
facilitating the transfer of over 300,000 acre feet.
<bullet> LBy developing an innovative Environmental Water Account
to set aside water for fish without reducing allocations to other
users. Last year, for the first time ever, south-of-Delta contractors
received commitments that their supplies would not be reduced during
the spring and summer because of additional regulatory restrictions.
<bullet> LAnd by hiring a lead scientist and launching a science
program to provide independent reviews of all aspects of the program.
This past year, the science program conducted independent reviews of
the science surrounding both our listed species--Delta smelt and
salmon, and a candidate species--Sacramento splittail, and conducted a
thorough, 3-day review of the science underlying use of the
Environmental Water Account for listed species. These and several other
workshops, including a series of studies on the operations of the Delta
Cross Channel, are leading to fundamental changes in our thinking about
how the Delta functions. We are now planning a 2-day workshop in April
to consider the recommendations from these independent evaluations, and
to further review the science surrounding water project operations and
the Delta.
We have not been successful, however, in meeting our goal of
increasing supplies to south-of-Delta CVP contractors. The CALFED Plan
anticipated that a series of operational measures and cooperative water
management actions would increase allocations by 15% to these
contractors, which would increase their allocations to 65-70% of
contract totals.
We understand that this target is going to be difficult to reach.
In fact, during the last several weeks and months, virtually every
interest group has expressed concern about one or more of the measures
under consideration to meet this target from the Santa Clara Valley
Water District, which is concerned about the potential risk to the
quality and reliability of its supplies; to the farmers in the South
Delta, who are concerned about the potential impacts to water levels in
the Delta from increased pumping; to environmental groups, who are
concerned about the potential risk to Delta fisheries. Each of these
groups supports the goal, but no one wants their supplies to be at
risk.
It is clear, therefore, that we are going to need the leadership of
the agencies to sort through the alternatives under consideration and
develop an operations plan that puts us back on track towards meeting
the commitments in the plan, while minimizing impacts to other users.
That's why I strongly endorse Assistant Secretary Raley's call for the
agencies to develop a new plan as soon as possible. To put it simply,
the credibility of the Program depends on it.
Thank you again for hearing my testimony.
______
[An attachment to Mr. Wright's statement follows:]
Attachment 1
summary of calfed bay-delta program's approach for meeting long-term
water needs
The Subcommittee's recognition that water needs in California
exceed the reliable supply of the State is indicative of the importance
of this issue. The CALFED Bay-Delta Program concluded its five-year
planning phase last year and has started implementation of a program
that may take several decades to complete.
As a brief background, California's water managers must deal with
highly variable conditions. Most of the natural runoff originates from
rain and snow during the winter in the northern part of the state while
the largest population centers are in the southern part of the State.
The natural runoff changes widely from season to season and from year
to year, requiring water storage and conveyance facilities to
redistribute water to the drier periods and locations. Water needs
continue to grow with increasing population and evolving environmental
flow requirements while some water supplies, such as those from the
Owens Valley and the Colorado River, have actually decreased. To make
management of these conditions even more difficult, there has been only
limited expansion of California's water supply system during the past
three decades.
However, finding solutions to water reliability problems in the
21st Century requires looking beyond simply adding new facilities.
While facilities are needed, CALFED's approach is to consider the
system as a whole, with all its interrelated parts. This includes
better operation and management of the existing system, better use of
existing water supplies, and simplifying the procedures and safeguards
so water users can willingly transfer water to other users. The CALFED
approach also requires a change in how we define water needs and water
supply reliability.
Overview of California Water Needs
Traditionally, many people have viewed water supply reliability by
looking at the size of the ``gap'' between estimated water needs and
the amount of water the system can provide each year. In this context,
a large gap means the system has low water supply reliability. The
latest California Water Plan Update (1998) estimates that by year 2020,
the need for water could be 2-6 MAN larger than what the system can
supply. While some might dispute the magnitude of this gap, most agree
that in at least some regions of the state, the economy, environment,
and lifestyles will change significantly for the worse if appropriate
measures and actions are not taken. Other considerations are needed to
convey a comprehensive picture of water management issues facing
California:
<bullet> LFirst, the water system must be considered as a whole. At
CALFED, we are often asked how much additional water supply a new
reservoir might add. Due to the complexity of the system, there is not
a single answer and it greatly depends on how the project is integrated
into the system. For example, Southern California may not benefit from
water supply created from a new Sites Reservoir in Northern California
unless South Delta Improvements are implemented and Delta export
capacity is increased. However, operation of Sites Reservoir for local
agricultural supply and to--improve operational flexibility for the
Environmental Water Account would give a different answer for water
supply reliability.
<bullet> LSecond, California water management goals go beyond
trying to balance projected water needs and supply. Simply looking at
the size of the gap does not acknowledge that water supply reliability
includes other goals. For example, improved water quality, the need to
preserve flood control and power generation values, and the need to
improve flexibility so project operations can be changed as needed to
better response to unforeseen conditions are all important parts of a
reliable system. In addition, the cost of new water supplies can affect
the size of the gap.
<bullet> LThird, there are other tools (beyond new storage and
conveyance facilities) that must be used to help meet California's
water management goals. Examples include:
* LImproving the integration of operations of the State and
Federal water projects with regional projects. For example, the new
regional groundwater projects developed by local districts could be
coordinated with S.P. and CVP operations to improve system-wide
operations.
* LFacilitating transfers between willing parties to reduce the
economic consequences of critical water shortages.
* LWater conservation and reuse to make better use of existing
supplies.
* LImprove environmental conditions to limit the need for further
environmental water requirements.
Approach to Providing for Water Needs
Our approach to providing for water needs includes broad planning
for the California Water Plan Update and more specific implementation
by a cooperative effort of CALFED agencies and local and regional water
districts.
California Water Plan Update--The State is continually working on
5-year updates to the California Water Plan Update to provide a broad
overview of Statewide water use, existing supply facilities and
programs, and options for improving water supply reliability. More
specific planning, such as the ongoing Colorado Water Use Plan, will be
included in the next revision to the California Water Plan Update in
2003.
Colorado Water Use Plan (formerly the Colorado River 4.4 Plan)--For
many years, southern California has used 5.2 million acre-feet of
Colorado river water annually to supply urban and agricultural users,
far exceeding its allocated share of 4.4 million acre-feet. The
Colorado Water Use Plan provides ``its Colorado River water users with
a framework by which programs, projects and other activities will be
coordinated and cooperatively implemented allowing California to most
effectively satisfy its annual water supply needs within its annual
apportionment of Colorado River water.''
CALFED Plan--The CALFED Program's commitment to a balanced and
integrated approach is what sets this effort apart from any other
large-scale water management program in the nation. Attachment 2
provides a map and list of water supply reliability highlights
accomplished during our first year (2000-2001) since the CALFED Record
of Decision. The Program has made significant progress to improve
California's water supply reliability by providing grants and loans
totaling about $200 million. The map demonstrates that we have been
able to make progress throughout the CALFED solution area extending the
length of the State. During Stage 1 (first 7 years following the ROD),
the CALFED Program will continue to make significant progress on:
<bullet> LOperational improvements of the existing system such as
the Environmental Water Account and Joint Point of Diversion.
<bullet> LConveyance improvements to allow more efficient and
timely movement of water to areas of need.
<bullet> LGroundwater storage projects in cooperation with local
water districts to expand dry year water supply and conjunctive use
groundwater with surface water supplies.
<bullet> LNew and expanded surface water storage to benefit all
water users, including the environment. Attachment 4 includes a summary
of how CALFED is proceeding with the five surface storage projects
identified in the ROD.
<bullet> LFacilitate water transfers between willing parties.
<bullet> LWater quality improvements to make water available for
more uses and reuses
<bullet> LWatershed projects to improve runoff conditions.
<bullet> LProjects to improve environmental health of the system
and reduce the conflict between environmental and agricultural/urban
uses of water.
<bullet> LRegional implementation strategies that include incentive
funding for local groups to develop collaborative, multiple purpose
projects to meet their needs. Examples include the Sacramento Valley
Water Management Agreement and the Bay Area Blending and Exchange
Project.
We have made projections in potential improvements in water supply
reliability that are likely by year 2010 from the Program assuming
continued funding. Attachment 3 includes a chart showing potential
improvements of approximately 3 million acre-feet annually by 2010. The
chart is accompanied by a ballpark indication of the magnitude of
contribution to the water supply reliability from a variety of water
management actions.
Local and Regional Planning--Beyond CALFED, there are other locally
and regionally focused planning processes that help improve
California's water supply reliability. A number of recent projects have
been designed to provide important additional storage for regional and
local water systems. The recently completed Diamond Valley Lake
provides 800,000 acre-feet of additional storage for Metropolitan Water
District. Projects like this can significantly enhance the reliability,
particularly when combined with improved operations of the State and
Federal projects.
______
[Attachments 2, 3, and 4 follow:]
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Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Nelson, you may begin your testimony.
STATEMENT OF DANIEL NELSON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SAN LUIS AND
DELTA-MENDOTA WATER AUTHORITY
Mr. Nelson. Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, good
morning. I am Dan Nelson. I am the Executive Director of the
San Luis and Delta-Mendota Water Authority, and I appreciate
the opportunity to appear before you today.
And, Mr. Chairman, I would like to take this opportunity to
congratulate and to thank you on a job well done in the
development and introduction of H.R. 3208. Your thoroughness,
leadership, and objectivity are admired and appreciated.
Californians are truly fortunate to have you in this leadership
position. We sincerely thank you for that.
As brief background, the San Luis and Delta-Mendota Water
Authority is a joint powers authority of 32 member-agencies.
The bond between all of these districts is, they comprise all
of the CVP districts that take their waters through the Federal
Tracy pumping plant south of the delta. It is on behalf of the
24 ag service districts that my oral testimony is primarily
focused on.
There are three points that I would like to leave with you
today. First of all, that the disproportionate impacts that we
talk so freely about are real. They affect real people, they
affect real jobs, and they affect real rural communities.
The second point is that the short-term CALFED supply
crisis has been entirely avoidable; that we do have discretion
and operational flexibility, and have had for several years, to
be able to meet easily the water supply objectives that are
pointed out in the Record of Decision.
And, last but not least, the third point that I would like
to leave you with is, as a result of what we have experienced
over the last several years and more importantly this year,
that legislative assurances are indeed necessary to ensure that
CALFED moves forward in a balanced way.
It is to this third point that I would like to focus on in
a little more detail. About 7 years ago, California water
resource managers were presented with some major challenges in
the form of the Endangered Species Act, the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act, and the Clean Water Act. It changed
fundamentally the way that we operated both the Central Valley
Project and the State water project, and we came together with
other agricultural and urban agencies, as well as the State and
Federal agencies, to try to come up with a balanced operations
plan which balanced the fishery needs, water quality needs, and
water supply needs for a temporary basis.
We were actually successful in doing that. We entered into
the Bay-Delta Accord, which again accomplished, at least
temporarily--it was held as revolutionary, it was held as a
truce to the water wars, etcetera. At that time the ag service
contractors in our area had a 75 percent supply. We gave up
500,000 acre-feet as part of the Bay-Delta Accord for this
stability of a 75 percent supply, and the expectations that
through the CALFED process, that our supplies would improve.
The theme for the last several years has been promises
made, promises broken, and a classic example of that is in
reference to past Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt, his
quote after signing the accord: ``A deal is a deal. We have
made a deal, and if it turns out that there are additional
requirements of any kind, it will be up to the United States
and the Federal agencies to come up with water.''
In addition to that, in working through the CALFED process,
there were several principles that were developed and
dismissed, principles such as ``no net loss,'' ``we all get
better together,'' and last but not least, when we were
continuing to have these conflicts in the implementation of the
accord, we were assured that all of these issues could be
worked out administratively. Hence, the process debacle.
Again, when we signed the accord, we had a 75 percent
supply and expectations to get better. Here I sit before you
several years later, $50 million of CALFED planning, in the
second year of CALFED implementation, with a 45 percent supply.
That is 600,000 acre-feet, a good size reservoir, 600,000 acre-
feet less water today than when we signed the Bay-Delta Accord.
And here we are at the crossroads once again of moving
forward to the next benchmark of CALFED, the next phase of
CALFED, authorizing CALFED legislatively, and we are being
asked once again, ``Trust us. This time we really do mean it.
We are really sincere about getting you this
administratively.'' Well, Mr. Chairman and Committee members,
we are having a really tough time with that, and we are
struggling very much with the notion that this is going to be
different than it has been over the last several years.
In closing and in summary, we look forward to working with
the Department of Interior and other CALFED agencies on a 2000
ops plan that works for everybody and meets the water supply
goals and meets our environmental objectives. And, in addition
to that, to support the passage of H.R. 3208.
Thank you very much for this opportunity.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Nelson follows:]
Statement of Daniel Nelson, Executive Director, San Luis & Delta-
Mendota Water Authority
Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee: Good morning. I am Daniel
Nelson, Executive Director of the San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water
Authority, and I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today
to discuss an issue of vital importance to the State of California,
indeed, the nation.
At the outset Mr. Chairman, I would like to extend our appreciation
for your efforts to ensure that the CALFED Program is implemented in a
balanced and innovative manner that links progress on environmental
restoration and enhancement with progress on water supply and water
quality improvements. Farmers on the westside of the San Joaquin Valley
are particularly appreciative of your efforts to ensure a 70%
allocation to south-of-Delta Central Valley Project agricultural
service contractors in normal years. Inclusion of section 103(a)(4) in
H.R. 3208 which provides this supply will help sustain agriculture in
the San Joaquin Valley, an industry that provides significant benefit
to the state and the nation, during the first four years of Stage 1 of
the CALFED Program. From this floor, we expect that the CALFED Program
will restore our water supplies to a level adequate to meet the needs
of our region. For the reasons that I will describe in my testimony,
without the inclusion of section 103(a)(4) in H.R. 3208, there would be
little hope that the water supply improvements promised in the
Framework for Action and the CALFED Record of Decision will ever be
realized.
The San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority
The San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority is a joint powers
authority organized under California Law. Its 32 member agencies are
water and irrigation districts that contract with the Bureau of
Reclamation for the receipt of water from the Central Valley Project.
These member agencies provide water for irrigation to approximately
1,200,000 acres of land within the western San Joaquin Valley, San
Benito County, and Santa Clara County and water for municipal and
industrial use throughout the same area. The area served by the
Authority's member agencies is among the most fertile, productive and
diversified in the nation. Rich soil, a good climate, and innovative
farming techniques have helped to place the area served by these
agencies among the most productive farming regions in the nation.
Farmers in this region produce over 50 different commercial fiber and
food crops sold for the fresh, dry, canned or frozen food markets;
domestic and export. With an adequate water supply they could produce
crops worth more than $2 billion dollars. One of the Authority's member
agencies, Santa Clara Valley Water District, is responsible for
providing water to 1.8 million people and to the vital high-tech
computer industry known as ``Silicon Valley''. This multi-billion
dollar industry is critical to the economic health of California and
the nation.
Both agriculture and the computer chip manufacturing industry
depend on adequate, reliable supplies of water. These water supplies,
and consequently the agriculture and industry they support, are at
risk. It was our hope that the CALFED Program would restore the
adequacy and reliability of the water supply necessary to sustain
agriculture and industry within the service areas of our member
agencies, but we were wrong. The CALFED Program has failed to meet its
water supply objectives for south-of-Delta Central Valley agricultural
water service contractors, and unless the Department of the Interior
modifies the manner in which it is implementing the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act, there is little chance the Program will ever
achieve those objectives. Like every other region of the arid west, the
ability of our farmers to produce crops and generate this economic
activity depends on the availability of an adequate, reliable source of
water.
Historical Reliability and Adequacy
To put this discussion in historical perspective, it is necessary
to point out that until 1991, deliveries to the Authority's member
agencies were highly reliable. For a period of nearly forty years, from
the early 1950s to 1991, water supplies for south-of-Delta CVP ag
service contractors were reduced only two times, in 1977 and 1978.
These reductions were a result of the extraordinary drought conditions
in 1977, the driest year on record in California. However, in 1991 a
new era of Project operations began.
Reductions in Supply Due to Regulatory Constraints
In 1991, the winter-Chinook salmon was listed as a threatened
species under the Federal Endangered Species Act. Because of this
listing, new restrictions were imposed on the Project. In 1992, the
Delta smelt was listed as a threatened species under the Federal
Endangered Species Act, and additional restrictions were imposed on the
Project. Also in 1992, the Central Valley Project Improvement Act was
passed by Congress and signed into law by former President George Bush.
The purposes of this Act were:
(a) Lto protect, restore, and enhance fish, wildlife, and
associated habitats in the Central Valley and Trinity River basins of
California;
(b) Lto address impacts of the Central Valley Project on fish,
wildlife and associated habitats;
(c) Lto improve the operational flexibility of the Central Valley
Project;
(d) Lto increase water-related benefits provided by the Central
Valley Project to the State of California through expanded use of
voluntary water transfers and improved water conservation;
(e) Lto contribute to the State of California's interim and long-
term efforts to protect the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta Estuary;
(f) Lto achieve a reasonable balance among competing demands for
use of Central Valley Project water, including the requirements of fish
and wildlife, agricultural, municipal and industrial and power
contractors.
Bay-Delta Accord
California water users were faced with several over-lapping
regulations and an unorganized array of Federal and state agencies
trying to implement them. Simply stated, there was chaos. The Authority
teamed with the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California to
initiate discussions with other ag/urban stakeholders,
environmentalists, and state and Federal agencies. These discussions
resulted in the 1994 Bay Delta Accord of which the Authority is one of
the signatories. At the time, the Accord was hailed as a revolutionary
agreement that would provide for the immediate protection and
restoration of the Bay-Delta ecosystem and water supply reliability for
water agencies that relied on exports from the Delta. As part of the
Accord, south-of-Delta CVP ag service contractors voluntarily committed
up to 500,000 acre-feet of water for restoration of the Bay-Delta
ecosystem pending the outcome of water right hearings to determine the
responsibility of other water agencies to provide water for this
purpose. Under the Accord standards, they could expect that on average
they would receive 75-80 percent of their existing contract amounts.
However, their voluntary commitment to provide 500,000 acre-feet for
restoration of the Bay-Delta was made in reliance upon former Secretary
of the Interior Bruce Babbitt's promise, ``Basically, what we're saying
is a deal is a deal. We've made a deal, and if it turns there are
additional requirements of any kind, it will be up to the United States
and the Federal agencies to come up with the water.'' (Emphasis added.)
Breach of the Accord
Unfortunately, Secretary Babbitt's commitment was soon forgotten.
In November 1997, Interior released a final administrative plan for the
implementation of CVPIA section 3406(b)(2) that would have taken
additional water away from south-of-Delta CVP contractors. Because the
Authority concluded this plan was inconsistent with the law, it
challenged the plan in court and prevailed. In response to the U.S.
District Court's judgment that the 1997 plan was inconsistent with the
law, in October 1999, Interior released another final decision on the
implementation of CVPIA section 3406(b)(2). Under the October 1999
plan, which has been implemented pending the outcome of another
Authority legal challenge, water supplies for south-of-Delta CVP ag
contractors will average 45 to 50 percent of their existing contract
amounts. In general, the CVPIA has been implemented by Interior in a
manner that has reallocated more than 1,000,000 acre-feet of CVP water
away from farms, ranches and rural communities that relied upon this
water for decades. Moreover, virtually all of the water supply
reductions that have resulted from implementation of the Act have been
imposed on south-of-Delta Central Valley Project agricultural water
service contractors.
Most of my comments today will focus on water shortages and CALFED
assurances to these ag service contractors, since they have suffered
the greatest impacts. But it should be recognized that implementation
of CVPIA has also resulted in chronic shortages for south-of-Delta
municipal and industrial contractors, poorer water quality in San Luis
Reservoir for drinking water treatment, and even the threat of
interruptions in supply to Silicon Valley during the summer months.
Disproportionate Impacts
The disproportionate impact of these regulatory requirements on the
water supplies of west side farmers was recognized by Governor Gray
Davis and former Secretary of the Interior Babbitt in June 2000, when
they signed the CALFED document entitled ``California's Water Future, A
Framework for Action.'' The framework correctly noted that south-of-
Delta CVP ag contractors have been ``disproportionately affected by
recent regulatory actions.'' A key commitment in the Framework was a
provision stating that during the first four years of Stage 1 of the
CALFED Program, south-of-Delta CVP ag contractors would receive in
normal years 65 to 70 percent of their contractual water supplies. In
other water year types there would be comparable improvements. The
Authority and its member agencies supported the framework based on this
commitment. But somehow between the signing of the framework agreement
and the issuing of the formal Record of Decision and the allocation to
south-of-Delta CVP ag contractors in the first year of Stage 1, the
commitment to restore that portion of our water supplies was forgotten.
In the first year of Stage 1 of the CALFED Program, notwithstanding
near normal water supply conditions, south-of-Delta CVP ag contractors
received an initial allocation of 45 percent, which was subsequently
raised to 49 percent. We are now approaching the second year of Stage 1
of the CALFED Program, and on January 25, 2002, Reclamation projected a
45 percent allocation for south-of-Delta CVP ag contractors and a 75
percent allocation for M&I contractors despite a forecast that this
water year will be an above-normal year. Meanwhile, b(2) was allocated
100%. This announcement is a clear indication that absent clear
direction from Congress, the Fish & Wildlife Service, which is
responsible for prescribing fish and wildlife actions under CVPIA, will
not allow the Bureau of Reclamation to take the discretionary actions
required to accomplish the water supply objectives established by the
Framework for Action and the CALFED ROD.
This conclusion is based on the negotiations among Federal and
state agencies that led to the Framework for Action and the technical
analyses on which Interior based its conclusion that it could provide
an additional 15 percent allocation to south-of-Delta CVP ag
contractors in normal water years with comparable improvements in other
year types.
On March 8, 2000, during discussions that preceded execution of the
Framework for Action the Regional Director of the Bureau of Reclamation
made a presentation concerning the manner in which Interior was
implementing CVPIA. His conclusions were as follows:
It is important to ensure Interior's b(2) policy is implemented in
a balanced manner that encourages sound water management practices and
eliminates uncertainties for other CVP water users. The existing
policy:
(a) Lfocuses the majority of the water supply impacts to a small
amount of CVP contractors;
(b) Lresults in greater impacts to CVP delivery capability in
wetter periods, thereby limiting ability to implement sound water
management practices (e.g., groundwater banking, surface water storage,
etc. which are critical for allowing water users to maintain stable
water supplies during drought periods);
(c) Lincorporates real-time decision-making and reset accounting
measures that create water supply uncertainties for farmers during the
onset of the irrigation season;
(d) Lprovides preferential treatment for b(2) water which may be
inconsistent with the CVPIA's intent;
(e) Lallows b(2) water to be rescheduled without considering
potential impacts to other CVP water users; and
(f) Lresults in the State of California's ability to capture b(2)
water.
Changes to the existing b(2) policy should be considered to ensure
that Interior is implementing b(2) in a balanced manner that encourages
sound water management practices and reduces uncertainties for other
CVP water users.
A copy of Regional Director Snow's presentation is attached hereto
as Appendix 1, and I request that it be made part of the record.
Improved Water Supplies Resulting from the Exercise of Discretion
To determine whether a more balanced implementation of the CVPIA
could be achieved, the CALFED agencies conducted technical analyses.
These analyses established that by exercising existing discretion,
water supplies for south-of-Delta CVP contractors could be increased in
normal water years by 15 percent, to 65 to 70 percent, with comparable
improvements in other water year types. Further, these increases could
be achieved in a manner consistent with existing law, including the
CVPIA, the Endangered Species Act, and the Clean Water Act, and without
doing any harm to environmental resources or reducing water supplies to
other CVP contractors. However, in actual CVP operations, the Fish &
Wildlife Service has refused to allow Reclamation to take the
discretionary actions required to accomplish the water supply
improvements that were achieved in the technical analyses. It is
principally for this reason that in the first year of Stage 1 of the
CALFED Program south-of-Delta CVP ag contractors receive only a 49
percent allocation and in the second year of Stage 1 of the CALFED
Program Reclamation projects that it will be able to allocate only 45
percent to these contractors. In other words, CVPIA is still being
implemented in the manner that led the Regional Director to conclusions
expressed on March 8, 2000.
For the 2002 water year, Reclamation and south-of-Delta CVP ag
contractors have identified numerous discretionary actions that would
improve water supplies for these contractors. These actions, which
include use of (b)(2) water with the Environmental Water Account and
reducing the quantity of (b)(2) water used this year under section
3406(b)(2)(C) and 3406(b)(2)(D), when combined with the changes to
Interior's (b)(2) accounting decision ordered by the District Court,
could increase our water supplies by as much as 30 percent.
Objective Science Review
The recent release of the National Academy of Science review of the
science supporting Klamath fishery actions has stirred ongoing concerns
in California that many of the fishery actions and regulations are
without a scientific foundation. For years stakeholders have been
requesting a thorough review of the science underlying environmental
requirements that are reducing water supplies by over a million acre
feet. For example:
<bullet> LWater users have waited for the State Water Resource
Control Board to conduct its triennial review of its 1996 Delta
requirements whose underlying relationships have been significantly
altered since the arrival of the Asian clam.
<bullet> LWater users have requested a review of the underlying
science of Delta water project requirements in the Garamendi Process
Fish Group in mid-1997 and were told by the Federal agencies that that
would not be a function of the group.
<bullet> LWater users requested an evaluation of population level
effects in CALFED's 1999 Water Management Development Team process and
were told by the Federal agencies that it could not and would not be
done.
<bullet> LWater users have requested a revision of the 1995 Native
Fishes Recovery Plan, many of whose underlying premises have changed,
but the Federal agencies refuse to conduct such a review.
<bullet> LWater users assumed that a portion of the $50 million
dollars spent during the five-year development stage of the CALFED
program would be spent reviewing the science underlying water project
requirements, but no such review was conducted.
<bullet> LAgriculture and Urban Water Users (ag/urban) through the
Association of California Water Users (ACWA) produced a briefing book
showing how to compare the fish benefit/cost ratio of Delta water
project requirements to other fish measures. We presented data showing
benefit/cost ratios for selected non-water-related actions that were 10
to 100 times more than those that affected water supplies. We hoped for
some interest from the Federal and state fish agencies. Instead, they
were initially defensive and ultimately dismissive.
<bullet> LAlthough the CALFED Science Program has made positive
contributions in some areas it has not initiated, nor has it indicated
that it will initiate a review of the science underlying the CALFED ROD
Regulatory Baseline, despite ongoing requests from water users.
We firmly believe that the Klamath situation is just the tip of the
iceberg and agree with Congressman Cal Dooley that a National Academy
of Sciences type review is long overdue.
CALFED Package
I must also point out that without the restored water supplies
promised by the Framework for Action, the CALFED Program will be of
little benefit to south-of-Delta CVP ag service contractors. In fact,
the projects identified by the CALFED ROD that involve increasing
storage and exchanges in the upper San Joaquin River would further
reduce water supplies for south-of-Delta CVP ag contractors. It is
ironic that agencies opposing the enactment of section 103(a)(4)
because they contend that it might result in reduced supplies for them
enthusiastically support the development of projects that will without
question reduce water supplies for south-of-Delta CVP ag service
contractors. South-of-Delta CVP ag service contractors have been
willing to acquiesce to these projects because of the commitment that
during the first four years of Stage 1 their water supplies would be
restored to 65--70 percent in normal water years, with comparable
improvements in other year types. It would be from this supply
reliability floor that our water supplies would improve.
The CALFED Program has the potential to solve California's greatest
water problems. To succeed, each element of the Program must be
implemented with equal vigor. This is critically important because,
notwithstanding the potential benefits to all Californians that could
result from the CALFED Program, if it is implemented in a way that
gives priority to any one of its many purposes, the Program will fail.
To date, the south-of-Delta CVP ag service contractor water supply
reliability element of the CALFED Program seems to have been ignored.
The performance of the Fish & Wildlife Service demonstrates that it has
continued to give priority to environmental uses of water without
regard to the impact of these uses on achieving the restoration of
supplies described by the Framework for Action and the CALFED ROD. It
has become painfully apparent that a clear expression of congressional
direction is required to compel the Fish & Wildlife Service to
implement the delicate balance struck by CALFED's Framework for Action
Thank you.
ATTACHMENT 1
b(2) presentation
lester snow
bureau of reclamation
u.s. department of the interior
DISCUSSION OF SECTION 3446 (B)(2) OF THE CVPIA
Introduction
It is important to ensure Interior's b(2) Policy is implemented in a
manner that is consistent with the foundational purposes of the CVPIA.
Section 3402 of the CVPIA states:
``The purposes of this title shall be:
(a) Lto protect, restore, and enhance fish, wildlife, and
associated habitats in the Central Valley and Trinity River basins of
California;
(b) Lto address impacts of the Central Valley Project on fish,
wildlife and associated habitats;
(c) Lto improve the operational flexibility of the Central Valley
Project;
(d) Lto increase water-related benefits provided by the Central
Valley Project to the State of California through expanded use of
voluntary water transfers and improved water conservation;
(e) Lto contribute to the State of California's interim and long
term efforts to protect the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin
Delta Estuary;
(f) Lto achieve a reasonable balance among competing demands for
use of Central Valley Project water, including the requirements of fish
and wildlife, agricultural, municipal and industrial and power
contractors.''
Changes to the existing b(2) policy should be considered to ensure that
Interior is implementing b(2) in a manner that is more consistent with
subsections 3402(c) and 3402(f) of the CVPIA.
______
Key Water Management Concerns
It is important to ensure Interior's b(2) policy is implemented in a
balanced manner that encourages sound water management practices and
eliminates uncertainties for other CVP water users. The existing b(2)
policy:
(a) Lfocuses the majority of the water supply impacts to a small
amount of CVP water contractors;
(b) Lresults in greater impacts to CVP delivery capability in
wetter periods, thereby limiting ability to implement sound water
management practices (e.g., groundwater banking, surface water storage,
etc. which are critical for allowing water users to maintain stable
water supplies during drought periods);
(c) Lincorporates real-time decision-making and reset accounting
measures that creates water supply uncertainties for farmers during the
onset of the irrigation season;
(d) Lprovides preferential treatment for b(2) water which may be
inconsistent with the CVPIA's intent;
(e) Lallows b(2) water to be rescheduled without considering
potential impacts to other CVP water users; and
(f) Lresults in the State of California's ability to capture b(2)
water.
Changes to the existing b(2) policy should be considered to ensure that
Interior is implementing b(2) in a balanced manner that encourages
sound water management practices and reduces uncertainties for other
CV? water users.
______
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Bishop, you may begin your testimony.
STATEMENT OF WALTER J. BISHOP, GENERAL MANAGER, CONTRA COSTA
WATER DISTRICT
Mr. Bishop. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the
Committee. My name is Walter Bishop. I am the General Manager
of the Contra Costa Water District, and as background I would
like to tell you the Contra Costa Water District is the largest
urban contractor of the CVP. We have total reliance on the
delta for our water supply, so water quality for us in the
delta is a key focus. The quality of our drinking water is
directly related to the operation of the State and Federal
projects.
My testimony today is going to be broken into two parts.
The first part of my testimony, I would like to offer to the
Committee six very specific areas that I believe the Secretary
has discretion which, if enacted upon, can improve water
supplies without hurting the environment. And, second, I would
like to look at three areas that I believe are in the long-term
focus of the CALFED ROD, which I believe can help us improve
water supplies in the 21st century.
Let me start with the areas of discretion. The Secretary of
the Interior has considerable discretion in how she approaches
things relative to the 800,000 (b)(2) water accounting. Judge
Wanger's decision as it related to the offset/reset I will talk
about in a minute.
But with respect to the 800,000 accounting, it is upon the
Secretary to ensure that areas where water is used, on the
American River, for example, for flow requirements, and other
CVP issues related to water quality standards, that if there is
a double benefit for that water with respect to fisheries, we
believe it should be counted against the 800,000.
Second, the Secretary can now exercise her discretion to
revise the current policy related to the 800,000 with respect
to offset and reset. The timing was particularly fortunate for
this hearing with the recent decision, but we believe offset
and reset have been ripe and on the table for at least 2 years.
A question was asked earlier as to whether or not this
affects State and Federal pumping. The answer is, of course it
does, with respect to the assurances given in the ROD. The
biological opinion that has been at least suggested may have to
be reopened because of this decision.
We would encourage the Secretary, before making that
decision, to look at the tools that she has now that weren't in
place when these biological opinions were issued. Hundreds of
millions of dollars have been spent on habitat restoration and
millions of acre-feet of water have been released, and we need
to look at the flexibility that the system has today that it
did not have when our total reliance was on water primarily for
fish restoration.
Third, the Secretary, in conjunction with Federal and State
agencies, has discretion with respect to operation of the
Environmental Water Account. Questions were asked earlier about
that. I think at least the Federal administration has a
responsibility to request and ensure that full funding of the
Environmental Water Account is included in the budgetary
request.
Fourth, the Secretary has the discretion to implement
methods to improve the accuracy of forecasting of deliveries.
In recent years the actual point, low point in San Luis
Reservoir, could have been more accurately predicted, and in
one case over 200,000 acre-feet of additional supplies made
available to contractors if that forecast was more accurate.
And I think you saw some of that with respect to recent
decisions on the Klamath, when very late in the season 70,000
acre-feet was made available as a result of reforecasting the
reservoir levels.
Fifth, the Secretary has discretion authority under CVPIA
to construct and acquire non-Federal entities, such as water
conveyance, conveyance capacity, and wells necessary to provide
water for refuges. I believe this is an area in which
additional supplies could be made available for refuges and
then water supplies from storage could be made available for
contractors.
Sixth, and finally, the Federal project can also help meet
the water needs of its contractors by expediting water requests
for water transfers and providing project power for those
transfers when they are made by Federal contractors, when they
have been restricted from the deliveries. Now, I know CVP staff
is working hard on transfers, but they need to dedicate a
consistent level of resources toward this and they need to work
hard on streamlining environmental protection permitting
processes.
I would like to move now to the three areas where I believe
we can have some long-term benefit. First is the role of good
science, peer review, and advancements in technology in our
decisionmaking. CALFED agencies and stakeholders have
consistently called for decisionmaking related to water needs
for the ecosystem to be based on strong science.
I think the recent National Academy of Science decision is
where we think all decisions need to be made in this way, an
outside peer review, and I know CALFED has organized outside
panels to review decisions made on allocating water for the
Environmental Water Account going to the environment. I would
encourage this Committee to request and get some of the
information that was provided on that with respect to tracking
of the science, with the decisions being made on decisions for
water and the fish in the CALFED process.
We believe improvements with respect to monitoring--we are
still using nets thrown from either banks or behind boats to
talk about where the fish are. Satellite monitoring, acoustic
monitoring, advancements in technologies can greatly improve
that and help some of our decisions.
Another area where I think we can improve the long-term
supply is increased cooperation between State, Federal and
local agencies. We heard earlier today that the State has
worked through Joint Point in pumping additional supplies.
But one of the key beneficiaries from the CVPIA was the
State, with respect to when the CVP releases water and their
pumps are at maximum capacity, that water is technically
abandoned and can be picked up by the State. Now, there has
been some cooperation, but I believe there are still some areas
in which some cooperation can improve, and some of the
allocated water which could be made available in the south
delta can go to the Feds.
Finally, I would like to talk about the key component of
CALFED, which is the balanced program. We have all talked about
CALFED needs to go forward as balancing. I think there is a
misconception that CALFED has storage for future demand. That
is not the case. CALFED looked at meeting future demand through
conservation, reclamation, and water transfers. Storage,
primarily in the CALFED program, is to increase reliability. I
want to also mention water quality is one of the tenets, and it
was also to do environmental restoration.
The storage that is in the first phase of CALFED is not
about meeting future demand in California. And I know Tim Quinn
is going to talk later about the strong reclamation/
conservation program. The urban agencies are committed to that,
but CALFED still needs to be just as aggressive in moving
forward with the planning and permitting for storage. It is a
key component of how we are going to meet future water quality
and reliability and ecosystem restoration. In fact, the
Environmental Water Account is a key component to some of the
storage going forward.
Mr. Chairman, I realize that some of these suggestions that
I made today cannot be implemented immediately. However, I
believe it is essential that the administrative agencies become
more energetic in the use of their discretion to actively
manage the water supplies for the maximum benefit of all the
State's needs.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bishop follows:]
Statement of Walter J. Bishop, General Manager, Contra Costa Water
District, Concord, California
Chairman Calvert, members of the subcommittee, my name is Walter J.
Bishop. I am the General Manager and chief executive officer for the
Contra Costa Water District in Concord, California. The Contra Costa
Water District serves 450,000 people and is the largest urban
contractor for the Bureau of Reclamation's Central Valley Project. The
District was the first contractor to receive water from the Central
Valley Project. The Contra Costa Water District is located within the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and is totally reliant on the Delta for
its water supply. The quality of our drinking water is directly
affected by the operations of the Federal and State water projects,
more so than any other urban agency in California. Our District has
been intensively and constructively involved with other urban and
agricultural water agencies, with Federal and state regulatory agencies
and environmental organizations in many of the planning and operational
efforts to reach solutions on Bay-Delta issues. The District has played
key roles in helping the Federal and State agencies, water users and
environmental organizations in reaching consensus in a variety of areas
including the 1994 Bay-Delta Accord and the joint Federal-State CALFED
Bay-Delta Program.
My testimony today will focus on possible solutions for reliably
meeting the present and future water needs of urban and agricultural
water users and the environment in California. The competition for this
finite water supply and increased regulation of the Sacramento-San
Joaquin system have resulted in reductions in supplies in some sectors,
in particular, the Central Valley Project (CVP) deliveries of water
from the Delta to its contractors. At the same time, the ecosystem
restoration actions taken since the early 1990s, both flow and non-flow
actions, have resulted in significant improvements to fisheries,
including listed species such as Delta smelt and winter run salmon. In
fact, the increases in Delta smelt population since the Bay-Delta
Accord suggest that the Delta smelt may be on the brink of recovery.
My testimony will first consider administrative and operational
changes that can be made to meet present water supply and reliability
needs. I will then address the question of finding additional solutions
to reliably meet future needs in the 21st Century.
Achieving and maintaining a balance of fisheries protection and
water supply for existing municipal and industrial and agricultural
needs has not been easy. We can improve on what has already been
accomplished by:
<bullet> Lusing water more effectively through discretionary
actions already available to the Secretary of Interior;
<bullet> Lusing good science and requiring peer review in decision
making while investing in high tech fish monitoring techniques to
ensure that measures to protect fish are effective and water is not
wasted;
<bullet> Lincreasing the cooperation between Federal, State and
local projects to maximize the use of available water supply tools;
<bullet> Limplementing the CALFED Bay-Delta Program in a balanced
way.
I will address each of these actions in turn.
1. Existing discretion available to the Secretary of Interior to
increase flexibility of CVP operations
The Secretary of Interior has considerable discretion to provide
increased water supplies through improved operational efficiency
without impacting fish species. The Secretary has discretion,
consistent with Judge Oliver Wanger's October 2001 decision in the U.S.
District Court (Eastern District of California) lawsuit regarding
implementation of the 800,000 acre-feet of dedicated CVP yield under
the 1992 P.L. 102-575, commonly known as the Central Valley Project
Improvement Act (CVPIA), Section 3406(b)(2), to ensure that the
accounting for use of the 800,000 acre-feet for fisheries purposes does
not ignore the considerable amount of water being used to meet American
River flow requirements and the full amount of CVP yield being used to
help meet the State of California's Bay-Delta water quality standards.
The increased fish flows on the American and increased Delta flows
required to meet the Bay-Delta standards provide benefits to fish that
were not in place prior to CVPIA and should be taken into account.
Accurately accounting for use of the 800,000 acre-feet of dedicated
yield will free up limited water supplies for other CVP purposes.
The Secretary will also has the discretion to revise the current
policy related to resetting the 800,000 acre-feet accounting for
upstream reservoir storage releases in the fall and early winter if
that storage is replaced later in the year (``reset''). The current
Department of Interior accounting policy allows releases from upstream
reservoirs during the period, October through January, to increase
river flows to benefit fish but does not allow that water to be
rediverted in the Delta to meet urban and agricultural needs. If the
upstream reservoirs refill by the end of January, then, even though the
fish have benefitted from the releases, they do not count toward the
800,000 acre-feet. This method of accounting compels additional fish
releases or export reductions later, and results in further reductions
in agricultural and urban water supplies. This reset policy gives the
fish a second or third bite at the apple while increasing the harm to
water users. If this same faulty accounting policy were applied to CVP
water service contracts, then contractors would not have to pay for
delivered water if the reservoirs later refilled.
The current Interior policy of offsetting upstream reservoir
releases made earlier in the year for fishery purposes against
reductions in releases later in the year when exports are cut back to
protect fish (``offset'') is similarly unfair and unreasonable. This
offset policy assumes that even though the water users south of the
Delta are directly hurt by reduced deliveries during the irrigation
season, and fish have presumably benefitted by the export cuts, even
more fish actions can be made because water is still available in the
reservoirs north of the Delta. Water in upstream reservoirs, which may
or may not be able to be delivered late in the irrigation season or
after, is not equivalent to water actually delivered to the farms when
it is needed. The loss in water supply reliability resulting from the
``offset'' policy has been estimated to be between 100 and 200,000
acre-feet annually. The Secretary has the discretion to fairly
implement these requirements such that CVP water supplies are not
unreasonably impacted.
A Federal Court decision that appears to agree with our concerns
regarding ``reset'' and ``offset'' was released on February 5 after
this testimony had been prepared. District Court Judge Wanger found
that Interior's ``reset'' and ``offset'' policies both allow more than
800,000 acre-feet to be dedicated to fisheries purposes and found these
policies to be arbitrary and capricious. The Secretary needs to revise
the 800,000 acre-feet accounting policy to ensure that water supplies
to CVP contractors are not unlawfully impacted.
The Secretary in conjunction with other Federal and State agencies
also has the discretion to operate the Federal project in coordination
with the CALFED Environmental Water Account to maximize the benefits to
fish and water users. However, the assets of the Environmental Water
Account consist of both water and money to buy water, and consistent
Federal funding is needed to make this innovative approach to water
management work.
The Secretary in coordination with other Federal and State agencies
also has the discretion to implement methods to improve the accuracy of
forecasting Federal and State contractor demands from San Luis
Reservoir to maximize the use of available storage. In recent years the
actual low point in San Luis Reservoir has been significantly higher
than forecasted. Had the contractor demands been more accurately
predicted by Interior up to 200,000 acre-feet more water could have
been made available to Federal contractors.
The Secretary also has discretion under the CVPIA Section
3406(b)(2)(D) to make the dedicated water that is not needed for
fisheries purposes, based on a finding by the Secretary, available for
other project purposes. The benefits of the CALFED Bay-Delta Program
ecosystem restoration program and other habitat restoration processes
implemented since the CVPIA are beginning to restore fish populations
within the Sacramento-San Joaquin Bay-Delta system. As these
populations continue to recover there will be opportunities for the
Secretary to use this water to restore the water supply reliability for
CVP contractors. The water needs for fisheries purposes must take into
account the other habitat restoration tools that have been and are
being implemented since 1992.
The Secretary has discretion and authority under Section 3406(d)(5)
of the CVPIA to construct or acquire from non-Federal entities such
water conveyance facilities, conveyance capacity, and wells as are
necessary to provide water to refuges. Finding alternative sources of
water for refuges will make water available for other project purposes.
The Federal project can also help meet the water needs of its
contractors by expediting requests for water transfers and providing
project power, generated using CVP facilities, to wheel transfer water
through the State pumping facilities. CVP staff is already working hard
to minimize delays in processing water transfers but lack the resources
and procedures to meet the increased demand for transfers.
Consideration also needs to be given to streamlining the environmental
permitting for transfers of Federal water.
The Federal project can also assist by providing the ability for
CVP contractors to carry over water in CVP or non-project reservoirs
for use in the next contract year. Contra Costa Water District was
unable to carryover water this year because carryover and rescheduling
is not specifically provided for in our CVP contract. CCWD often uses
its existing Los Vaqueros Reservoir to make releases to meet the
District's water quality goals when the Federal and State projects are
making releases from upstream reservoirs to meet Delta water quality
and fish objectives. CCWD could assist the Federal and State projects
meet those Delta ecosystem and water quality goals by reducing its
diversions from the Delta during these periods if it could be
guaranteed that CCWD could replace that water during times of excess
flow in the Delta. This is consistent with Section 3408(d) of the 1992
CVPIA which authorizes the Secretary to enter into agreements to allow
project contracting entities, such as CCWD, to use project facilities,
in this case Shasta Reservoir, for supplying carry-over storage.
The Secretary should also incorporate these concepts of carryover
and rescheduling into the current process of long-term renewal of CVP
contracts (required under Section 3404(c) of the CVPIA) to improve
operational flexibility of the CVP. Interior is currently reviewing the
bases for negotiation of these long-term renewal contracts.
2. Implementation of good science and peer review in decision making
while employing improved technologies for project operations.
CALFED agencies and stakeholders have consistently called for
decision making related to the water needs for the ecosystem to be
based on a strong scientific program. Which employs state of the art
technology and independent peer review. Recently, the National Academy
of Sciences was asked to peer review the science used in decisions made
regarding the Klamath. This type of review should be routine when
moving forward with resource decisions on the Bay Delta. Additionally,
CALFED has developed a long-term program to monitor the health of the
ecosystem and will make decisions based on its findings. Federal
agencies involved in this effort such as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service and National Marine Fisheries Service need to ensure that they
are applying sufficient resources to these efforts.
Adaptive management will not work without the underpinning of a
good scientifically sound database. The current technologies used to
monitor the location of fish species within the Bay-Delta system are
based in large part on outdated technologies such as nets deployed from
river banks or towed behind boats. These provide limited insight on
where the fish are, in what numbers or where they are heading. High
tech methods such as that used in satellite remote sensing, acoustic
sensing and other imaging techniques need to be implemented to better
understand how to protect and enhance fisheries while restoring water
supply reliability. Techniques used in other fields and the
resourcefulness of the government laboratories and universities in the
San Francisco Bay Area and high tech areas like Silicon Valley should
be brought to bear on this problem.
Better knowledge of fish population response to flows, water
quality, ocean harvest and other factors will enable the development of
better science that can be use to assess the bases for fisheries
actions, the results of such actions, and allow real-time adaptive
management changes to those fish actions which may not always depend on
more water releases.
While high tech fish monitoring may not be able to be deployed in
time to directly improve water supply reliability in 2002, research and
development needs to get underway now to be able to provide benefits in
future years. Additional funding now will ensure better science for
guiding and maximizing the efficiency of future project operations to
meet all project purposes.
3. Increased cooperation between the Federal, State and local projects.
The ability of the Federal CVP to meet its contractors' water
supply needs could be greatly increased if the CVP were able to make
more use of the available State storage and conveyance facilities. The
State of California already cooperates with the CVP in this regard but
Congress should encourage and help facilitate an even greater level of
cooperation.
The Federal pumping facility at Tracy in the South Delta is
regularly at its maximum capacity. There are times when the Central
Valley Project is making releases of previously stored CVP water
released from upstream reservoirs to meet fisheries habitat goals, such
as maintaining cold temperatures for spawning fish, and is unable to
recapture or reuse that Federal water to meet other project needs. This
water has to be abandoned by the CVP where upon it is captured instead
by the State Water Project using its excess capacity at the State
pumping facility <SUP>1</SUP>. With better cooperation between the
State and Federal agencies regulating and managing the water projects,
a major share of that water could be pumped for the CVP at the State
pumping facility, stored in available CVP, State or local storage
facilities, and remain available for CVP project purposes.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Note that the requirement for releases from Shasta Dam for cold
water habitat predate the 1992 Central Valley Project Improvement Act
and are not part of the 800,000 acre-feet of CVP yield that is
dedicated for restoring anadromous fish. Releases of water to meet the
800,000 acre-feet provisions of CVPIA may or may not fall under the
definition of abandoned water, depending on the final outcome of the
ongoing 800,000 acre-feet litigation in Federal Court.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The State already provides some wheeling of CVP water through the
State facilities and allows temporary use of the State's share of
storage in San Luis Reservoir for the benefit of the CVP. However, this
joint use of facilities needs to be expanded to enable the Federal
project to retain control over its water supplies.
This existing cooperation between the State and the Federal
projects is not always one way--in June 2001, for example, the CVP
pumped State Water Project water at Tracy to provide water to SWP
contractors while the lining of the upper California Aqueduct, a State
facility, was being repaired. A similar intertie from the State
aqueduct to the Federal canal should be implemented this year to
increase the ability of the CVP to deliver water to its contractors.
This will allow the CVP to pump water to its full allocated and
permitted level rather than being restricted by the reduced downstream
canal capacity.
The CALFED Bay-Delta Program calls for increasing the permitted
capacity of the State pumping facility in the South Delta to 8,500
cubic feet per second (cfs) initially and eventually to 10,300 cfs.
This should only go forward if all impacts on other water users are
mitigated; in particular the potential water quality impacts at CCWD's
drinking water intakes. However, if the proposed expansions can be
implemented without redirecting impacts to others, the Federal agencies
should seek to formalize a share of that increased capacity to avoid
further exacerbating the current windfall provided to the State project
from actions by the Federal project to improve fisheries and the Bay-
Delta ecosystem.
One example where Federal-State cooperation would be appear to be
straightforward and could help improve a water agency's situation is in
the case of Santa Clara Valley Water District, a San Francisco Bay Area
urban agency, which is both a State Water Contractor and CVP
contractor. Moving some CVP water to Santa Clara and the Silicon Valley
via the South Bay Aqueduct rather than through San Luis Reservoir and
the San Felipe Project would free up CVP capacity for other contractors
while reducing an additional constraint on CVP deliveries, namely water
quality issues for Santa Clara related to the low point in San Luis
Reservoir storage. This would require agreements with the State and
agreements with and between local agencies in the Bay Area. This
proposal is currently being studied as part of the CALFED Bay-Area
Blending/Exchange Project and the San Luis low point study, and could
produce significant water quality and water supply reliability
benefits.
As I mentioned earlier, CCWD unsuccessfully sought to carryover
some of its CVP allocation in Shasta Reservoir this year. This was
water that the CVP did not have to release to meet Delta flow and
fisheries requirements because CCWD was taking water directly from Los
Vaqueros Reservoir and reducing it diversions from the Delta during
balanced conditions. This is an example where Federal project should
cooperate with a local agency to meet Federal project goals.
4. Implement all aspects of CALFED Bay-Delta Program in a balanced
manner
California's population is expected to increase by more than 8
million within the next 15 years, according to the California
Department of Finance. Many of the administrative and operational
actions I have already discussed will also help increase the water
supply reliability needs in the near term future. Most of the future
increases in water demand were identified by CALFED as being addressed
by implementing water conservation and reclamation and transfers.
However, new groundwater and surface storage projects, in particular
those described in the CALFED Record of Decision, are needed to ensure
the needed water quality for drinking water and the environment, and to
meet the CALFED Environmental Water Account needs. These new storage
facilities will allow more efficient use of capacity in existing
reservoirs and improve water supply reliability.
New storage can lead to a win-win-win situation. For example,
increased storage adjacent to urban areas can be used to capture good
quality water during times of high flows when fish needs are being met.
During times of low flow in the Delta when the source water from the
Delta is typically more salty and fish are more susceptible, urban
agencies can rely on the previously stored water to maintain an
acceptable water supply for their customers and reduce their diversions
from the Delta to the benefit of fish and water supply reliability.
I encourage Congress to put its full support behind ensuring that
CALFED is implemented in a balanced way. The new groundwater and
surface storage projects outlined in the CALFED Record of Decision are
critical components of a balanced CALFED program and a necessary
component for ensuring water quality and supply reliability to not only
meet California's existing food production, manufacturing, and
industrial and municipal needs but also the increased needs as
California's population grows during the 21st Century.
Conclusion
Mr. Chairman, I realize that some of the suggestions made in this
testimony cannot all be implemented immediately. However, I believe it
is essential that the administrative agencies become much more
energetic in using their existing powers to intelligently and actively
manage their water supplies for the maximum benefit of all the state's
needs. It is no longer acceptable to manage water supplies for just a
single purpose, ignoring at the same time the opportunities they have
to serve additional needs. We must make full use of the powerful tools
of flexibility, innovation, cooperation and consensus to meet this
challenge and build a better future. Thank you for the opportunity to
appear before you today.
______
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
Our next witness is Mr. Osann, representing the Natural
Resources Defense Council.
STATEMENT OF EDWARD R. OSANN, CONSULTANT REPRESENTING THE
NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL
Mr. Osann. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Ed Osann. I
am here on behalf of NRDC, the Natural Resources Defense
Council. I have a prepared statement. I would like to leave
that for the record, Mr. Chairman, and summarize simply a few
key points.
Mr. Calvert. Without objection, so ordered.
Mr. Osann. First of all, let me start by saying that NRDC
strongly supports the CALFED ROD and its balanced
implementation. The ROD was the culmination of a 10-year effort
of a great number of stakeholders. As you might imagine, we are
enthusiastic about some portions of it and skeptical about
other portions, but CALFED is the road map for California's
water future, and without it we would be looking at a
considerably more chaotic situation.
I also agree with the remarks of Mr. Bishop that the bureau
forecast, the bureau's early season forecasts on potential
water deliveries, have been excessively conservative, and
unhelpful in that regard. And to the extent that these can
reliably be improved in the future, that would be beneficial
both to water users and natural resource managers.
Mr. Chairman, you alluded to last week's decision, and of
course it has been the understandable focus of a great deal of
discussion here today. We believe that this is potentially very
destabilizing. We think that this decision really takes us to
the precipice. Where are we, when the key element of the
environmental baseline for the ROD, for the ROD of the
Secretary, has been yanked out from underneath? Where are we if
we don't have a valid biological opinion? Where are we if we
don't have a valid NEPA final environmental impact statement?
So we think it is really incumbent upon the Secretary to
appeal the decision and to protect the 1999 (b)(2) formulation.
Attached to my testimony is a letter to the Secretary in
support of the 1999 formulation, signed by virtually all of the
principal environmental groups in the State.
The most important thing that Congress can do is enact
legislation that will authorize the balanced implementation of
CALFED consistent with the ROD. We believe the Senate bill does
that. We believe the House bill does not. There are several
issues and concerns we have about the House bill.
Notable among them is the assurances language. In objecting
to the assurances language, we are not alone. Attached to my
statement is a letter to you, Mr. Chairman, signed by the
Natural Resources Defense Council, Friant Water Users,
Metropolitan Water District, United Farm Workers, and
California Trout, all objecting to this singling out of this
particular group of beneficiaries for assurances language.
We would urge the Congress to move this year to enact
legislation to authorize CALFED in a balanced manner consistent
with the ROD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Osann follows:]
Statement of Edward R. Osann, President, Potomac Resources, Inc., on
behalf of the Natural Resources Defense Council
Chairman Calvert and members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for the
opportunity to speak with you today. My name is Edward R. Osann. I am
here today on behalf of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC),
an organization with over 500,000 members, 100,000 of them in
California, to testify regarding Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta
operations and related water supply issues.
By way of background, I have appeared before this subcommittee on
many occasions in the past. From 1993 to 1995, I served as Director of
Policy and External Affairs for the Bureau of Reclamation. Prior to
joining the Federal Government, I served as Director of the Water
Resources Program of the National Wildlife Federation from 1980 to
1993. I currently maintain a consulting practice specializing in energy
and natural resources policy.
CALFED: Key to the Future.
For the past 10 years, stakeholders and agencies have been working
in California to develop a comprehensive plan to address a broad range
of complex ecosystem restoration, water quality and water supply issues
related to the Bay-Delta system. This extraordinarily challenging
effort resulted in a final plan, adopted through the CALFED Bay-Delta
Program in August of 2000. This ambitious plan enjoys support from the
Bush and Davis administrations, as well as from agricultural, urban,
environmental, and other stakeholder groups. If implemented in a
balanced fashion, NRDC believes that this plan will result in
significant water supply, water quality, and ecosystem benefits. West
side CVP water supply is one of many issues addressed in this plan. In
short, the CALFED plan is currently the only map available to help
decision-makers navigate complex water problems in California.
Westlands: Reckless Attacks on CALFED.
One of the issues you are considering today is the delivery of
highly subsidized water from the Central Valley Project (CVP) to the
Westlands Water District and other growers on the west side of the San
Joaquin Valley. We acknowledge that growers in this area face
significant challenges, but it is important to recognize that they knew
of these challenges when they made business decisions to purchase land
and sign water contracts in this area. Westlands growers paid lower
prices for their land because of the selenium and other drainage
problems in this region. These west side interests have always known
that their CVP water supplies are junior to other water users and that
their CVP contract provides a supplemental supply, to be delivered when
available and well short of what they claim to be their full need.
Because of these lower land prices, Westlands growers have been able to
invest in water transfers, higher value crops and drainage and
irrigation systems. They have also been aided by massive water, crop,
and other subsidies.
The Central Valley Project, like many water projects, is
overcommitted. Water users have succeeded in persuading project
operators to write contracts for far more water than they are capable
of delivering. In California, the Friant unit of the CVP regularly
cannot deliver full Level 2 supplies. The State Water Project has never
delivered all of the water for which it has written contracts. In fact,
it regularly delivers 60 percent or less of contract entitlements. The
West side of the San Joaquin Valley also exhibits this trend, although
no more than other water projects. Other water users--in the Friant
Unit and the State Project--have recognized this uncertainty and have
planned appropriately to meet their needs. Westlands, however, has
adopted a different strategy. Its approach has been to attempt to
litigate and legislate its way to a more reliable subsidized water
supply, at the expense of the ecosystem and other water users. We urge
you not to encourage this destructive and destabilizing approach to
resolving water issues.
The remainder of my testimony will focus on a number of
recommendations which we believe would keep the CALFED program moving
forward in a balanced fashion and would result in West side water
supply benefits, together with additional benefits throughout the
state.
We urge Congress and the Department of the Interior to take the
following actions--
1. Support Implementation of the CALFED Program. The CALFED program
is already providing benefits to water users, including those in the
Westlands Water District. These benefits have included funding for
groundwater, water quality, and water use efficiency programs. CALFED
has also created an Environmental Water Account, which is helping to
restore the Bay-Delta ecosystem and provide growers with greater
certainty of supply. Ultimately, a healthy ecosystem, another goal of
the CALFED program, will also provide greater certainty for water
users.
Congress is currently considering legislation to authorize Federal
participation in the CALFED program. NRDC strongly supports S. 1768.
However, H.R. 3208, as reported by the Resources Committee, would
fundamentally undermine the CALFED program and threaten its success. We
have shared with Committee staff a summary of some of the key
differences between these bills. We urge the House to pass a CALFED
bill this year that implements, and does not alter, the delicate
balance in the CALFED plan. Future appropriations for CALFED could be
at risk if an authorizing bill is not passed soon.
2. Prevent Rollbacks of Environmental Laws that Would Threaten
CALFED. The Westlands Water District has sued the Department of the
Interior as part of an attempt to force the Department to withdraw key
decisions of the implementation of section 3406(b)(2) of the Central
Valley Project Improvement Act. The Department's October 1999 decision
has been upheld by the courts in the past. Last week, however, Interior
suffered a legal setback in this case. We strongly urge the Department
to appeal this ruling and continue to defend the implementation of the
CVPIA. We are confident that Interior's October 1999 provision will
prevail on appeal. This issue is a critical test of the
Administration's support for the CALFED Program. The October 1999
decision is a key foundation for the CALFED program, as outlined in the
attached letter to Secretary Norton. In particular, it is important to
note that if Interior does not continue to defend (b)(2)
implementation, it will eliminate the water supply assurances that have
benefited Westlands and all other water users in the Central Valley,
Southern California, and the Bay Area. A failure to fully implement--
and defend--the CALFED Record of Decision requirements regarding the
CVPIA and the ESA would jeopardize the entire CALFED program. It would
directly undermine both ecosystem restoration and water supply
reliability for much of the state. Over the long term, it would
undermine CALFED programs designed to benefit the entire state's
environment and economy. We urge the Department of the Interior not to
roll back environmental protections established under the CVPIA, the
Endangered Species Act, and the Trinity River Restoration Act.
3. Refuse to Interfere in California Water Allocation Issues.
Westlands is seeking legislation to guarantee its CVP water deliveries.
Such a provision is included in H.R. 3208 as reported by the Resources
Committee. Although less damaging than previous versions, the current
language would still undermine the CALFED program, including its
environmental protections and its water supply reliability benefits for
other urban and agricultural water users. Such legislative assurances
also represent substantial interference in state water allocation
issues. Attached is a letter opposing legislative water delivery
assurances signed by the Friant Water Users Authority, the Metropolitan
Water District of Southern California, United Farm Workers, California
Trout, and NRDC.
4. Urge the Westlands Water District to drop its Legal Attacks. In
the past several years, the Westlands Water District has launched legal
attacks to weaken legally-required environmental protections, to halt a
project by the East Bay Municipal Water District, to undermine the
water supply for farmers in the Friant Unit of the CVP, and,
indirectly, to weaken the CALFED water delivery assurances which
benefit all south-of-the-Delta water users. As a result of the attack
on the Friant Unit of the CVP during 2001, farmers withdrew an offer to
sell 200,000 acre-feet of water to Westlands. In short, during the past
year, Westlands managers' aggressive legal strategy cost Westlands
farmers 200,000 acre-feet of water. Withdrawing this action would allow
Westlands to begin to rebuild these business relationships, which
benefit both seller and buyer. Westlands' confrontational actions are
not leading to durable solutions that will benefit its farmers.
5. Write Renewed CVP Contracts with Responsible Financing and
Quantity Provisions. The Bureau of Reclamation is currently negotiating
long-term contract renewals in the Central Valley. In the past, Federal
subsidies have inflated demand for water and worsened environmental
problems. These subsidies also worsen the overproduction and commodity
price problems facing agriculture throughout California. For your
information, I have attached a Bureau of Reclamation graphic that
indicates that over the past half century, CVP water users have repaid
only 5 percent of the taxpayer investment of the CVP allocated to
irrigation and M&I water. The repayment shown is in nominal dollars,
and still leaves Federal taxpayers shouldering all of the interest on
this investment for CVP agricultural water users. We urge the Bureau to
write contracts that move away from the massive subsidies of the past
and that contain contract quantities that accurately reflect the
delivery capability of the CVP.
6. Require an Open Process to Develop a Land Retirement Program.
Tom Birmingham, the General Manager of the Westlands Water District,
has suggested that it might be appropriate to stop farming, or to
``retire,'' up to 200,000 acres of Westlands--one third of the
District. In retrospect, some of this land should never have been
irrigated. In principle, we agree that an ambitious land retirement
program could produce multiple benefits, including environmental, water
supply, and water quality benefits. However, despite the fact that NRDC
is a party to the litigation in which these issues are being addressed,
and despite multiple requests, we have received only scant information
regarding pending land retirement and settlement discussions. What
information we have received raises serious concerns regarding
potential environmental impacts, impacts to other water users, and the
appropriateness of the expenditure of hundreds of millions of Federal
dollars. We believe that a land retirement partnership could produce
broad benefits, but it will not succeed unless it is developed through
an open process with other stakeholders--now excluded from the
process--at the table. We urge the Bureau of Reclamation to ensure that
the process used to develop a land retirement program is an open and
inclusive one.
7. Promote Urban and Agricultural Water Use Efficiency. CALFED has
undertaken an economic analysis of all water supply options in
California. Even without adding the economic benefits of a healthy
environment, this analysis shows that the least expensive new water
supplies in California are those that focus on improving water use
efficiency--for agricultural and urban water users. The CALFED program
has a major water use efficiency program.
The CALFED Process has led to a ``fragile peace'' on water issues
in California. This ambitious effort is implementing a balanced program
to serve the environment and economy of a state with over 30 million
residents. However, the Westlands Water District, which represents a
few hundred landowners, has chosen a different path. We urge Congress
and the Administration to pursue the workable recommendations listed
above, rather than abandoning this promising approach for the Westlands
strategy of confrontation and conflict.
Thank you for this opportunity to address these important
California water issues.
Attachments :
<bullet> LAugust 28, 2001 letter regarding the CVPIA and CALFED
<bullet> LFebruary 1, 2002 letter regarding legislative water
deliver assurances
<bullet> LCentral Valley Project repayment graphic
______
[Attachments to Mr. Osann's statement follow:]
Natural Resources Defense Council * Save San Francisco Bay Association
* California League of Conservation Voters * League of Women Voters of
California * Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations *
Sierra Club * American Rivers * Friends of the River * The Bay
Institute of San Francisco * California Trout * California Sportfishing
Protection Alliance * Planning and Conservation League * Mono Lake
Committee--CLEAN South Bay * Marin Conservation League * Golden Gate
Audubon Society * Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society * Sierra Nevada
Alliance * WaterKeepers of Northern California * Friends of the Trinity
River * California Urban Creeks Council * Save the American River
Association
August 28, 2001
Gale Norton, Secretary
Department of the Interior
1849 C Street, NW
Washington DC, 20240
Re: LImplementation of Section 3406(b)(2) of the CVPIA
Dear Secretary Norton,
We are writing to express our appreciation for your continuing
efforts to defend the final October 5, 1999 Department of Interior
final decision regarding implementation of Section 3406(b)(2) of the
Central Valley Project Improvement Act (CVPIA). The ``(b)(2)''
provision requires the Bureau of Reclamation to dedicate 800,000 acre-
feet per year from the Central Valley Project to the restoration of the
Bay-Delta estuary and its anadromous fisheries. The October 1999 final
decision was issued after years of negotiation, and ultimately
litigation, regarding implementation of section 3406(b)(2). It has
repeatedly been upheld as legally valid by the Federal court.
We understand that some have requested that the new administration
reopen the October 1999 final decision. We write to urge you to reject
these requests. Although we disagree with some portions of the final
decision, we urge you not to administratively re-open this decision.
The CALFED Record of Decision (ROD) is premised on full implementation
of the CVPIA, including the commitment to provide 800,000 acre-feet of
CVP water to Central Valley fish and wildlife each year. Strong
implementation of the CVPIA is critical to restore the Bay-Delta
ecosystem and its fisheries. Because of the close relationship between
CVPIA implementation and CALFED, any decision to weaken CVPIA
implementation would have direct and immediate impacts on the CALFED
process. We would like to briefly present a few of these connections.
Environmental Water Account: The Environmental Water Account (EWA)
is intended to ``provide water for the protection and recovery of fish
beyond water available through existing regulatory actions related to
project operations,'' (ROD, p. 54) clearly including the CVPIA. In
fact, the size and operating rules of the EWA were determined based on
extensive modeling and evaluation which assumed the full use of the
800,000 acre-feet supply of water ``pursuant to section 3406(b)(2) of
the CVPIA in accordance with Interior's October 5, 1999 decision,
clarified as follows'' (ROD, p. 56). (The ROD goes on to resolve
``offset'' and ``reset''--two critical CVPIA accounting issues.) The
permits which allow water project operators to export water from the
Delta, providing the EWA is being implemented, could be invalid if the
CVPIA baseline for the EWA were no longer in place.
Endangered Species Act and Delta Pumping Commitments: The
Biological Opinions that support CALFED implementation and commitments
made to water users regarding ESA implementation, the Environmental
Water Account and Delta pumping are explicitly dependent on
implementation of the CVPIA as described in the October 1999 final
decision and the ROD. In particular, resource agencies found that the
CALFED ROD complies with the requirements of the ESA because of the
benefits of the full range of protection and restoration tools in the
ROD. A weakening of the CVPIA would undermine CALFED's compliance with
the ESA and require a reinitiation of consultation. It would likewise
undermine commitments made to water users regarding Delta pumping and
water supplies.
Balancing: The CALFED ROD requires a finding of balanced
implementation. Specifically, this section of the ROD requires that
agency actions be ``consistent with the intent of this ROD and
applicable regulatory compliance documents'' (ROD, page 5). Any
decision to reverse final decisions regarding implementation of (b)(2)
would be inconsistent with the ROD and with environmental compliance
documents and would make it impossible to make a credible finding of
balanced implementation.
Consistency with the CALFED ROD: Interior signed a CALFED
``Implementation Memorandum of Understanding'', which is included in
the CALFED ROD. One of the implementation principles states that ``The
Agencies will support the implementation of the CALFED Program as
described in the ROD. Agencies will support and implement actions
consistent with the ROD'' (ROD, Attachment 3, page 5). Clearly, it
would be impossible to honor this commitment if Interior were to
reverse critical commitments about implementing section 3406(B)(2) made
in the ROD.
National Environmental Policy Act: The October 1999 final decision
and the clarifications regarding ``offset'' and ``reset'' are formally
incorporated into the CALFED ROD and environmental documentation. Any
change in these positions would affect the validity of the CALFED
environmental documents and could require a new NEPA analysis, and most
likely the issuance of a supplemental environmental impact statement.
The key to the success of the CALFED program is maintaining the
balance in the ROD that attracted broad support from all stakeholder
groups and from the state and Federal legislatures. The CALFED ROD
resolved a range of outstanding issues and created a package of
programs and strategies that will provide broad benefits for all water
users and the ecosystem. They key word here is ``package.'' It is not
possible to undermine one portion of the ROD without causing that
package to unravel, both politically and legally. Any such actions
would not merely damage CALFED, they would damage the California
environment and economy.
We would be pleased to meet with you to discuss the CALFED program
and implementation of the CVPIA. In particular, if you consider any
reopening, revisiting or clarification of (b)(2) implementation issues,
we request an opportunity to meet with you before you make any
decisions. We look forward to working with you to implement the CALFED
ROD. Thank you for your consideration of our views.
Sincerely,
,-- ,
Barry Nelson Cynthia Koehler
Natural Resources Defense Council Save San Francisco Bay
Association
Sarah Rose Roberta Borgonovo
California League of Conservation League of Women Voters of
Voters California
,-- ,
Dan Sullivan S. Elizabeth Birnbaum
Sierra Club American Rivers
Elizabeth Reifsneider Gary Bobker
Friends of the River The Bay Institute of San
Francisco
Nick Di Croce Richard Izmirian
California Trout California Sportfishing
Protection Alliance
Gerald H. Meral, Ph.D. Frances Spivy-Weber
Planning and Conservation League Mono Lake Committee
Bob Raab Trish Mulvey
Marin Conservation League CLEAN South Bay
Arthur Feinstein Kelly Crowley
Golden Gate Audubon Society Santa Clara Valley Audubon
Society
Laurel Ames Jonathan Kaplan
Sierra Nevada Alliance WaterKeepers of Northern
California
Byron Leydecker John Steere
Friends of the Trinity River California Urban Creeks Council
Zeke Grader Alan D. Wade
Pacific Coast Federation of Save the American River
Fishermen's Associations Association
______
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 77682.001
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] 77682.002
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
STATEMENT OF JOHN STOVALL, GENERAL COUNSEL, KERN COUNTY WATER
AGENCY
Mr. Stovall. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure to
be here on behalf of the second largest contractor on the State
water project. I am pleased to be here with Mr. Quinn, another
minor contractor on the project, and particularly pleased to be
here with Steve Macaulay, the Chief Deputy Director of the
Department of Water Resources. They have been a consistent and
reliable partner in trying to provide sufficient water to the
State of California. We are not so sure that the west side CVP
contractors would say the same about the bureau.
And by that, I will explain it later, but I don't mean to
criticize Mr. Raley and his staff, because in our view they are
sort of the new kids on the block here and they deserved a time
to get their feet on the ground. But we expect that they do
have their feet on the ground now, and we expect them to begin
to comply with the law as announced by the courts recently.
To understand the CALFED puzzle, we believe you have to
step back and get a little perspective on the situation. CALFED
has been a multiyear process which examined dozens of
alternatives that were presented to it, and they selected three
that were ultimately carefully studied for consideration. It is
no surprise to you probably that our agency supported the dual
conveyance alternative, but CALFED selected a less intensive
alternative, less intensive infrastructure at least, that they
are pursuing. We support that vigorously and are working toward
its implementation.
What that alternative does though, is to make those
infrastructure components that are part of it that much more
critical. The groundwater and surface storage is critical, an
also critical, as you have heard here today, are the south-of-
delta improvements that improve conveyance capacity at the
pumps.
Another key, or the key actually to success of all of this,
is administrative cooperation and flexibility. If we don't have
that administrative cooperation and flexibility, in our view
the whole thing falls apart, and we will have a repeat of the
electrical crisis that California has suffered. And as the
Chairman has pointed out, we can't build ourselves quickly out
of a water crisis like we seem to have on the electrical side.
There are three major components required administratively
for this solution. The first is, we believe that the bureau
must abandon the discredited policies for implementation of
CPIA that it has pursued. The court in the Eastern District of
California has now ruled that those policies were beyond its
discretion and weren't supported by the law. We believe the
bureau has the opportunity to vigorously move to follow the
law, and we believe that they should use this opportunity to
recommit themselves to serving the water needs of Californians.
If they do that, it will go a long way, even if they are
providing the 800,000 acre-feet that CVPIA requires, it will go
a long way to helping resolve our current situation. Their
current policy has in effect driven some of their contractors
in desperation to attack water supplies of others, and that has
generated tremendous amounts of discord in the California water
community which would be eased significantly if the bureau
actually lived up to their obligations.
We all need to stand by the creative efforts of the
Environmental Water Account, and support its continuation,
because it is a key to resolving the ESA concerns that created
such havoc in California in the early parts of the 1990's.
Finally, the infrastructure components here are a balanced
package with all of the ecosystem components and other items in
the alternative that CALFED has decided to pursue, and it is
important that they move together as a balanced package. Key to
that is the passage of your bill, the passage of Senator
Feinstein's bill in the Senate, and the development of a final
product that creates balance and allows us to move forward. We
would encourage everyone to do everything possible to make that
happen, and that may involve in some cases taking language that
they might not be particularly fully satisfied with in order to
make it happen.
And with that, I will just be available for questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Stovall follows:]
Statement of John F. Stovall, Kern County Water Agency
Introduction
Thank you for the opportunity to present the views of the Kern
County Water Agency on the important issues you are considering today
related to CALFED and California water supply in 2002. My name is John
F. Stovall and I am the General Counsel of the Kern County Water
Agency. Additional personal information will be submitted as an
exhibit.
The Kern County Water Agency is a local governmental entity with
political boundaries encompassing the County of Kern, a territory
approximately the size of Massachusetts, Vermont and Rhode Island
combined. It has a population of more than 600,000 people. Almost 1
million acres of the most productive farmland in the world and about
400,000 people rely on the Agency for a significant portion of their
water supply.
The Agency is the largest contractor for agricultural water on the
State Water Project, and also the third largest contractor for
municipal water. We contracted and paid for this supply intending to
achieve an adequate water supply for the people and lands of Kern
County. Although the uncertainties of nature render our exact water
supply this year difficult to predict, we are certain that the systems
which we have paid (and continue to pay) great sums of money for are
now incapable of providing us with the reliable and adequate water
supply which was promised. That situation exists throughout most of
California, and CALFED and Californians currently face tremendous
regulatory obstacles in trying to improve California's water supply.
Solutions to our water supply shortages require cooperative
efforts. Those of us relying on the State Water Project are working
hard to ensure that unreasonable regulatory restrictions do not further
impair our future and our economies. We are also resolved that other
water users, stressed by their own situations, not attack our own
supplies in desperation. Those interested in an adequate water supply
must constantly encourage Federal and State agencies work vigorously
and creatively to improve the water supply for all Californians while
they meet their statutory environmental responsibilities. Unwise and
overzealous environmental regulation in the past has reduced supplies
to many California water users. We believe that both the Federal and
State systems will now work together to improve water supplies for all.
In 2001 Kern county's people and farms received 39% of their
contracted supply in the first dry year after a series of wet years.
The State Water Project we bought was supposed to provide a full supply
in the seventh year of a drought.
In 2002, it appears as though we may essentially have a mythical
``normal'' year in the watersheds serving the State Water Project, yet
we have a 45% allocation at this time. If that normal year
materializes, it is still likely our supply will be significantly below
our contracted entitlement. CALFED is supposed to help resolve this
problem and the problems of others in the state who are similarly
situated, but CALFED faces a number of serious challenges to the
assumptions upon which it was built.
CALFED has chosen to pursue the least intensive of the solution
alternatives it identified in the hope that administrative and
regulatory flexibility, coupled with minimal infrastructure
improvements would suffice. While some creative administrative programs
have been implement (the Environmental Water Account for example),
other basic components of an administrative solution have been slow in
coming (for example, changes in the administration of CVPIA to comply
with the law.) Pending challenges to the programs instituted thusfar
call into question the viability of those creative programs. Overcoming
these challenges will require a cooperative effort by all concerned to
either prove that regulatory restrictions can be reasonably implemented
to minimize infrastructure requirements, or to implement more
significant infrastructure improvements which may be needed to satisfy
regulatory requirements.
I turn now to your specific questions:
1. Given that present and future demands of urban, agricultural, and
environmental needs exceed the capacity of the project(s),
where do we find solutions to reliably meet these needs in the
21st century?
Regulatory flexibility and administrative dedication to meeting the
needs of water users are key to reducing infrastructure needs for both
projects, the State Water Project (SWP) and the Central Valley Project
(CVP), as well as other California water systems. If these are not
forthcoming to supplement minimal infrastructure improvements, then we
must have more extensive infrastructure solutions.
The solutions currently attempted are essentially the first CALFED
alternative that was under consideration. Each of the alternatives
relied on significant conservation efforts, but the hallmark of the
first alternative was utilization of regulatory flexibility and minor
infrastructure improvements to achieve benefits theoretically
approaching those of the third, ``dual conveyance'', alternative.
The first alternative relies heavily on assumptions that
administrative solutions have the potential to reach a 65% normal
supply for CVP south of delta contractors with minimal infrastructure
improvements. Administrative solutions for the CVP are discussed in the
response to the next question on general administrative solutions. But
the assumptions of regulatory flexibility and the potential for
effective administrative relief are now called into question by threats
of litigation from those who have been opposed to any infrastructure
improvements at all. We believe that prudence requires a careful
examination of returning to a more intensive infrastructure solution if
the ``soft path'' of the first alternative proves to be a quagmire.
Fortunately, CALFED has done the groundwork for a significant
infrastructure solution; it is the third or ``dual conveyance''
alternative. Coupled with the significant conservation regimens and
storage improvements contained therein, the dual conveyance solution
holds the most promise for actually protecting endangered species, and
improving water supply and drinking water quality.
Creation of significant off-stream surface storage, enhancement of
existing storage, and conjunctive use are all contained in the ``dual
conveyance'' alternative. But the hallmark of the alternative is its
namesake, the system of dual conveyance which allows operational
flexibility to avoid entrainment of fish and other adverse
environmental impacts, enhance source drinking water quality, and avoid
impairment of water supply due to catastrophic or regulatory
disruptions.
The duel conveyance alternative provides the following benefits:
1) LThe majority of the water diverted to water users with the duel
system will come from the Sacramento River upstream of the Delta and
the result is significant reductions (close to elimination) of the
THM'' precursors currently in the export water from Delta peat soils
and bromides due to salt water intrusion from the San Francisco Bay.
This will allow urban water waters users to meet all existing and
likely future EPA water quality standards using current treatment
methodologies.
2) LThe duel system provides the CVP and SWP operational
flexibility to provide all of the fishery enhancement protections
currently desired by state and Federal fishery regulatory agencies at
no water cost to the projects. The duel system allows the projects to
provide these benefits and to increase the average annual CVP and SWP
deliveries by about 100 to 150 TAF.
3) LThe duel system also provides operational flexibility that
allows the CALFED proposed storage facilities upstream of the Delta to
be fully utilized. With current Delta transfer facilities water supply
produced by new storage north of the Delta could only be utilized in
very dry years. With the duel system, that storage could be utilized in
almost all years and would allow projects such as the Kern Bank and the
East Reservoir to be fully utilized to the benefit of many water users
south of the Delta.
Local conjunctive use and water banking projects such as our own
Kern Water Bank are also an essential component of a solution to the
problem regardless of the CALFED alternative pursued. Responsible local
agencies have recognized the necessity of pursuing local and regional
responses to the inability of the State and Federal Governments to
solve this urgent problem. Conjunctive use has been recognized as a
valuable and environmentally beneficial method of storage, and we in
Kern County, with the assistance of CALFED, are at the forefront of
this effort. Our Agency and others in Kern County created groundwater
banking programs to help stabilize our supplies before CALFED was
created and continue to work to enhance its capabilities.
The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California is another
local agency that has acted on its own to improve its supply. It has
developed its own significant off-stream storage project, the Diamond
Valley Reservoir. Other local agencies have similar success stories in
improving their own water supplies through development of water,
without taking water from others. These programs, however, require the
cooperation of State and Federal agencies.
Ultimately, if the first alternative is unsuccessful in meeting
California's needs then the more significant infrastructure
improvements in the form of dual conveyance and more surface water
storage will be required. We are working hard to make the first
alternative work, but it requires sufficient funding, administrative
and regulatory creativity, and good faith by those who led CALFED to
try the first alternative with quite limited infrastructure
improvements.
2. In your opinion, what administrative or operational changes,
consistent with existing law, or legislative changes can be
made to meet the goals of water supply and reliability set
forth in the CALFED Record of Decision?
As mentioned, if the ``soft path'' is to provide any relief to the
California water crisis, administrative solutions and regulatory
flexibility must be forthcoming. Some of these have been implemented
and are working reasonably well; the Environmental Water Account is an
example. We view the following as the administrative and regulatory
actions which must be implemented to make the current CALFED
alternative work, and we believe they are possible within the existing
statutory framework. It may be however that some legislative
improvements are necessary as discussed below. If these cannot be
achieved two choices remain: pursuit of the dual conveyance alternative
or serious disruptions of water supply for Californians.
Administrative
Reasonable and balanced implementation of CVPIA.
It is true that the Department of Interior and state have
environmental responsibilities which must be met. Meeting these
obligations must not be an excuse for avoiding their clear contractual
and governmental obligations to provide an adequate water supply for
the people they serve however. In the case of the Department of the
Interior, past policies led the Bureau of Reclamation to discount the
importance of its commitment to provide a water supply to its
contractors. A recent decision in the Federal courts supports this
belief. In the words of the Federal Judge examining the Bureau's
implementation of the CVPIA:
``Interior is contractually bound to provide specific amounts
of water to the water districts absent a water shortage. There
is no justification to increase the use of CVP ``yield'' for
(b)(2) purposes over 800,000 AF, when (b)(2) uses have not
caused or contributed to the increase in CVP yield. Instead,
Interior is arbitrarily preferring (b)(2) uses over all other
water uses that have claims to CVP yield.'' San Luis & Delta-
Mendota Water Authority et al. v. United States of America, Civ
No. F 97-6140 OWW DLB (EDCA Feb.5, 2002) (Supplemental
Memorandum Decision and Order Re: Summary Judgment Motion on
Offset/Reset) at p. 12 (footnote omitted).
This was done without regard for contractual obligations of the
Bureau to their contractors, and without any legal authority. Again,
the trial judges' words are instructive:
The government and the environmental plaintiffs have pointed to
no legal authority that authorizes Interior to create
accounting concepts of ``reset'' and ``offset'' that ignore and
do not account for the actual use of CVP yield for (b)(2)
purposes in violation of Congress' direction that exactly
800,000 AF of CVP yield are to be dedicated and managed
annually for (b)(2) purposes.'' San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water
Authority et al. v. United States of America, Civ No. F 97-6140
OWW DLB (EDCA Feb.5, 2002) (Supplemental Memorandum Decision
and Order Re: Summary Judgment Motion on Offset/Reset) at p.
16-17.
Put simply, the Bureau, without apparent concern for its
obligations to its contractors, got very creative in its accounting to
take more water from them than Congress intended. It is an example of
why we are concerned that the administrative dedication to solving the
real problems of California water users may be difficult to develop.
Administrators and regulators should focus their creativity on
helping to supply adequate water for Californians. If they do, we
believe that the 65% targeted supply for south of delta CVPIA
contractors can be met with the minimal infrastructure improvements
contemplated in the first phase of CALFED without taking water from
other water users. This should reduce markedly the tensions among
California water users, and allow those who have attacked the supplies
of others to work cooperatively with others.
Flexible implementation of the ESA based on sound science.
The administration of the Federal Endangered Species Act is another
case in point. The recent review of Federal actions on Klamath project
by the National Academy of Science supports what we have suspected all
along. Federal regulatory agencies are relying on their own inclination
to take water from water users in a ``meat ax'' approach to solving
environmental problems. We believe a more economically sophisticated
approach is required. Before decisions are made that are catastrophic
to communities, regulators should give due regard to whether there is
actual peer-reviewed sound scientific support for taking the water. The
jobs of people, indeed entire communities, depend upon that water.
Klamath is a dramatic example of a problem that has been present in
regulatory agencies for a decade: Federal agencies with single purpose
missions disregard or discount impacts on humans in their decision
making. The troubling new development reflected in the recent San Luis
& Delta Mendota Water Authority v. U.S. decision is that even agencies
who have clear obligations to serve people, under both contract and
mission, have discounted those obligations. This has serious
implications regarding the potential for success of an alternative that
requires commitment to balance. We are hopeful that those in the
Federal Government responsible for water supply will again recognize
their contractual commitments, and work to meet those commitments
without taking water from other water users.
Achieving reasonable and scientifically sound implementation of the
Endangered Species Act may be extremely difficult. It will require
dedication within the Department of Interior and elsewhere to serving
people while utilizing valid science to both protect the environment
and insure that people are not harmed without solid scientific reason.
That dedication from the Bureau of Reclamation is necessary to ensure
that regulatory restrictions are reasonable.
We believe the existing Endangered Species Act provides the
regulatory flexibility to achieve many of the goals if administrative
solutions are sought. Existing mechanisms for consultation and habitat
conservation planning can achieve solutions that both benefit species
and improve water supply. But these solutions are now the subject of
legal challenges by radical environmental groups who seek to undo the
progress made thus far. We do not believe those challenges will be
successful, but if they are then the death of the first CALFED
alternative will be their responsibility.
Continuing beneficial use of flood and high flow water.
The history of California water in the past decade has been the
actual reduction in existing supplies due to overzealous environmental
regulation. A key to making the first CALFED alternative successful is
at least maintaining the status quo on existing supplies. Yet recent
actions by the Department of Interior threaten historical uses of high
flow and flood waters for conjunctive use projects that ``bank'' such
water for use in dry years. In fact, they threaten a substantial source
of Environmental Water Account water in normal and dry years. The most
basic step in solving our water supply problem is for Federal and State
agencies to work with local agencies to preserve existing supplies.
Our Agency has been a reliable partner of the Friant Division of
the CVP for many years in taking high flow and flood waters to enhance
flood protection in the San Joaquin valley and store those waters for
benefit in dry years. We hope to continue that function of storing high
flow water for beneficial use in dry years. It will require the
cooperation of the Bureau however, and willingness to work with an
Agency which has been a reliable partner for many years. We call upon
the Bureau to facilitate our use of this water which has both
environmental and water supply benefits.
Cooperative Efforts with Other Water Systems.
The Bureau and the State Water Project have long been partners in
addressing California's water supply needs. We call upon the Bureau to
renew its commitment to being a reliable and trustworthy partner with
the SWP. We on the State Water Project join in the concern of CVP
contractors at the apparent disregard for their contractual rights that
has now been confirmed in Federal court. We are confident that the
Bureau will now work hard to meet those commitments. We are also
confident that they will work toward cooperative solutions to improve
the water supply for all Californians.
Specifically, the Coordinated Operating Agreement has been a stable
and unifying landmark in a stormy sea. We urge the Bureau to resist any
temptation to enhance its own supplies to the detriment of others. The
COA should remain a source of stability that enables the Bureau and the
Department of Water Resources to work together to solve the problems
that face us and create additional yield in difficult circumstances.
Local agencies must work to improve their own supplies.
It isn't just Federal and State agencies that have administrative
problems. Local agencies too are faced with difficult administrative
decisions: to take the high and challenging road of working toward
improved supplies for all, or the low road of taking water from others.
Our agency fully appreciates the frustration of dealing with Federal
and state agencies who have occasionally seemed intent on creating
rather than solving problems (though we must commend the State
Department of Water Resources on their work in trying to help solve
these problems.) We are confident that recent court decisions will
reawaken a commitment to improving the water supply for Californians.
We would encourage all local agencies to give Federal and state
administrators a chance to improve supply administratively; passage of
HR 3208 is a first step even if some of the controversial provisions
have to be modified.
Then, if the first CALFED alternative is not successful it will not
be because water users have not tried hard to make it work.
Legislative
The passage of the Calvert and Feinstein bills and achievement of a
product that pass both houses of Congress is critical to success.
Without the necessary funding and assurance of balance provided by HR
3208 in particular, the future of CALFED and California's water supply
is bleak indeed.
Ultimately, if challenges to the program reveal aspects of the
program that need additional legislative authorization, then it must be
forthcoming. We believe that the program can be achieved with current
regulatory authorizations under the appropriate acts however.
Conclusion and Summary
CALFED has been a long process. We are now in the midst of
determining if regulatory and administrative flexibility, coupled with
relatively minor infrastructure improvements, can achieve the same
benefits as the major infrastructure alternative--the dual conveyance
alternative. It can achieve significant benefits for water quality,
water supply and the environment. If the current attempted ``soft
path'' is unsuccessful, we must be ready to move aggressively to the
third alternative to prevent serious damage to California's economy.
______
Mr. Calvert. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Quinn?
STATEMENT OF TIMOTHY H. QUINN, VICE PRESIDENT, STATE WATER
PROJECT RESOURCES, METROPOLITAN WATER DISTRICT OF SOUTHERN
CALIFORNIA
Mr. Quinn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Timothy
Quinn. I am Vice President, State Water Project Resources, at
the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.
The blessing or the curse of being last, most of what I
have got in my testimony has been put before you, so I will try
and very briefly summarize how we responded to the two
questions that you directed to us in your letter of invitation.
The first question was, given that demands on the existing
major projects clearly outstrip supply capabilities, how are we
going to balance demand and supply in the 21st century? As I
said in my written statement, we think the answer to that
question is, in a word, diversification, which has been
mentioned by several other witnesses up here.
What I mean by diversification is you have to rely more on
local investments and local resources for your reliability
future, not at the expense of ignoring the import systems that
are important to you, but your reliability to a substantial
degree lies in your own back yard. Southern California
experience is instructive in this regard.
I came to the district in 1985 as a new upper manager at
the district, I was taught the ``complete the State water
project'' speech. It was ``We've got a contract for 2.0115
million acre-feet of water, and we want the State to honor that
contract and to deliver the water even when it's very dry.''
Well, that one-dimensional strategy failed. In 1991 we had
widespread mandatory rationing in our service area. Economic
damages were substantial. Firms were saying that they couldn't
locate plants or expand plants in California because of a lack
of reliable water supplies. Chaos reigned.
Yesterday Senator Feinstein said that she didn't want
energy to be the forerunner for California water. Well, in some
sense it is the post-runner, because we had an energy-type
experience in 1991 and it was no fun. It was very damaging to
our economy.
In Southern California we determined to start investing in
a more diversified strategy, and I think it is worth noting
that last year in 2001 our allocation of State project water
was very similar to what it had been 10 years earlier in 1991.
We didn't push any panic buttons. We pulled water out of our
groundwater accounts. We had the cushion of Diamond Valley
Lake. Our demands were down because of very aggressive
investments in reclamation and conservation. We went for a
modest amount of water to a very businesslike dry-year transfer
program administered by the Department of Water Resources. We
maintained reliability.
CALFED has embraced that strategy. That strategy is
essential to the economic well-being of the entire State. That
is why we so strongly support the efforts to authorize that
diversified strategy. The competitive grant program fits like a
glove on a hand for the problem that we are trying to solve
with the CALFED program.
Let me turn to the second question. I agree with much of
what has been said previously. The fact is, you can't read the
commitments in the ROD and then read the projections for supply
of the Bureau of Reclamation and come to any other conclusion
than this system is broke and it has got to be fixed consistent
with the supply commitments in the ROD.
We continue to believe that a statute is not the way to
solve that problem. We view this as a problem, a serious
problem in administrative discretion. We also don't think that
this is about a legal dispute. Whatever happens on appeal,
whether Judge Wanger's decision--we substantially agree with
his analysis--is upheld or not, there is a problem.
The problem is that Interior has used its discretion to
undermine balance instead of supporting the balance that is in
the Record of Decision. And the real policy question here is,
is Interior willing to use its discretion in a way that
supports the balanced outcomes of the ROD or not? If it is,
there are a lot of tools available and we think the job can get
done. Start with following the judge's order. Look for other
ways to apply discretion that accomplish the balance in the ROD
instead of disproportionately favoring one use over another.
Over the longer term I think Interior and their contractors
are going to have to get much more aggressive. The State water
contractors, Kern County, Metropolitan, virtually every State
water contractor has gone through some very aggressive form of
integrated resources planning, implementing a diversification
strategy in their service areas. We went through the difficult
job of renegotiating our State water contract, rethinking it
from one end to the other, and the Monterrey Agreement
dramatically changed how we managed the resources available to
us under our contract, and it worked.
Federal contractors have not done either of those things,
and we think it is long overdue. The bureau should be working
with its contractors and with others to do essentially a
Monterrey Agreement, where they are rethinking their own
project, how do they deal with the challenges that we are
facing today, instead of just relying on the operational
procedures that they have always used in the past.
Let me close with a couple of things that are important to
Metropolitan. One is, I wish that the Southern California
representatives were still here. We are concerned that there
could be serious negative impacts on Southern California from
this judge's decision. We are hearing rumors that the CALFED
agencies may decide that we don't need ESA assurances any
longer because a judge has ruled that decisions by the Federal
Government were unlawful. The loss of those assurances would be
devastating from a Southern California perspective, and we will
argue strongly against it.
I think with that I will close and be glad to answer any
questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Quinn follows:]
Statement of Timothy H. Quinn, Vice President, State Water Project
Resources, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for this
opportunity to appear before you on matters of considerable importance
to California. My name is Timothy Quinn. I serve as Vice President of
State Water Project Resources at the Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California.
Today, you have asked witnesses to address two questions:
Given that present and future demands of urban, agricultural,
and environmental needs exceed the capacity of the project,
where do we find solutions to reliably meet these needs in the
21st century?
In your opinion, what administrative or operational changes can
be made to meet the goals of water supply and reliability set
forth in the CALFED Record of Decision?
Mr. Chairman, I will address these questions in order.
Meeting Water Needs in the 21st Century: The Diversification Strategy
Metropolitan believes the answer to the first question is, in a
word, diversification. While California's water managers once believed
our water supply security rested solely in the completion of large
water projects, primarily the State Water Project (SWP), we have come
to recognize we must invest heavily in local resources as well as
assure the security of the statewide water supply system.
Nowhere has this diversification strategy been more vigorously
implemented than in Southern California. Twenty years ago, Southern
California water planners embraced a long-term vision that was one-
dimensional: We wanted the state to honor its contract with us for
2.0115 million acre-feet (MAF) of SWP entitlements, even during the
driest of years. That vision, for better or worse, was not realized,
largely as the result of legitimate environmental concerns.
Today, through Metropolitan's Integrated Resources Plan, we have
moved substantially toward restoring the reliability of the region's
water supplies by investing heavily in local resources, including:
<bullet> LVast reclamation plants to reuse imported water supplies;
<bullet> LConservation programs that save more than 700,000 AF
annually, equal to the combined water demands of the cities of Los
Angeles and San Francisco;
<bullet> LGroundwater storage projects in Southern California and
in partnerships in the San Joaquin Valley and along the Colorado River
Aqueduct in which we have accumulated 1.5 MAF of stored water;
<bullet> LRegional surface storage in Diamond Valley Lake, with a
storage capacity of 800,000 acre-feet built at a cost of $2 billion;
and
<bullet> LStrategic use of water transfers with Colorado River and
Central Valley agricultural partners.
Due to these investments, water use in Southern California today is
about the same as it was in 1975, despite an increase in population of
5 million people.
The importance of these regional resource investments is difficult
to overstate. Today, water demands in Metropolitan's service area
average about 3.8 MAF. By 2020, regional water demands are expected to
average about 4.8 MAF. Our supply challenge is to provide that
additional 1.0 MAF for the $680 million regional economy and fulfill
our unwavering commitment to implement the California Plan to live
within the state's allotment of Colorado River water. Fully 85 percent
of the water expected to meet these growing demands will come from
regional and local investments. These plans for a diversified supply
strategy are not merely written on paper. We are implementing them,
committing billions of our ratepayers' dollars.
To be successful, the diversification strategy requires that the
CALFED Program be successful. From CALFED, we require better water
quality in our SWP supplies to protect public health, assure the
success of reclamation investments, and maintain a balance of SWP and
Colorado River supplies. We require the financial assistance CALFED
promises for the massive investments required in local water supply
resources and expensive water treatment technologies that must be
implemented, if we are to continue using SWP water in our treatment
plants and still meet increasingly stringent drinking water standards.
And we require reliable SWP supplies, to replenish our south-of-the-
Delta storage capacity when it is relatively wet and meet a portion of
dry-year demands.
The CALFED Program has embraced the diversification strategy. At
its core, the CALFED Record of Decision (ROD) is an aggressive,
balanced plan of action, with deadlines and budget commitments to
provide accountability. The CALFED Program strongly emphasizes a
commitment to habitat restoration--an unprecedented program now well
underway--and to investments in local water supply resources throughout
California. It contemplates up to 4.5 MAF of new storage capacity and
necessary improvements to through-Delta water conveyance. Equally
important, CALFED has successfully implemented an Environmental Water
Account, to provide flows for the restoration of fisheries and
essential regulatory assurances for water supplies against further
takings under the Endangered Species Act.
In Southern California, the diversification strategy is working. A
little more than a decade ago, at the end of the 1987-1992 drought with
a SWP supply of only 30 percent, mandatory rationing was widespread in
Southern California, as it was elsewhere in the state. Economic damages
were substantial. Reports were widespread of companies hesitant to
expand plants or locate new ones in California due to unreliable water
supplies. California water in the early and mid-1990s looked a lot like
energy markets at the beginning of the 21st century. Simply stated,
chaos reigned.
In sharp contrast, last year with SWP deliveries similarly limited,
there was no panic. Instead, water demands had been lowered through
aggressive demand management strategies; Metropolitan withdrew water
from its groundwater storage accounts and from Diamond Valley Lake; and
we purchased a modest amount of water from the business-like dry-year
transfer program administered by the California Department of Water
Resources. There was no rationing. Reliability of supplies was
maintained. At the same time, in part due to the historic efforts to
improve habitat and restore beleaguered fisheries, most fishery species
of concern appear to be on a recovery trend.
To keep California on this successful track, it is imperative that
we fulfill the vision of CALFED. It is for this reason that we so
strongly support the efforts to authorize the CALFED Program in H.R.
3208 <SUP>1</SUP>, introduced by Chairman Calvert, as well as the
efforts of Senators Feinstein and Boxer to pass authorization
legislation for the CALFED Program in the Senate.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ As discussed below, Metropolitan continues to oppose the so-
called ``assurances'' language in H.R. 3208.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Administrative and Operational Changes
While overall the CALFED Program provides a sound plan for a secure
water future for California, success has not been universal. One of the
most notable exceptions is the operation of the Central Valley Project
(CVP) both prior to and after the adoption of the CALFED ROD in August
2000.
Recognizing the serious water supply shortfalls experienced by CVP
agricultural service contractors in the west San Joaquin Valley, the
ROD includes a commitment to increase supplies for this region to 65 to
70 percent of their contract amounts under ``normal'' hydrologic
conditions. Yet, in a January 25, 2002 statement, the U.S. Bureau of
Reclamation (Bureau) announced water supply projections that clearly
fall far short of this commitment. Based on the current operating
guidelines for the CVP, under dry conditions, CVP Westside contractors
can expect deliveries of 45 percent, comparable to the current
allocation to SWP contractors. But while SWP contractors can expect
increased deliveries under more favorable hydrologic conditions, CVP
deliveries will be no more than 45 percent even under above-normal
hydrologic conditions. Ironically, if the year turns out wet, CVP
deliveries will be reduced to 35 percent due to the Department of
Interior's (Interior) current plans to implement the Central Valley
Project Improvement Act (CVPIA). The current operational guidelines of
the CVP are not consistent with the clear commitment in the CALFED ROD
to balance water supply and environmental benefits.
Wherein lies the remedy? In a December 11, 2001 letter to Chairman
Calvert (Attachment A), Metropolitan's Chief Executive Officer Ronald
Gastelum expressed our opposition to statutory remedies for this
problem. Like many other water districts throughout California, we
believe that statutory protections to guarantee the water supplies of
one select group of water users, no matter how carefully worded,
inherently pose the risk of putting others at a disadvantage. Such
statutory solutions threaten to replace one form of imbalance with
another. For this reason, we continue to oppose the so-called
``assurance'' language in any CALFED reauthorization bill.
Metropolitan believes just as strongly that the remedy lies in
appropriate use of administrative discretion, as expressed in a
subsequent January 8, 2002 letter to Secretary Norton (Attachment B).
We believe that Interior has ample discretion under existing law to
achieve the balance promised in the ROD. In recent years, Interior has
used its discretion to implement a number of questionable measures in
implementing Section 3406(b)(2) of the CVPIA, which dedicates 800,000
AF of CVP yield for specified environmental purposes (b(2) water).
Chief among these discretionary acts are three accounting practices for
tracking the use of b(2) water that have been labeled ``reset'',
``offset'', and ``credits''. In a decision dated February 5, 2002, the
United States District Court, Eastern District of California has now
found all three of these practices unlawful. For the reasons set forth
below, regardless of the ultimate outcome in the courts, each of these
discretionary actions warrants reexamination.
Reset. One of the uses of b(2) water is to release water from
upstream storage to augment in-stream flows for specific environmental
purposes. Under Interior's reset accounting practice, if storage
subsequently recovers due to wet conditions before the end of January,
the b(2) account is ``reset'' as though the delivery of water for
environmental purposes had never occurred. Using this logic, it could
be argued that if Interior releases stored water for delivery to a CVP
contractor and storage levels subsequently recover, then its contract
obligations should be ``reset'' and Interior should still be obligated
to deliver the contractor's full contract amount as though the initial
delivery had never occurred. The soundness of such a policy is subject
to question. Certainly, allowing for ``reset'' after one project use
but not another introduces systematic imbalance to CVP operations which
has contributed to the water supply shortfalls in the west San Joaquin
Valley. <SUP>2</SUP>
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ According to the Federal District Court decision: ``[Interior]
is not free to use ``reset'' to ``undedicate'' and not account for (b)
(2) use in a water year, because the current year's overall CVP water
delivery capacity has been increased by the windfall of increased
precipitation. . . Other than to prefer one competing use for water
over another, without legal authority, the reset mechanism is a post
hoc rationalization to justify not charging actual (b) (2) use.'' U.S.
District Court, Eastern District of California, Supplemental Memorandum
and Order, February 5, 2002, pages 12-13.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Offset. The offset accounting practice affects CVP operations
during summer months of peak irrigation demand. During these months
with virtually no natural precipitation, water generally must be
released from storage to be delivered to CVP export contractors.
Accordingly, under some circumstances upstream storage will be higher
in the system because export deliveries are cut to protect fish as a
b(2) measure. Under the offset accounting practice, such shortages of
water during peak irrigation months may not count as a use of b(2)
water, because, under certain circumstances, the increase in storage
``offsets'' the loss of export water supply in Interior's accounting
methodology. Thus, despite the fact that an environmental benefit
ostensibly occurs by reducing exports and the fact that a clear
economic harm occurs for the westside water user, Interior's offset
accounting practices may treat such water as never being used for b(2)
purposes. Like reset, the Federal District Court has found the offset
accounting practice arbitrary and capricious and has ruled it unlawful.
<SUP>3</SUP>
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ The District Court held: ``Thus, although CVP yield was
actually used for (b) (2) purposes, and not made available for other
CVP water users, it was not accounted for under the (b) (2) account.
Once water is used for (b) (2) purposes, it must be accounted for.
Interior may not use ``offset'' to ``undedicate'' and not account for
as (b) (2) use, water that has already been used for (b) (2) purposes
in a water year.'' Ibid, page 15.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Credits. The CVPIA expressly states the purposes of b(2) water
include water used pursuant to the state's Water Quality Control Plan
(WQCP) and to meet ESA objectives. Water used for these purposes should
be fully credited against the 800,000 AF of yield dedicated for
environmental purposes under the Act. Yet, Interior's accounting
practices place an arbitrary cap of 450,000 AF annually on the amount
of water credited for these purposes. When actual impacts on the CVP
exceed this amount, this accounting practice makes it likely that more
than 800,000 AF will be taken from CVP contractors and used for the
environmental purposes of the Act. In an October 19, 2001 ruling, the
District Court agreed, ordering Interior to fully credit water used for
WQCP and ESA purposes. <SUP>4</SUP>
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ Emphasizing the importance of maintaining some certainty for
CVP Contractors, the court argued: ``[I]f it were left to Interior's
``discretion'' whether or not to count CVP yield used for such [WQCP or
ESA] (b) (2) purposes, the annual 800 TAF cap would be illusory. The
800,000 TAF [sic] is intended by Congress as an immutable floor and
ceiling on annual reallocation of water from CVP yield for (b) (2)
purposes. If Interior uses more than 800 TAF for (b) (2) purposes in
any year, but does not count all CVP yield used for such purposes, it
violates CVPIA Section 3406 (b) (2).'' U.S. District Court, Eastern
District of California, Memorandum Decision and Order, October 19,
2001, page 35.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Whether within Interior's legal discretion or not, Interior's
current b(2) accounting practices are inconsistent with the balance
objectives defined in the CALFED plan of action. The use of water
dedicated for environmental purposes, whether b(2) or otherwise, should
reflect the best scientific information available and attempt to
achieve environmental restoration objectives with the least economic
impact on others. Interior's practices appear to result in the use of
more than 800,000 AF annually. Moreover, many of these practices have
the effect of concentrating fish protection actions disproportionately
on reducing CVP exports where the scientific support for such use tends
to be weaker and the economic costs higher. Regardless of the ultimate
outcome in the courts, Metropolitan urges Interior to reexamine its use
of administrative discretion in implementing CVPIA and make appropriate
adjustments consistent with the objectives of the CALFED ROD to balance
water supply and environmental restoration objectives.
Environmental Considerations and the Role of Science
We are aware some interests may be concerned about the implications
for environmental restoration of changes in the administration of CVPIA
or other environmental laws. Metropolitan strongly agrees that the
water supply benefits of the ROD should not be achieved at the expense
of environmental restoration. Indeed, the philosophy of the CALFED
Program is that we can accomplish both environmental restoration and
water supply reliability--and that is the case here.
Already, some have suggested that because portions of the CALFED
environmental baseline have been declared illegal there should be an
immediate acre-foot for acre-foot increase in the Environmental Water
Account or that ESA assurances should be withheld this year from the
State Water Contractors and others. Such actions are premature. The ROD
contains an orderly, public process based on science for dealing with
such uncertainties and addressing whether additional EWA assets should
be implemented. Metropolitan strongly urges Interior to follow those
procedures.
It is important to recognize that California's fisheries are in far
better shape today than they were a mere decade ago. That is certainly
the case for the three ESA listed species that have been a concern in
the operations of the CVP and SWP in recent years: the winter-run
chinook salmon, the spring-run chinook salmon, and the delta smelt.
The winter-run chinook salmon has been the subject of intense
management activities and, for the first time in decades, the
population of this species is on a recovery trend. The winter-run
numbered only 191 returning adults in 1991, but last year more than
7,500 adults returned to spawn, the largest number since 1982. If
CALFED is able to proceed with plans to restore 42 miles of cold water
river habitat for this species on Battle Creek (a Sacramento River
tributary near Redding), the winter-run may well be within reach of the
population restoration goals of CVPIA and CALFED. Similarly,
populations of the spring-run chinook salmon are rebounding on other
Sacramento River tributaries. On Butte Creek, a critical spawning area
for this species, CALFED restoration efforts with local and statewide
cooperation have restored nearly 30 miles of prime habitat. As a
result, where once only a few hundred fish returned to spawn, in recent
years the returning adults number in the tens of thousands. The Delta
smelt population index is also up, having climbed nearly to recovery
levels in the past few years.
While these recent trends are encouraging and certainly suggest
that we are doing something right through the CALFED Program, the fact
is none of these species have yet achieved the sustainable population
levels established as goals by both the Federal and state governments.
For this reason, any changes in the use of discretion to accomplish
water supply objectives must be part of the broader CALFED package that
also keeps these and other species on a recovery track. To assure that
these decisions are based on the best scientific information and do not
undermine environmental restoration efforts, Metropolitan urges that
Interior follow the procedures outlined in the ROD and consult the
CALFED Science Program for guidance. For the same reasons, we recommend
that Interior, in cooperation with the CALFED Science Program, convene
an independent panel of scientists to offer advice on the best means of
refining CVP operations in a manner that is consistent with the
environmental restoration goals of the CALFED Program.
Mr. Chairman, once again, thank you for the opportunity to appear
before you today. I would be glad to answer any questions the
Subcommittee may have.
______
Attachment A
December 11, 2001
Honorable Ken Calvert
Chairman
Subcommittee on Water and Power
United States House of Representatives
1522 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
Dear Chairman Calvert:
Re: LWater Assurance Language in H.R. 3208
On behalf of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern
California, I want to commend you for the extraordinary leadership that
you have demonstrated in seeking legislation to authorize the CALFED
Bay-Delta Program. After decades of gridlock, the CALFED program holds
the promise of investing in California's future in a balanced manner
that advances the interests of all California water users, its economy
and environment. We believe that H.R. 3208 addresses the most important
California water issues before the Congress in a generation.
It is therefore with considerable concern that we have watched the
debate unfold regarding water supply assurances for certain Central
Valley Project agricultural contractors in the west San Joaquin Valley.
This so-called assurance language remains one of the most significant
obstacles to the passage of this historic legislation. Metropolitan
agrees that water supply reliability for these contractors must be
addressed in a manner consistent with the CALFED Record of Decision.
However, we strongly believe that any attempt to do so in H.R. 3208 or
any other Federal legislation is inappropriate. A statutory mandate to
guarantee water supply levels for one water user inherently risks
creating a disadvantage to others'directly contrary to the balanced
outcomes promised by CALFED.
We urge that the assurance language in H.R. 3208 be deleted and,
instead, all parties focus on developing effective administrative
remedies to resolve the agricultural water supply reliability problems
in the west San Joaquin Valley. We are prepared to participate in this
administrative process in any way we can to help assure a balanced and
fair solution. The passage of CALFED authorizing legislation is too
important to put at risk when more effective and equitable
administrative solutions are available for such a contentious issue.
Very truly yours,
Ronald R. Gastelum
Chief Executive Officer
cc: Senator Diane Feinstein
Senator Barbara Boxer
Secretary Gale Norton
Governor Gray Davis
California Congressional Delegation
______
Attachment B
January 8, 2002
The Honorable Gale Norton
Secretary
United States Department of the Interior
1849 C Street, NW
Washington, DC 20240
Dear Madam Secretary:
Re: LAdministrative Resolution of Water Supply Assurances Issues
In a December 11, 2001 letter to Chairman Ken Calvert regarding
water supply assurance language in H.R. 3208, Metropolitan urged that
the Department of Interior (Interior) develop administrative solutions
to the water supply reliability concerns of Central Valley Project
(CVP) agricultural contractors in the west San Joaquin Valley. We
believe that Interior must act now to implement effective and balanced
administrative solutions to these water supply problems. Indeed, the
success of this effort this year could be critical to the overall
success of the CALFED process.
While at times controversial and complex, at it's heart the CALFED
process is built upon the foundation of balanced outcomes--a promise
laid down in the Framework Agreement of June 2000 and the Record of
Decision (ROD) in August 2000. To be successful CALFED must meet the
reasonable needs of agricultural, urban, and environmental interests.
The CALFED program does not and should not alter the underlying
statutory authorities of the participating state or Federal agencies.
But, the success of the Program does require that the considerable
discretion these agencies have in accomplishing their charge be used to
accomplish the fundamental promise of balance as defined in the CALFED
program.
While the CALFED program enjoyed many successes in 2001, we believe
that the operational plans governing the delivery of export water,
particularly to CVP agricultural contractors in the west San Joaquin
Valley, is falling considerably short of the promise of balance in the
ROD.
Metropolitan firmly believes that Interior has ample discretion to
meet this supply objective and that it can do so in a manner consistent
with the environmental restoration goals of CALFED and without
threatening the supplies of the Friant Water Users Authority or others.
It is far better to accomplish this task administratively than to rely
on uncertain and time consuming legislative solutions. We respectfully
urge you to immediately address this issue, with open participation by
agricultural, urban, environmental, and other stakeholders, and commit
to developing a solution in a timely manner so that CVP project
operations during 2002 achieve the balanced outcomes promised in the
ROD.
Metropolitan stands ready to assist in this process in any way that
we can. If you would like to discuss this critical issue further,
please do not hesitate to call me at (213) 217-6211.
Very truly yours,
Ronald R. Gastelum
Chief Executive Officer
cc: Bennett W. Raley
Assistant Secretary for Water and Science
______
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. We have a series of votes on, and I
am going to ask a quick question and then I am going to recess
the hearing, and Mr. Radanovich is going to come back to chair
the hearing because I have to be at another meeting which has
already started.
Very quickly, Mr. Wright, please explain the previous
administration's policy on offset/reset under the (b)(2)
policy. And after that, please explain the judge's decision in
regards to this policy made last week, as well as he came to
that conclusion, and hopefully you can make that quickly so I
could run over and vote.
Mr. Wright. I have never heard anybody clearly and simply
explain offset and reset, so I am not going to pretend that I
can. What I will say briefly is that--and clearly you need to
hear this from Interior--they made certain judgments in
interpreting the law that, when you allocate water for fish, if
that results in increases in storage, that you some up with a
different accounting method than if you simply count every
acre-foot that is allocated. And that has been a raging issue
ever since the law was adopted.
It is clear that we have new marching orders. As Secretary
Raley said, that may change. There may be a stay, there may be
an appeal, but for now the court's decision is the law of the
land and we are going to, the agencies are going to implement
it in that fashion.
Having said that, there is still a lot of work that needs
to be done with respect to (b)(2) and EWA water, depending on
how the remaining assets are allocated, that certain water
users and fisheries come off better or worse. So there is still
a lot of work to be done with respect to the relationship
between the water that is remaining to balance the three goals
that I talked about earlier: to protect fish; to maintain the
assurances that the State water contractors are concerned
about; and also to meet the target.
Mr. Calvert. Thank you. I am going to recess this hearing
until 12:30. Mr. Radanovich will be coming back to chair the
hearing, so if you could please be patient with us, we are
going to go off and vote. So we are in recess.
[Recess.]
Mr. Radanovich. [Presiding.] OK, we are back in session. I
have a real quick question of one person before I turn it over
to Cal, and that is to you, Dan. Do we know for sure that it
was Arthur Andersen that was the chief accountant for the
(b)(2) water? You don't have to answer. That is OK.
Cal, do you want to go ahead?
Mr. Dooley. Yes, thank you. I thank all of you for your
testimony, and --
Mr. Radanovich. Excuse me, Cal. If you don't mind, can we
just go for 5 minutes a pop, and we will just go back and forth
until all our questions are done?
Mr. Dooley. Sure.
Mr. Radanovich. OK.
Mr. Dooley. I appreciate all your testimony, and Mr.
Bishop, I appreciate your suggestions in terms of some specific
actions that could be taken that could address some of the
challenges that we face.
I guess, you know, what I hear everyone saying though is
that in some ways that what was offered or was presented in the
Record of Decision in terms of providing some assurances in
terms of south-of-the-delta is that I haven't heard anyone say
that they think that we could meet those under, you know, the
present circumstances, and there has been some question whether
or not we can meet them at all. And, I guess, what has changed
from the time that the Record of Decision was being promoted by
a lot of you, and certainly people in the Department of
Interior, and from what we find this today?
I mean, nothing has really changed, but all of a sudden now
for all of the protestations that Secretary Hayes and others
made, that we could hit this 65 to 70 percent with operational
flexibility, that they promoted to us, now suddenly that seems
to have evaporated. Mr. Wright, you made a pretty strong
statement in your testimony that you didn't know if we could
hit that. What changed? Or did anything change? Or were we sold
a bill of goods?
Mr. Wright. Well, I think what has changed recently is, we
finally have a group of Federal appointees that are in place
and are confirmed that are serious about addressing the
problem. We had a lag of about a year or so where, to be
candid, we didn't have the kind of leadership that we have
needed, and what I am hearing and what you heard from Assistant
Secretary Raley is that you now have the commitment from the
administration to tackle this problem.
Also certainly, you know, the court case gives us--changes
things in terms of our ability to meet the target, and I
think--
Mr. Dooley. But, I mean, I guess my question is that there
are a lot of folks were promoting the Record of Decision, said
that we could hit that 65 to 70 percent. The court decision was
post that Record of Decision, which gives us greater
flexibility, we think, to hit it. But, you know, were people
misrepresenting what was possible in the Record of Decision?
I mean, I put a lot of confidence in that. I mean, I
encouraged some of my constituents to continue to be supportive
of this process because of what was offered, you know, and was
presented, and I haven't heard anything today that--you know, I
don't know what this was based upon, by a lot of the testimony
I have heard.
Mr. Wright. Well, I think that the tools are there, and you
would not have heard what you heard from the State and Federal
representatives if they weren't--
Mr. Dooley. And I guess, you know, maybe Mr. Bishop and Mr.
Quinn on this, it is that you both identified some actions that
the department could utilize, that could provide for perhaps
increased water availability to meet the assurances. Mr. Quinn,
I think it was you in particular that expressed a frustration
that the department hasn't been as aggressive in utilizing some
of these options.
If you are in a position such as we are in Congress, if you
have an agency that is not following through and is not
enacting, you know, policies to achieve a statutory objective,
why shouldn't we be a little more prescriptive? Why should we
have the confidence that we can continue to rely on
administrative discretion in order to hit these targets? When
you clearly indicate in your testimony that it hasn't worked in
the past years, why should we have any confidence it is going
to work in the future? And why should we not, as a body of
Congress, prescribe to the department that they utilize some of
these procedures that both you and Mr. Bishop identified?
Mr. Quinn. The fundamental problem will still remain the
use of discretion. The fundamental problem that we have today
is that discretion has not been used with an eye toward
balance.
The fact is, we have a new administration. That
administration has just gotten up in the saddle, and I think we
need to--I frankly don't think you should accept the response
that you can't get there from here. That has not been
demonstrated to my satisfaction. If we think creatively, in a
balanced way, maintain our commitment to ecosystem restoration,
I have not come to the conclusion that you can't get there from
here, and am somewhat disturbed to hear that coming from the
Bush administration.
The 65 to 70 percent didn't come out of whole cloth. It was
bureau analysts. It was based on studies done by the bureau,
and they went to their experts in Sacramento, and they were
told that they could accomplish 65 to 70 percent. And now we
are being told we can get to 45 percent even if it is wet.
Those numbers are not stacking up for me.
But the fundamental answer to your question is, whatever
you do in legislation, our concern is to make sure that it
doesn't tip the scales. We want discretion applied toward
balance. If you have a statute that says, ``Apply your
discretion for this select group of people,'' we think that
potentially undermines our interests. So does Friant. So do the
San Joaquin River group. And even if you get those words in
legislation, your fundamental problem is, how are they applying
their discretion?
Mr. Dooley. Well, I guess, and now that you brought up the
assurances language, have you read the last version of that
where--you know, I guess, what is it that--you know, we went
over it with Secretary Raley, where we are not directing the
Secretary, we are giving them maximum discretion, we are
providing the protections for water, you know, other water
users in terms of quality and cost.
What additional, you know, language would you need in order
to give you a greater comfort that what we are trying to do
here is to ensure that the Secretary is using their discretion
in a practical manner, holding everyone else harmless, in order
to achieve a target which was prescribed and which was offered
in the Record of Decision? I mean, we made, I made a good faith
effort to try to make sure that we could address some of these
legitimate concerns, and what more would you suggest we have to
do?
Mr. Quinn. Let me start my response by, with no
equivocation, this is a problem that must be solved. We are not
arguing about whether we should be meeting supply commitments
in the ROD. We are perhaps arguing over what is the best
strategy to do so in a balanced fashion.
Now, with that firm commitment from us to solve the
problem, we continue, with Friant and with others, to have
concerns about any language in the bill that is built around
the notion of protecting the supplies of a single group. I
think that you have shown--
Mr. Dooley. But how does it protect the supplies of a
single group when it simply says that the Secretary used, to
the maximum extent possible--you know, whatever is practical
actually it says, not even possible--you know, to try to strive
to achieve the 65 to 70 percent? How would that--you know, it
is not saying, directing the Secretary, ``You hit this.'' It is
encouraging them to do what they can that is practical, while
holding everyone else harmless. I mean, I think I find it a
gross overstatement that we are trying to carve out a separate
group here and providing them some additional protection.
Mr. Quinn. Well, the way we interpret the language, Mr.
Dooley, is still that the discretion is to be applied toward an
objective of meeting a supply objective for a select group of
CVP contractors--
Mr. Dooley. Which is consistent with what was in the ROD--
Mr. Quinn. Which is consistent, well, it is consistent with
what was--it is consistent with the goal that is in the ROD,
but there are other goals in the ROD, and the implication is
that you can't get there from here, there is going to be a
balancing process in implementing the ROD. I am greatly
disturbed. I believe in that commitment in the ROD. I would
like to see the bureau fulfill the commitment, but we are
hearing testimony today that they can't. So if they have got a
statutory requirement to do so, whose hide is it going to come
out of? That is the concern that other water users in
California--
Mr. Dooley. If you could give me an analysis of the
statutory requirement that would be in the legislation that I
put together, that would require them to hit that 65 to 70
percent, I look forward to that.
Mr. Radanovich. Thank you. Also, Tim, while we are on the
subject, if you have got an idea about how we can meet that
commitment without assurance, can you put it in writing for me
or show me the studies that the bureau conducted to come up to
that 65, 75 percent? I would love to see you send me some
information that shows me how that can be done without a
legislative fix.
Mr. Quinn. I would be glad to respond to that, and
encourage you to be pressing the bureau for the same
information.
Mr. Radanovich. Sure. Yes, I would be happy to.
Just on my opening line of questions, I really want to
comment on some of the opening statements, because I keep
hearing ``fair and balanced'' as far as when it refers to
CALFED and how we have proceeded over these last 7 years in
this process, and I--frankly I don't. I would love for somebody
to convince me that this has been a balanced approach to
accomplishing some of the water needs in this State.
I think that, and I don't have the numbers exact, but the
example should be accurate that we have spent about $300
million so far on CALFED, and about 80 to 90 percent of that
has been on environmental restoration, which I think is great.
I think that that portion of water in California needs to be
addressed, but I certainly see a lopsided approach to solving
some of these problems.
And Patrick, God bless you, you mentioned some of the
things that CALFED has accomplished, and you mentioned in there
that progress on assurance--the only people that have got
assurance now are the people that had assurance all along, and
the only ones who don't have assurance now are the people that
never had assurance. We still have Westlands at 45 percent.
We have got no movement on water storage. CALFED has ducked
on all the major water storage issues. They have put them out
into the future. We have got a real threat when this--you know,
as this law is progressing hopefully into law, that we are
going to end up authorizing and giving the green light to
spending on more environmental restoration while we simply
study storage projects again for the next go round.
And I would like somebody to explain to me how this has
been a balanced project so far, and meeting everybody's needs,
because I think that is literally just a bunch of crap. And
furthermore, what I don't want to hear is how some of the
environmental restoration projects have had an ancillary effect
by increasing very small, limited amounts of water supply for
other users. So please don't tell me, unless you have got a
good argument to tell me how this has been a balance so far,
don't come to this Committee and say that this is balanced and
moving forward.
Patrick, you mentioned three things that CALFED wants to
do. You still listed fish ahead of allocation and assurance,
and to me that still presents the problem in this plan, and
that is that environmental restoration is still the driving
force in this thing. Not that I am against environmental
restoration, but don't tell me that it is in balance with
allocations and assurance and increased water supply, because
it is not.
And Mr. Osann, since you are representing the environmental
community, feel free to respond, but there still is no
commitment from the environmental community that I find that is
supportive of increased water supply in California, other than
perhaps some type of underground water storage.
So this is what I see from my view, from here. This is
going nowhere, and we have got a very good possibility when
this bill comes up that we are still not going to address
California's most urgent need, and that is increasing water
supply so that we can achieve a balance between environmental
restoration, agricultural needs, and urban needs. And frankly,
guys, I don't see it.
I mean, we have got a good chance of it if this bill passes
on the House side and goes into law, but if there is any
deviation from that in a conference with what is being proposed
in the Senate, we are going to get nothing more than what we
see. And if any one of you cares to respond, that is fine, but
I feel it is important to make that statement for the record,
because I have been hearing a little bit too much about
balanced approach, and it is just I have not seen any of that
in 7 years on this project.
Tim, if you would, do me a favor and give me a brief
explanation of offset/reset. I have been in this business for a
while and I don't understand offset/reset and how that pertains
to the recent court decision on (b)(2).
Mr. Quinn. I will do my best, and there may be others here
who can help me out.
Reset deals with water operations for the CVP early in the
water year. One of the uses of (b)(2) water is to release water
from Shasta for an environmental purpose, so you have drawn
down your storage for an environmental purpose, to do an
environmental good. Then if before January 31st Mother Nature
is kind to you and gives you storms, and the storage recovers,
then Fish and Wildlife Service resets the 800,000 acre-feet and
they get to proceed as though that water use had not occurred.
The judge found that that would lead to using more than
800,000 acre-feet of water. He raised questions about it. If
reset were appropriate, why do it just for one use and not for
others? And he questioned the balance in the policy that
Interior has established.
So that is reset. Offset affects project operation later in
the year, in the summer. During the summer months, frequently
to deliver water to the export pumps when Mother Nature is not
giving you any natural precipitation, you have to release water
from storage.
So if you reduce pumping in those months at the export
pumps in order to reduce fish entrainment, and later on in the
year because of those actions there is a higher level of
storage upstream in the system, then the argument is the
increased storage offsets the reduced pumping. So despite the
fact that the farmer didn't get his irrigation supply in peak
irrigation demand and economic harm hurt, ostensibly an
environmental benefit occurred, although the science is not
strong on just what kind of environmental benefits you get from
this particular activity.
The argument was that, similar to offset, it was as though
the water had not been used for environmental purpose, and the
judge found fault with that as well, arguing both practices
would lead to using more than the 800,000 acre-feet, and this
judge is very firm. You get 800,000 acre-feet, not 799,999 or
800,001 acre-feet. You get 800,000 acre-feet, no more, no less.
Mr. Radanovich. I see. Thank you.
Dan, I have got a question. You were in my office the other
day talking about an MOA, and could you tell me what the status
of that is and where it is at? And be aware that Friant is now
represented in the room, and since they are not here to testify
I am going to ask you to let them know that this is out there,
because I want to get what their reaction is going to be to
this thing.
Mr. Nelson. There have been ongoing efforts to resolve our
differences with Friant, and we are on the very front end of
even conceptualizing an MOA, and primarily the MOA just
establishes sort of a process and how it is that we are going
to go about discussing issues, what the issues are. And so it
is very preliminary, and the only paper that is out is in very
preliminary draft form. Have I put enough caveats on yet? And
that is what I know about the MOA.
Mr. Radanovich. I was led to believe, at least, that there
was an MOA heading toward Friant and you were waiting for their
decision as to whether to accept it or not.
Mr. Nelson. Well, there has been an MOA that has been
developed as a result of several conversations amongst the
potential participants, and now all of the individuals are
taking that back home and sort of fleshing it out at home.
Mr. Radanovich. Meaning both sides are in this process of
doing that?
Mr. Nelson. That is correct.
Mr. Radanovich. So there is not a formal MOA that is going
to Friant, that Friant is going to make a decision on, as I was
led to believe yesterday?
Mr. Nelson. I have just been informed that it is an MOU,
not an MOA, just for clarification.
Mr. Radanovich. Thanks.
Mr. Nelson. And as well that the Westlands board has
adopted this, and it is going to the Friant board here soon.
Mr. Radanovich. Would you mind communicating with the
Friant representative who is here now, who is not able to
testify--his name is Joe Rader, in the back there--to ask him
to find out when Friant is going to deal with that issue?
Mr. Nelson. I would be happy to work with Joe on that,
Congressman.
Mr. Radanovich. Thank you very much. I appreciate it.
Cal?
Mr. Dooley. I guess, you know, there has been a lot of talk
about the need, you know, to make sure that we are having the
independent review on the science and the peer review, and a
number of you talked about that. You know, I have requested
that the Secretary request the National Academy of Sciences
engage in a similar study in the delta as they did in the
Klamath. And I guess I would ask, would anyone see that there
would be any harm in NAS conducting such a study, and would you
all agree that it would provide some value perhaps in terms of
operations? Would anyone object?
Mr. Bishop. Let me just jump in. I am a big advocate of
this. I believe that it gets to some of your questions there
about whether you deal with some of these discretion areas by
being prescriptive in law or allowing the discretion.
I am on the side of, every time Congress has tried to be
prescriptive, they have oversight hearings as to whether the
prescriptive number was never met. When they rely on what the
courts have found over and over, the discretion of the
delegated person, and give them the tools and give them the
goals and the criteria for applying that discretion, you have a
much better outcome.
In this particular case, what we see over and over again is
the science is immature, and when the agencies that have to
apply immature science--this is whether it be the Clean Water
Act, the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act--every time
a regulatory agency has to apply science in the absence of a
mature, robust, peer-reviewed, accepted science, they err on
the side of conservatism. And when you do that, particularly I
heard it today, in a changeover administration with leadership
not in place, conservatism gets placed on top of conservatism,
and you end up with an outcome that doesn't balance the
decision at all.
National Academy of Science is one vehicle that has been
used by many agencies, regulatory, to come in and put a fresh
light on the science and say, ``This type of a decision, while
being very conservative, is not justified based on the science
to date, and you might want to wait, or you might want to try
something different.''
I alluded to CALFED is trying to do that on the ecosystem
restoration program, outside scientists coming in, and some of
their preliminary findings, if anybody attended their meetings,
were along the same lines, which is they cannot find a cause/
effect why water is being released now and what benefit it is
going to have on the fish, but it has been some widely held use
that the pumps cause the damage, so therefore that is what you
have got to do.
I think the National Academy of Science coming in would
look and say, ``You have spent $500 million on habitat
restoration, ecosystem restoration. You have more tools to deal
with the issues, other than water, and we need to review our
reliance on water as the only tool for fishery recovery.''
And I think that gives you the basis on which now you can
have administrative discretion, which is characterized by
swinging to one end of the spectrum or the other.
And that is why I would strongly encourage that happening,
and happening as a regular basis, and if it has to be put in as
a prescriptive reason, how you make these decisions--
Mr. Dooley. OK, so I would take that as a yes, then. How
about you, Mr. Nelson? NAS review, would you support that?
Mr. Nelson. Absolutely, and we have been requesting for
several years that there be independent review of the science
behind the regulations.
Mr. Dooley. I don't know, Mr. Wright, if you can take an
official position on that. Would you have any objection to
that?
Mr. Wright. We don't. Obviously we need to discuss that
with our State and Federal colleagues. We are clearly committed
to independent science. We have had several panels, as I talked
about, that include some of the best experts in the country. I
think the only issue is, you know, is the National Academy
itself, you know, the right vehicle? What are the costs
involved? What is the timing involved? There is certainly
nobody in the program that has any issue with independent
science. It is just trying to find the best vehicle.
Mr. Dooley. I am working on the assumption that there
wouldn't be any cost to the stakeholders in this, and so it
would be, you know, totally independent.
Mr. Quinn, would MWD have any objections, or would you
support an NAS--
Mr. Quinn. No, we would strongly support it. We just want
to make sure that CALFED's chief scientist is part of the
process.
Mr. Dooley. And Mr. Stovall?
Mr. Stovall. Yes, we would support it, and I think sound
science is critical. We are already, as a result of Judge
Wanger's decision, we are hearing environmental groups sort of
chanting the mantra of trying the water somewhere else, and
there needs to be a sound scientific review of whether there
aren't better solutions than just taking water from people.
Mr. Dooley. And Mr. Osann?
Mr. Osann. Yes, with the approval of the Chair, Mr. Dooley,
I would like to have a chance to reply for the record on this.
Mr. Dooley. OK. Do you have a preliminary reply or--
Mr. Osann. My initial sense is that NRDC would not object
to an NAS review if you want like a third opinion, bearing in
mind that there is a substantial science component, independent
science component, built into CALFED, so you are getting a
second opinion now, and also bearing in mind that NAS is not
going to be going out doing field work. They are going to be
doing review of what is available, and as a priority we would
recommend funding the people that are actually doing the work
in the field.
Mr. Dooley. OK, and the reason why I am--you know, the
reason--you know, I have already put this request in, and so
your, the statements that you have made is something that I am
going to also forward to the Secretary. And Mr. Osann, we will
wait for your formal review to support that.
George, did you want to go ahead?
Mr. Radanovich. No.
Mr. Dooley. Mr. Osann, you made a statement in your written
testimony regarding Judge Wanger's decision, that goes to the
extent that if Secretary Norton should, you know, obviously
appeal this, and you say in your statement, ``In particular, it
is important to note that if Interior does not continue to
defend (b)(2) implementation, it will eliminate water supply
assurances that have benefited Westlands and all other water
users in the Central Valley, Southern California, and the Bay
area.''
Now I will say that, you know, some of the water agencies
and Westlands in particular look at Wanger's decision certainly
as not something that jeopardizes their water supply
assurances, and I just, I don't quite understand, you know,
what is--you know, how you are making the statement that
Westlands is jeopardized by the Wanger decision.
Mr. Osann. It looks to us as though it casts doubt on the
validity of the current biological opinion and the NEPA final
environmental impact statement of the ROD, and injects a degree
of instability and uncertainty into the whole mix.
Mr. Dooley. So what would be the outcome of that, I guess?
How does that--I guess I need to play that out in terms of, OK,
so it does bring this into question. How does that, you know,
reduce the supply of water that is going to Westlands?
Mr. Osann. What will be the basis for the ESA compliance
for the 2002 operation of the pumps?
Mr. Dooley. Mr. Nelson, what would be your response?
Mr. Nelson. Well, a quick clarification on a minute point.
It doesn't just affect Westlands. It would affect 24 other ag
service contractors south of the delta in the same way that it
affects Westlands.
With that, the (b)(2) decision, we need to be very clear
about what it does and what it doesn't do. We have always had
that discretion. I think what you have heard from everybody up
here, regardless of what the judge says, this is, the reset and
offset is something that has been on the top of the list of
discretionary items that should be used in meeting the 65 to 70
percent.
And so notwithstanding whatever it is that Judge Wanger
ultimately said or ultimately will say, or what the 9th Circuit
appeal court will say, the fact of the matter is, we have
discretion to account for the 800,000 acre-feet in a way that
doesn't take into consideration reset and offset, which allows
the Bureau of Reclamation to use much more than 800,000 acre-
feet.
The second point I would like to make is, we have an array
of tools that are available to us for meeting environmental
objectives. We have (b)(1) water, which is a reoperation of
CVP, without any cost to contractors. We have (b)(3) water,
which allows the Restoration Fund, which the CVP water users
pay each and every year into, to be used to go out and purchase
additional water. We have the EWA to be able to go out and
purchase some additional water, as well as several other tools
that are available to us to meet our environmental objectives.
Essentially, what the judge has said is, ``Department of
Interior, you have overstepped your bounds on this one tool.''
So I would suggest that we take a couple of steps back, No.
1. Evaluate do we need this level of protection, and that is
where the earlier discussion of scientific review, do we need
this level of protection for endangered species. And, No. 2,
what are the other ways that we accomplish that? What other
tools can we use to accomplish that?
Mr. Dooley. I guess my final question for the panel is, Mr.
Osann provided information where--I think from a number of
environmental groups, requesting the Department of Interior
appeal the Wanger decision. Have any of the other groups that
you all represent, are any of you requesting the Secretary to
appeal the Wanger decision? Mr. Quinn?
Mr. Quinn. No.
Mr. Dooley. Mr. Stovall?
Mr. Stovall. No.
Mr. Dooley. Mr. Bishop?
Mr. Bishop. No.
Mr. Dooley. Mr. Nelson?
Mr. Nelson. No.
Mr. Dooley. Mr. Wright?
Mr. Wright. No.
Mr. Dooley. So all of you--yes, Mr. Osann?
Mr. Osann. Excuse me, Mr. Dooley. The attachment that I
provided was a letter in support of the (b)(2) formulation of
the department but it was not following the opinion of last
week.
Mr. Dooley. Oh, excuse me, so I didn't characterize that
correctly and I apologize for that.
Are you guys going to be appealing the decision of Judge
Wanger, the NRDC?
Mr. Osann. I don't know. We haven't reached a decision on
that yet.
Mr. Dooley. All right. Thank you very much.
And I think on this my--I am finished up my questions--I
just want to thank all of you, not only for your testimony
today but, I mean, we sometimes have disagreements but I really
do acknowledge that each and every one of you have a great deal
of expertise and have been a real constructive part of trying
to address a lot of the water problems we face out there, and
they obviously are very challenging. And I just want to make
sure you understand that, you know, I am committed to being a
partner with you as we try to further bring clarity and
resolution to these issues.
Mr. Radanovich. Thanks, Cal, and I want to echo your
sentiments as well. It is such a frustrating process, but I
remain committed to CALFED and to all of you to try to reach a
balanced solution. I still want to hear from each and every one
of you, do you all think that this process, everybody is moving
forward together? Tim? Come on.
Mr. Quinn. I learned a long time ago, the Member is always
right.
Mr. Radanovich. Come on, you know me well enough. Just give
me a guess.
Mr. Quinn. As I state in my testimony, Mr. Chairman, there
are clearly places where we are not achieving the balance that
the ROD promised and we need to fix that, but that is far from
the conclusion that CALFED is totally broken. We are moving
forward on studies for surface storage. That process must
continue, and Metropolitan will aggressively support it.
The EWA is out there. It is an enormous step in the right
direction, from our perspective. Our ESA assurances, for the
first time in my career I could go to my board and say our
State project supplies were reliable last year. We got the
principle established in the accord, but we never had any means
to enforce it. EWA gives us the tool that can provide those
assurances, which is why I am so horrified that some are saying
because a Federal court makes a decision over here about
something other than the State water project supplies, we could
wind up losing our ESA assurances.
So I do believe CALFED is part of the solution. They are
now in implementation mode. They are moving forward, not
exactly the way I would like, but if they don't deserve an A, I
don't think they deserve an F either. Perhaps B minus.
Mr. Stovall. I think, Mr. Radanovich, we would actually
concur with you on that as far as what has occurred this far,
and to some extent that has been part of the plan. It was known
that some of these environmental solutions or impacts would
occur first. But we are now entering a critical testing period.
The things that will actually improve water supply--and Mr.
Quinn alluded to the EWA, a very significant part of that,
improvement of the south delta pumping facilities--are things
that are critical to making this happen, and I think critical
to making the 65 percent come into reality, and those things
are facing environmental challenges now, challenges from groups
who actually never really supported CALFED in the first place.
It is going to be critical, in our thinking as to the
continuation of the CALFED process, if we do actually pass this
test and some of these water supply things do start happening
now, because now is the time they have to start happening.
Mr. Radanovich. Do you see the current Senate version as it
relates to implementation of water storage as a positive
direction or a negative direction?
Mr. Stovall. We like Mr. Calvert's bill better in that
regard. We think that Mr. Calvert's bill provides more
assurances of balance and that this balance will continue. We
believe that and support moving Senator Feinstein's bill
forward, although we think the protections for balance are very
fragile in that bill, and we certainly wouldn't want to see any
reduction. We would like to see some improvements of protection
for balance out of whatever final product comes out of both
houses.
Mr. Radanovich. Thank you.
Mr. Osann?
Mr. Osann. Yes, with regard to your--the points you made
earlier about balance and the position of the environmental
community relating to storage, I did want to comment on that.
Mr. Radanovich. Sure.
Mr. Osann. I can't speak for the entire environmental
community here today. I can speak on behalf of NRDC, and I
don't think the record will support a contention that NRDC is
implacably opposed to any surface storage.
We have supported the CALFED ROD. The ROD calls for the
study of additional storage in an orderly way, study of the
economics and the environmental consequences associated with
specific storage projects. I don't think we have done anything
to obstruct or discourage those studies from going forward, and
like I said in my opening remarks, we are enthusiastic about
some portions of the ROD, we are skeptical about other
portions, but we support the project, the CALFED program going
forward in a balanced way.
Mr. Bishop pointed out that surface storage in the CALFED
framework is not for new growth but is to firm up existing
supplies and in that context the storage comes into the system,
if it does, comes into the system as an insurance policy. And
the beneficiary pay principle is embodied in the CALFED ROD.
That is another element of it that we strongly support. So at
some point there are going to be some decision points a few
years out as to whether the potential beneficiaries--whether
the premium, if you will, for this insurance policy is
commensurate with the hazard that is being insured against,
which is a shortfall of supply.
We don't know how those decisions are going to come out. We
don't know if the storage options that are developed under
CALFED are really going to be seen as economical or practical
by potential beneficiaries, to the point where someone is
really willing to come forward and put their own dough into
those projects. But we are certainly willing to see that
process play itself out, environmental evaluation and the
economic evaluation. We are not discouraging anybody from
funding those studies.
Mr. Radanovich. Was it the intention--I am hearing from the
previous speaker, too, that when CALFED began, although I
understood it to be something to where no one stakeholder was
going to be allowed to kind of get ahead of the others, so that
you could bring everybody along together, that seems to be in
conflict with what I have heard said, that there was some idea
that the environmental restoration ought to occur first and
therefore all the funding kind of went in that direction right
away. It seemed to be in conflict with the idea that everybody
would be brought forward, you know, kind of closely together,
but instead put the environmental stakeholder much further out
than the others.
Mr. Osann. I think there are some ripeness issues here, as
well. CALFED does envision a progression of investments, and
some investments are small, easily understandable, and they are
more or less ready to go. Others take more advance preparation
and the lead time on them is necessarily going to be longer.
Mr. Radanovich. It still seems hard to get that principle,
though, because in my appearance it looks like the
stakeholders, the environmental stakeholders are way out ahead
on a lot of this stuff, and yet there is still resistance to
move forward I think a little bit more aggressively on storage.
Mr. Osann. I know, for instance, that in the area of water
conservation and efficiency there are--in the ROD there were
pretty ambitious plans to ramp up spending for both
agricultural conservation projects and urban conservation
projects. Now, a good number of those have gone forward, but we
are not near the funding levels in the early years that were
envisioned in the ROD.
Mr. Radanovich. Yes, and I equate more water availability
to storage. I think the conservation measures are good, but
they are not going to get us there for--
Mr. Osann. There are significant chunks of water associated
with both agricultural and urban conservation.
Mr. Radanovich. Right.
Mr. Bishop?
Mr. Bishop. I don't want to repeat what is ahead of me, but
I agree with Tim in that the balance is not perfect but it is
not an F, and I would equate water quality delays as as
critical as water supply. I know we are focused on supply, but
we are not going to get supply if we don't improve the quality,
and that is another area we are going to focus on.
I also agree with Mr. Stovall in that this is the testing
period, and the only comfort I can give you as you share your
frustrations is, I think I am the only one at the table that
has built a reservoir in the last 10 years that got a 404 and a
water right. The toughest process. Los Vaqueros. And I will
tell you, I was about where you are, sir, in the first 3 years
of that process, where we were spending $30 million on
environmental restoration and net benefits, and no permits, no
authorities, and significant opposition, even though today
everybody says they were in favor of it, significant opposition
at that time.
And I would just say we are in the wandering in the desert
period, where the next year or two we can catch up pretty
quickly on storage studies, and we are not going to get storage
without ecosystem restoration and efficiency. You know that. So
the money we are putting in right now may frustrate us because
we are not making the kind of progress on quality and storage,
but if we get the funding, we can move on that, and those two
will be critical underpinnings for the critical permits.
Mr. Radanovich. Yes. OK, thank you.
Mr. Nelson?
Mr. Nelson. We are very apprehensive about CALFED and how
at least what we have experienced over the last couple of years
in the initial implementation of CALFED, we have actually
realized some of the apprehensions that we did have going into
it, when the ROD first came out or when we first analyzed the
ROD. When the ROD came out, we first looked at the regulatory
baseline and immediately recognized that it was excessive and
without any science or any scientific support, and certainly
that is proving to be true.
Secondarily, it appears to us as if a lot of the
environmental provisions are sort of front-loaded, on the front
end of being able to move forward with a lot of the
environmental protections and provisions, while most of the
water supply provisions are several years away and many studies
away.
And then, last but not least by any means, especially from
our area, we looked at the language in the ROD about the
balance, trying to balance our water supply, and the water
supply objectives as being ambiguous, and certainly we are
realizing how it is, the difficulties as a result of that that
the CALFED agencies are having in meeting those water supply
objectives.
So we are still working with moving CALFED forward, but we
are watching very carefully and it certainly is headed in a new
direction that we couldn't support ultimately.
Mr. Radanovich. OK.
Patrick?
Mr. Wright. We, among the CALFED agencies, continue to
believe that the plan as a whole is a balanced plan. Having
said that, I share your concern that if we cannot meet the
commitments in the plan, and particularly those that Mr. Dooley
and others have raised, that support for the plan is going to
evaporate. Hopefully this hearing will be another wake-up call
for us to put our heads together and come up with a plan that
meets all the objectives that we have talked about,
particularly with respect to 2002 operations.
I did not mean to imply earlier that our goals, the three
goals of meeting the 65 to 70 commitment, the water supply
reliability assurances for the other south-of-delta
contractors, and meeting needs of fish, were in any particular
order. We need to meet all of those goals and, as Wally Bishop
emphasized, we also need to protect--
Mr. Radanovich. That was the order I was looking for
originally.
Mr. Wright. It is a challenge. It is a delicate balancing
act, but with your help and leadership and hopefully a
reauthorization bill, we will be able to get there.
Mr. Radanovich. Patrick, I am aware--I have got this study,
which is a beautiful study, in front of me, the tracking
report. Is this not being funded anymore? What is the deal with
this?
Mr. Wright. We are struggling to find money to continue our
planning and tracking system. We are going to find it. If we
have to cut other elements of the program, it is going to be
painful, given our general fund cuts and the fact that we have
only got now in the President's budget $15 million.
The first thing to go when we get funding cuts are
organizational activities as opposed to projects, and so our
concern with respect to the program is with less funding the
program elements that are most at risk are things like science
and planning and tracking and oversight and coordination. So we
are going to need to work with you and others to make sure that
those--that that is where the added value of the CALFED program
is.
There is somewhat of a perception among even some of the
stakeholders that now the plan is out, the agencies can just go
and implement the plan. Well, as we have seen today, that is
not as effective as having a strong CALFED staff that is
keeping the agency's feet to the fire, doing the science, doing
the planning and tracking, doing the public outreach that is
necessary. So we continue to believe at the program that the
CALFED entity and a governing structure that gives you more
accountability than you have had on this issue for the last
couple of years is vital to our continued success.
Mr. Radanovich. So you are committed to maintaining this?
Mr. Wright. Yes, absolutely.
Mr. Radanovich. Good news, because this is a valuable
document here. It is very good.
Well, I want to thank you all.
Cal, you have no other questions?
And I don't want to come across as being anti-environment.
I think that I support the goals of the environmental
restoration that is in the plan, in the ROD, and in CALFED, but
I think that the time has come, as everybody knows, to start to
concentrate on storage, and it needs to manifest itself in
dollars, percent funding, overall increases, and time and
attention. And I am fearful that that is not happening, and I
hope that it does manifest itself in whatever bill this House
and Senate passes and the President signs.
So thank you for being here. Continue to work, and
hopefully we will continue to progress on this. Thank you very
much.
[Whereupon, at 1:18 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
[A letter submitted for the record by Mr. Barry Nelson,
Senior Policy Analyst, Natural Resources Defense Council,
follows:]
March 6, 2002
The Honorable Ken Calvert, Chairman
Subcommittee on Water and Power
U. S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20510
Dear Chairman Calvert:
At your February 14 hearing regarding Delta operations and the
CALFED program, you asked for NRDC s position regarding a proposal for
a National Academy of Sciences (NAS) review of CALFED decision-making.
Ed Osann indicated that we would provide additional views on this
subject. I am writing to provide these views.
NRDC has been involved in the CALFED process since its inception.
We have consistently advocated the establishment of a strong science
program to assure that CALFED decision-making has a firm scientific
foundation. We are pleased that CALFED has taken this need seriously.
CALFED has hired Sam Luoma, an experienced and well-respected scientist
from USGS to serve as its head scientist. This science program has
played a central role in assuring the strongest possible scientific
basis for CALFED s ecosystem restoration decisions. In fact, CALFED has
already involved key members of the scientific community who would be
almost certain participants of any NAS review. In short, CALFED has
already obtained extensive independent scientific review of ecosystem
restoration actions.
However, other areas of the CALFED program have not received such
careful external scientific evaluation. For example, there has been
little outside scientific review of the following issues:
Cumulative Impacts from Existing and Proposed Increases in Delta
Pumping: Despite the extensive work CALFED is undertaking regarding
water diversions from the Delta, the program has not convened an
outside panel of experts to evaluate the cumulative impacts from
existing Delta pumping. Such an evaluation would be particularly
valuable because CALFED is moving to relax existing pumping limits in
the Delta. The impacts from increased Delta pumping could be
significant. Ten years ago, the last major external review of the
science regarding Delta diversions set the stage for the Bay-Delta
Accord. However, that process, and the work of the CALFED program, have
not resolved several key issues. For example, how would additional
pumping affect tidal wetlands and wildlife in the Suisun Marsh the
state s largest brackish marsh? An external review would reveal
scientific progress made in the past ten years regarding Delta
diversions.
The Impacts of Renewing Federal Water Service Contracts: The
Department of Interior is currently negotiating the renewal of expiring
Central Valley Project water service contracts that, collectively, will
control the delivery of millions of acre-feet of water during the
coming 25 years. There has not, however, been an independent scientific
review of the environmental impacts of these proposed renewals.
Likewise, there has not been an independent review of the potential
conservation benefits of moving away from historic water subsidies
towards realistic pricing of CVP water.
The Economic Merits of Proposed New Surface Storage Facilities:
CALFED is pursuing several proposed new and expanded surface storage
facilities. CALFED s own analysis suggests that alternative water
supply options would be less expensive. NRDC s additional analysis has
raised serious concerns regarding the economic viability of these
proposed projects. However, not all stakeholders have been convinced by
this analysis. We would welcome an independent analysis of the economic
merits of proposed new surface storage facilities and the willingness
and ability of water users to pay the full cost of water from these
proposed facilities.
While the ecosystem program has received extensive scientific
review, the critical issues outlined above have received little outside
scientific review through the CALFED program. If there is any NAS
review of the scientific basis of CALFED decisions, we recommend that
this review begin in these areas.
Thank you for keeping the hearing record open to allow us to
provide these additional comments. We look forward to continuing to
work with you to address critical California water issues.
Sincerely,
Barry Nelson
Senior Policy Analyst
cc: Senator Barbara Boxer
Senator Dianne Feinstein
Congressman George Miller
Assistant Secretary Bennett Raley
Resources Secretary Mary Nichols
Patrick Wright, CALFED
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