{"id":163229,"date":"2021-05-14T08:45:35","date_gmt":"2021-05-14T08:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.counterpunch.org\/?p=135814"},"modified":"2021-05-14T08:45:35","modified_gmt":"2021-05-14T08:45:35","slug":"as-fish-die-salmon-advocates-say-newsoms-drought-declaration-highlights-water-injustice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/05\/14\/as-fish-die-salmon-advocates-say-newsoms-drought-declaration-highlights-water-injustice\/","title":{"rendered":"As Fish Die, Salmon Advocates Say Newsom\u2019s Drought Declaration Highlights Water Injustice"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Governor Gavin Newsom today expanded his drought emergency declaration to 39 additional counties, including the Klamath River, Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and Tulare Lake Watershed counties where he said \u201caccelerated action is needed to protect public health, safety and the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

A total of 41 of\u00a0California\u2019s 58 counties\u00a0are now under a drought state of emergency, representing 30 percent of the state\u2019s population.<\/p>\n

The expanded drought declaration was released as juvenile Chinook salmon are already dying of disease in the low water conditions in the main stem of the Klamath River.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The Governor said \u201cclimate change-induced early warm temperatures and extremely dry soils\u201d have further depleted the expected runoff water from the Sierra-Cascade snowpack, resulting in \u201chistoric and unanticipated reductions in the amount of water flowing to major reservoirs, especially in Klamath River, Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and Tulare Lake Watershed counties.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWith the reality of climate change abundantly clear in California, we\u2019re taking urgent action to address acute water supply shortfalls in northern and central California while also building our water resilience to safeguard communities in the decades ahead,\u201d said Governor Newsom. \u201cWe\u2019re working with local officials and other partners to protect public health and safety and the environment, and call on all Californians to help meet this challenge by stepping up their efforts to save water.\u201d<\/p>\n

Salmon and Delta advocates criticized the Governor\u2019s declaration for catering to large corporate agribusiness interests \u2014and pointed out the\u00a0poor water management by the state and federal governments in the Sacramento and Trinity-Klamath Basins during recent\u00a0droughts.<\/p>\n

“Today Central Valley lawmakers and Governor Newsom used the drought, which is the result of climate change, to advocate for \u00a0taxpayer-funded pork projects, such as private canals and the Sites Reservoir, for industrial agriculture, which uses up to 80% of the state’s developed water,\u201d said Regina Chichizola, co-coordinator of Save California Salmon, in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cPoor water management during the last drought led to 90% of the salmon dying and toxic algal blooms in cities\u2019 water supplies. Tribal and fishing communities are suffering,” she noted.<\/p>\n

“The fact is we can’t dam our way out of climate change. Industrial agriculture uses most of the state’s water, while exporting their crops and offering little benefit residents of this state. California’s antiquated water rights system leaves cities and the environment high and dry while almonds get clean water,\u201d emphasized Chichizola.<\/p>\n

“These talks about water storage, drought relief, and voluntary agreements are happening without consent with the California Tribal communities and other salmon and clean water advocates,\u201d pointed out Morning Star Gali Pit River Tribal Member and Save California Tribal Organizer.<\/p>\n

Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta,\u00a0also responded to the declaration, noting that \u00a0\u201cGovernor Newsom\u2019s latest declaration tears pages from the playbook Governor Brown used in 2013 and 2014.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone gets something except the Delta,\u201d\u00a0she stated. \u201cWe get salinity barriers. This will disrupt waterways and create stagnant pools with larger harmful algal blooms throughout the summer and fall. These algal blooms pose dangers to public health through water contact to people and dogs, but also from the emission of airborne contaminants.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cUnder this plan, multiple fish species in the Delta, like Chinook salmon and Delta smelt, may become part of the sixth great mass extinction on Governor Newsom\u2019s watch,\u201d Barrigan-Parrilla concluded.<\/p>\n

Tim Stroshane, Restore the Delta\u00a0policy analyst, said\u00a0Governor Newsom\u2019s latest declaration signals that \u201ctemporary urgency change\u201d petitions will be sought by the US Bureau of Reclamation and the Department of Water Resources to waive water quality objectives in the Delta.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday’s proclamation also gestures in the direction of preserving existing cold-water pools in the upstream reservoirs, particularly at Shasta and Oroville lakes. This is likely too little too late.\u00a0Unfortunately, these reservoirs are already extremely low, and their cold-water pools were dissipated over this past winter when supplies were shipped to southern California and San Luis Reservoir south of the Delta,\u201d said Stroshane.<\/p>\n

The poor water management by the Department of Water Resources and the Bureau of Reclamation that has excerbated the current drought is revealed\u00a0in my analysis of water exports out of the Delta for the past decade.<\/p>\n

In 8 out of the past 10 years, the combined water exports from the state and federal water projects have exceeded the 3 million acre feet annual export figure that many believe to be the maximum amount of water that can be exported from the Delta without destroying the ecosystem and harming fish species.<\/p>\n

In every water year except two, 2014 and 2015, the state and federal projects exported well over 3 million acre feet of water from the Delta.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The 3 million acre feet cap of water exports in all years is a key recommendation of the Environmental Water Caucus (EWC) updated solutions plan titled\u00a0\u201cA Sustainable Water Plan for California.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

In fact, 2011 was the all time record export year with 6.67 million acre feet of water diverted from the Delta, followed closely behind by the 6.46 million acre feet exported in 2017. 2018 saw 4.62 million acre feet exported from the Delta, while 2019 saw 5.3 million acre feet exported and 2020 saw 3.65 million acre feet exported:\u00a0https:\/\/viewperformance.deltacouncil.ca.gov\/pm\/water-exports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If the state doesn\u2019t conserve enough water to maintain carryover storage so that salmon can successfully spawn and the juvenile fish can outmigrate, then we end up in the situation where the CDFW had to truck all of the Sacramento River hatchery salmon smolts downriver to the bay so that fish are able to survive in a drought year.<\/p>\n\"\"\n

For more information, see here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The situation with out migrating juvenile salmon is very dire in the Klamath Basin now.\u00a0An email from CDFW environmental scientist Dan Troxel on May 7\u00a0says\u00a0the mainstem Klamath is at its highest level “RED,” indicating an imminent or active fish kill.<\/p>\n

“Well it seems the unfortunate potential outcomes are already manifesting themselves on the mainstem Klamath. Our partners at USFWS and Yurok Tribal Fisheries are seeing some very distressing signs in the 0+ out-migrating Chinook salmon; a substantial portion of fish showing clinical signs of disease (C. shasta) and even dead fish being caught in outmigrant traps,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cDue to this, the mainstem Klamath is at its highest Readiness Level \u201cRED\u201d, indicating an imminent or active fish kill. Unfortunately these few inch long salmon mortalities don\u2019t draw the same attention as adult fish, but it is just as important to actively monitor the situation and implement KFHAT\u2019s Fish Kill Response plan if deemed necessary,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n

According to the KFHAT report, \u00a0\u201cThe Mid and Lower Klamath are showing signs of diseased and dead Chinook salmon noted by partners at Yurok Tribe. Active juvenile fish kill currently happening. Will continue to monitor situation and re-evaluate within the next few days.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

On the Sacramento River and its tributaries, the situation is so bad that all of the juvenile chinook salmon (smolts) from state fish hatcheries are getting truck rides to saltwater this spring to increase their survival, triggered by projected poor conditions<\/a> in the Sacramento River and other Central Valley rivers this year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The post As Fish Die, Salmon Advocates Say Newsom\u2019s Drought Declaration Highlights Water Injustice<\/a> appeared first on CounterPunch.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

This post was originally published on CounterPunch.org<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Governor Gavin Newsom today expanded his drought emergency declaration to 39 additional counties, including the Klamath River, Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and Tulare Lake Watershed counties where he said \u201caccelerated action is needed to protect public health, safety and the environment.\u201d A total of 41 of\u00a0California\u2019s 58 counties\u00a0are now under a drought state of emergency, representing More<\/a><\/p>\n

The post As Fish Die, Salmon Advocates Say Newsom\u2019s Drought Declaration Highlights Water Injustice<\/a> appeared first on CounterPunch.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1909,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163229"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1909"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=163229"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":163230,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/163229\/revisions\/163230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=163229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=163229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=163229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}