<div dir="ltr"><div>Here's some more on proposition 1.<br><br></div>Ed<br><br><h2><a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/10/31/1340650/-Prop-1-Opponents-Call-Nature-Conservancy-s-500-000-Political-Contribution-Disturbing" target="_blank">Nature Conservancy contributes $500,000 to Yes on Prop. 1 campaign</a></h2>
<p><span>by</span> <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/user/Dan%20Bacher" target="_blank">Dan Bacher</a>
</p>
<ul><li style="margin-left:0px;max-width:120px"><div><span style="vertical-align:bottom;width:76px;min-height:20px"></span></div><br></li><li><br></li><li><a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/10/31/1340650/-Prop-1-Opponents-Call-Nature-Conservancy-s-500-000-Political-Contribution-Disturbing#comments" target="_blank">3 Comments / 3 New</a></li></ul>
<p>Opponents of Proposition 1, Governor Jerry Brown's State Water Bond,
today called a $500,000 political contribution to Prop. 1 by The Nature
Conservancy, one of the largest recipients of Walton Family Foundation
money every year, “disturbing.”</p>
<p>“Donors to Prop. 1 want this water bond to pass so that they can get
something from it: short-term jobs building dams that will be created
with public tax dollars, land to manage bought with public funds, and
taxpayer-subsidized water to grow permanent crops on unsuitable land,"
said Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta.</p>
<p>“Prop. 1’s big dam projects will make very little new water, and the
water will mainly go to unsustainable huge agribusinesses,” said Barbara
Barrigan-Parrilla. “Most disturbing is the $500,000 that the Nature
Conservancy has contributed to the Prop 1 campaign. The Nature
Conservancy has benefited from the gifting of public lands in the Delta
by the Department of Water Resources."</p>
<p>She emphasized, "The Nature Conservancy turned a blind eye to oil
drilling in the Gulf of Mexico for the ability to manage wetlands, and
pumps oil on its own lands. In California, they are turning a blind eye
to the issue of how water exports will be accelerated from the Bay-Delta
estuary if Prop. 1 passes, and how this water will fill Governor
Brown's Delta tunnels."</p>
<p>"They are supporting water policies that will serve special corporate
interests in exchange for the opportunity to manage more conservancy
projects in the Delta and throughout California," concluded
Barrigan-Parrilla.</p>
<p>The Nature Conservancy, known for its service to corporate interests
at great expense to fish, wildlife, the environment and the public
trust, received a total of $5,482,699 from the Walton Family Foundation
in 2013. This includes $1,545,963 for freshwater "conservation" on the
Colorado River, $1,437,986 for freshwater "conservation" on the
Mississippi River. $475,000 for marine "conservation," and $2,023,750
for other "conservation" grants.</p>
<p>The Walton Family Foundation is governed by the descendants of Sam
and Helen Walton, the founders of retail giant Walmart, a company
notorious for the poor treatment of its workers and its environmentally
destructive practices around the globe.</p>
<p>An analysis of environmental grants that the Walton Family Foundation
gave to conservation organizations in 2013 reveals that NGOs supporting
Proposition 1, the water bond on California's November 4 ballot,
received $10,786,949 in grants while opponents of the controversial
measure received none. </p>
<p>Supporters of the water bond getting money from the Walton Family
Foundation in 2013 include the Nature Conservancy, National Audubon
Society (the parent organization of Audubon California, a bond backer),
the Ocean Conservancy, Trout Unlimited, American Rivers, Defenders of
Wildlife and Ducks Unlimited. The Foundation lists their environmental
contributions in three categories: freshwater conservation, marine
conservation and other conservation grants. (<a href="http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/2013-environment-grants" target="_blank">http://www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org/...</a>) </p>
<p>National Audubon Society, the parent organization of Audubon
California, received $2,570,767, including $312,100 for freshwater
conservation on the Colorado River, $2,058,667 for freshwater
conservation on the Mississippi River and $200,000 for marine
conservation.</p>
<p>The foundation gave the Ocean Conservancy, a strong supporter of the
privately funded Marine Life Protection Act Initiative to create
questionable "marine protected areas in California, $1,552,083 for
projects in the Gulf of Mexico.</p>
<p>Trout Unlimited was awarded $610,650 for freshwater conservation on the Colorado River.</p>
<p>American Rivers received $424,400 for freshwater conservation on the Colorado River.</p>
<p>Defenders of Wildlife got $100,058 for freshwater conservation on the Mississippi River.</p>
<p>Finally, Ducks Unlimited, Inc. received $46,292 for freshwater
conservation on the Mississippi River from the Walton Family Foundation.
</p>
<p>The Walton Family Foundation dumps many millions of dollars every
year into corporate environmental NGOs, including the Environmental
Defense Fund, Conservation International, Nature Conservancy and the
Ocean Conservancy, that promote the privatization of the oceans through
"catch shares," questionable "marine protected areas" and other
projects.</p>
<p>“It is highly troubling to see the impact that Walmart and a few big
foundations are having on the conservation of our resources, as well as
the protection of our artisanal and traditional fisheries including
tribal fisheries," said Zeke Grader, Executive Director of the Pacific
Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations (PCFFA) and opponent of
Proposition 1.</p><br></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 12:36 PM, karinajoy <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:karinacotler@gmail.com" target="_blank">karinacotler@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div style="word-wrap:break-word">Since our ordinance is about water, thought you might like to read a negative review of prop. one.<div>Karina<br><div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div style="word-wrap:break-word"><div><br><div>Begin forwarded message:</div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0px"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica';color:rgba(0,0,0,1.0)"><b>From: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'">"Freddie Long" <<a href="mailto:longfreddie@gmail.com" target="_blank">longfreddie@gmail.com</a>><br></span></div><div style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0px"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica';color:rgba(0,0,0,1.0)"><b>Subject: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'"><b>PROPOSITION ONE! NO! NO! NO!</b><br></span></div><div style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0px"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica';color:rgba(0,0,0,1.0)"><b>Date: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'">October 31, 2014 at 11:36:53 AM PDT<br></span></div><div style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0px"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica';color:rgba(0,0,0,1.0)"><b>To: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'">"BIG SOLLV List" <<a href="mailto:sollvbig@sollv.org" target="_blank">sollvbig@sollv.org</a>><br></span></div><div style="margin-top:0px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:0px;margin-left:0px"><span style="font-family:'Helvetica';color:rgba(0,0,0,1.0)"><b>Reply-To: </b></span><span style="font-family:'Helvetica'"><a href="mailto:longfreddie@gmail.com" target="_blank">longfreddie@gmail.com</a><br></span></div><br><div><div link="blue" vlink="purple" style="font-family:GillSans;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;font-weight:normal;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:normal;text-align:start;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px" lang="EN-US"><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><b><i><span style="font-size:18pt;color:rgb(192,0,0)">Published in Anderson Valley Advertiser</span></i></b><span style="font-size:18pt;color:rgb(192,0,0)"><u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><b><i><span style="font-size:18pt;color:rgb(192,0,0)">California's North Coast Water Relics</span></i></b><span style="font-size:18pt;color:rgb(192,0,0)"><u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><b><span style="font-size:18pt;color:rgb(192,0,0)">Will Parrish, October 15, 2014</span></b><span style="font-size:18pt;color:rgb(192,0,0)"><u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">In roughly three weeks, the relatively slim percentage of Californians who<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">vote in the Nov. 2014 election will decide on a politically contentious (is<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">there any other kind of water politics in California?) $7.5 billion state<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">general obligation bond, Proposition 1, entitled "THE State Water Bond"<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">[emphasis added]. A creature of the dominant political response to<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">California's panic-strickening drought, the bond issue would provide a<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">greater level of financing for new water projects than any in the state's<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">recent history.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">Although the bond includes funding for everything from bike trails to water<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">recycling to wetlands restoration, its most pivotal line item is $2.7<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">billion that would be allocated to expanded water storage. That likely means dams, and it especially likely means help with construction of the Sites Reservoir, a vast new facility just east of the Mendocino National Forest, about 10 miles west of the town of Maxwell. The bond singles it out for special mention.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">Sites Reservoir would involve two large dams on the mainstem Sacramento River, each around 310 feet high. The water would be ferried through the Tehama-Colusa and Glen-Colusa canals, as well as a third canal that would be built specifically for the project and originate north of Colusa. All of this liquid gold would thereby be plumbed into the Antelope Valley, drowning an estimated 14,000 acres of grassland, oak woodland, chaparral, riparian habitat, vernal pools, and wetlands (including 19 acres of rare alkali wetlands). The water bond, it should be noted, would only cover part of the cost of constructing these enormous new installations. Sites would be California's first massive water infrastructure project since the 1982 completion of Lake Sonoma, a huge reservoir that is nevertheless less than one-fifth as large, which dams the headwaters of Dry Creek: a tributary of the Russian River that runs off the opposite slope of the Navarro River’s headwaters southeast of Anderson Valley. As of this writing, the state water bond enjoys strong support, especially from the state's political leaders: Only one state legislator voted against placing the bond on the ballot. <u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">The growing specter of California's first massive dam in more than three<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">decades brings up a major point about the State of California's long-term<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">planning process. The state's infrastructure agencies tend to develop their<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">water supply, transportation, and other projects based on 25-, 50-, and<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">100-year plans. With the persistence of Banquo's ghost, projects conceived<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">before many voters were born can quickly come back to life after political<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">alignments change in response to big events, such as big droughts. For their part, California water infrastructure planners have long envisioned<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">capturing virtually every single drop of free-flowing water in this state<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">behind a dam, enabling them to control exactly where water goes and who<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">receives it. I have sitting on my computer desktop a PDF of a 1964<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">California Department of Water Resources document entitled "Possible<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">Additional Facilities to the State Water Resources Development System in the North Coastal Area and West Side Sacramento Valley." The document is compelling exactly because of how shocking it is to the sensibilities of<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">most people who would view it today: an era in which it is widely<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">acknowledged that unlimited exploitation of the natural world is a death<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">sentence for the planet. By contrast, this document is the product of an era<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">in which California's highways, dams, canals, electrical grid, suburban<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">housing, and industrial manufacturing capacity grew recklessly and without<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">restraint.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">For perspective here, consider that the largest reservoir currently existing<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">today in California, the Shasta Reservoir, holds 3.5 million acre-feet of<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">water, and consider further that California has altered its natural<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">watersheds to a greater extent than any area of equivalent size in the<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">world. This map features at least four reservoirs that would be considerably<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">larger than Shasta Reservoir. The map is color-coded. Installations drawn in red are an intermediate priority, meaning they are feasible to build in the<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">next 25 years. Those drawn in green are a priority to build in the next 50<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">years.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"><<a href="http://theava.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/ca-watermap.jpg" style="color:purple;text-decoration:underline" target="_blank">http://theava.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/ca-watermap.jpg</a>> </span><span style="font-size:14pt;color:rgb(71,135,255)"><u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">The largest of the reservoirs this document envisions, the so-called<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">"Humboldt Reservoir" (which appears on the 50-year plan), would span much of Humboldt County's interior, including an enormous swath of the Six Rivers National Forest. It would capture water from the Eel and Klamath Rivers via a dam on the lower Klamath, for the purpose of shunting that water via a network of tunnels and canals into the so-called Helena Reservoir - a huge add-on to the existing Trinity Reservoir. From there, it would be on to Whiskeytown Reservoir and thence to the Sacramento River, which would virtually pipe it down to the main beneficiaries of this unparalleled plumbing system: San Joaquin Valley agribusiness and the water districts that provide Southern California's megalopolises. What did state water infrastructure planners have in mind for Mendocino County? Well, if you like Lake Mendocino now, you may just learn to love the so-called "Enlarged Coyote Valley Reservoir," which would expand the current reservoir by a factor of five. Five!<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">But there's so much more. A new dam on the Eel River would expand the present-day Van Arsdale Reservoir and Lake Pillsbury Reservoir above Potter Valley - currentlyseparated by a distance of more than 12 river miles - into one continuous reservoir known as English Ridge Reservoir. The reservoir would extend even further than that, though, encompassing a significant expanse north of Potter Valley. (The US Bureau of Reclamation energetically pursued this plan for a time in the late 60s) Round Valley would have been entirely flooded, its current residents forcibly relocated, more or less, by a dam on the Middle Fork Eel River. In place of Round Valley, we would have the Dos Rios Reservoir, an enormous man-made (and, to a far lesser extent, woman-made) lake that would connect to English Ridge Reservoir by way of the so-called Elk Creek Tunnel. English Ridge, in turn, would drain into Clear Lake via the Garrett Tunnel, which would be bored through the mountains that comprise the southern portion of the Mendocino National Forest. Dos Rios Reservoir would feature a second outlet, providing a more direct route to the Central Valley, a tunnel feeding into another massive new reservoir also envisioned on this map, the Glenn Reservoir Complex in Glenn County. This enormous reservoir, far larger than Shasta Reservoir, would be just west of the actually-existing Black Butte Reservoir, which is roughly due east of Chico.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">And that's still not enough water for the good people of Glenn County to<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">have on hand, either. Spencer Reservoir would capture the waters of the<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">North Fork Eel River channel (remember, the Eel has four major forks - all<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">slated for new dams here), shunting it off into the Glenn Reservoir Complex<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">as well.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">And those are just some of the projects our state's water planners<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">envisioned as possibilities worth considering in the ensuing 25 years.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">The 50-year plan would involve development of the Bell Springs Reservoir and the Sequoia Reservoir, which would flood most of the remainder of the<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">mainstem Eel River's 192-mile channel, or at least the portion not already<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">drowned under the aforementioned English Ridge Reservoir, beneath another reservoir about four times larger than the latter.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">Part of the reason these projects never came to pass is that when the Army<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">Corps of Engineers and the State Division of Water Resources pursued<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">construction of the Dos Rios Reservoir in the late-1960s, they were thwarted by vigorous grassroots opposition and Republican Governor Ronald Reagan, who vetoed state funding for the facility. The social upheavals of the time compelled Reagan and other leading politicians of the era to grant many of the demands of the burgeoning environmental movement, with this political dynamic leading to passage of the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act several years later.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">(Mark Scaramella's uncle, then-Supervisor and Mendocino County board<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">chairman Joe Scaramella, also opposed the Dos Rios dam, not on environmental grounds, but on the grounds that the dam would take hundreds of square milesof prime ag land out of production and, even more importantly, off the County's tax rolls. Joe Scaramella helped Richard Wilson organize oppositionto the crazy idea in the months leading up to Reagan's veto. All of this is documented in Ted Simon's fine book, "The River Stops Here.”) But once the wheels of an enormous bureaucratic machinery start turning on an idea, does it ever really die? Not entirely. <u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">The state transportation agency that prefigured CalTrans put forth a transportation infrastructure plan roughly two years prior to the State Division of Water Resources master plan, in 1962, which called for (among many other things) a four-lane freeway bypass around the tiny north Mendocino County town of Willits. For a time, the idea seemed entirely antiquated. Then, CalTrans and local politicians dusted it off in the early-90s. California voters approved general obligation bond money in 2006 for transportation projects. CalTrans siphoned off a big chunk of those funds into the coffers of its Willits Bypass project, which will handle only 5,000-10,000 cars a day. And you all know what happened from there.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">There are other interesting parallels in California's history. In 1906, the<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">conflagrations that consumed San Francisco following the 1906 earthquake<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">provided renewed impetus for the Hetch Hetchy Dam project, which San<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">Francisco-based engineers first developed in detail in 1864: exactly 100<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">years before the Division of Water Rights developed its master plan for<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">transferring North Coast water to the Central Valley and Southern<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">California. If water tunneled into The City from the Sierra Nevadas had been available, project boosters asserted with little foundation, then the fires would have been extinguished before they grew out of control.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">In December 1964, the largest flood in the modern history of the Eel River<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">caused what biologists refer to as a "mass wasting event." It was another<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">case of North Coast ecosystems' sacrifice on the altar of reckless expansion elsewhere in the state. Clear-cut logging throughout the Eel River system had fueled the suburban construction boom in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. The reckless logging had left deforested soils to run off into the river channel, with hundreds of miles of temporary roads also contributing to the problem. The Army Corps attempted to justify the construction of the Dos Rios Dam for flood control. However, among all the proposed dams on the Eel River, Dos Rios would have the lowest impact on flood control. The moral of the story: natural disasters create huge new political openings. Nowadays, California's water infrastructure boosters are saying this new set of proposals are the answer to the state's water supply problem. Of course, California's existing reservoirs sit empty in large part due to the loss of snow melt, not capacity problems; climate change is a huge new factor in all of this. Of course, the odds that any of the abandoned projects I've mentioned in this piece will be revived any time<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">soon are slim. But if dams become a popularly supported political solution<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">to the state's water woes, it remains to be seen which seeming relics from<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt">the past the water boosters will dust off.<u></u><u></u></span></div></div><div><div style="margin:0in 0in 0.0001pt;font-size:12pt;font-family:'Times New Roman',serif"><span style="font-size:14pt"> </span></div></div></div>_______________________________________________<br>To Unsubscribe, or Change Settings, go to<br><a href="https://lists.multitalents.net/mailman/options/sollvbig" style="color:purple;text-decoration:underline" target="_blank">https://lists.multitalents.net/mailman/options/sollvbig</a></div></div></blockquote></div><br></div></blockquote></div><br></div></div><br>_______________________________________________<br>
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