Background

The Klamath Water Users Association (KWUA) is a non-profit corporation that has represented Klamath Irrigation Project farmers and ranchers since 1953. KWUA members include rural irrigation districts and other public agencies, as well as private concerns who operate on both sides of the California-Oregon border. 

Klamath Basin Farmland and geese,
Spring 2004 © Anders Tomlinson

                              Calendar
Wednesday, July 14, 2004 – KWUA Executive Committee Meeting. 6:00 p.m. KWUA office, 2455 Patterson Street, Suite 3, Klamath Falls.

Economic impacts play a significant role in the FERC dam relicensing process. The following two KWUA articles address a USGS recreational impact study:
Western Economists Question USGS Draft Klamath Recreational Study by Klamath Water Users (KWUA) Executive Director Dan Keppen, posted to KBC 5/19/04
Study on Klamath Project recreation impact dead wrong  Done by the U.S. Geological Survey, it is laced with inaccuracies and dangerous assumptions Herald and News by Dan Keppen posted to KBC 5/19/04.

Letter to CDFG (CA dept. of Fish and Game) from KWUA (Klamath Water Users Association) re: 2004 Iron Gate Hatchery operations, 5/18/04.

KWUA response to NOAA fisheries, "By letter dated April 1, 2004, NOAA Fisheries transmitted to the Klamath Basin Area Office of the Bureau of Reclamation a revised incidental take statement (ITS) for NOAA Fisheries’ May 31, 2002 biological opinion (BO) regarding impacts of the Klamath Project on coho salmon. The attached letter provides the comments and objections of the Klamath Water Users Association (Association) to the revised ITS." 5/11/04

KWUA response to The Oregonian editorial board's 'buy out Project farmers' article: See Oregonian article posted 5/10 below, 'Klamath's water woes run deep'.

KWUAs 'letter to the editor' in today's Oregonian, 5/7/04, Fishery regulations cause problems.

KWUA response to NOAA fisheries, "By letter dated April 1, 2004, NOAA Fisheries transmitted to the Klamath Basin Area Office of the Bureau of Reclamation a revised incidental take statement (ITS) for NOAA Fisheries’ May 31, 2002 biological opinion (BO) regarding impacts of the Klamath Project on coho salmon. The attached letter provides the comments and objections of the Klamath Water Users Association (Association) to the revised ITS." 5/11/04

KWUA response to The Oregonian editorial board's 'buy out Project farmers' article, 5/11/04

Mining water in the basin, Mail Tribune 5/5/04. 
KWUA Dan Keppen responds to Mail Tribune editorial 5/5/04. "The artificially high lake and river flow levels supported by the water bank– such as those that contributed to the 2001 curtailment of Upper Klamath Lake irrigation supplies - have been questioned by the National Academy of Sciences."

MEDIA ADVISORY: Activists’ Refuge Report Resurrects Familiar Anti-Farming Solutions, by Dan Keppen, KWUA Executive Director, 4/16/04. The Oregon Natural Resources Council, WaterWatch of Oregon, and other critics of Klamath Project agriculture earlier today released its latest version of its "solution" to the challenges facing the Klamath Basin. Keppen provides an initial response to this report, including a 'myth vs. fact' sheet. For the ONRC report, go HERE. For Refuges in Peril, go HERE.

KWUA Response to OSU Water Allocation Briefs  2/2/04 - Brief #1: The Value of Irrigation Water Varies Enormously and Brief #2: Potential Benefits of Water Banks and Water Transfers Across the Upper Klamath Basin

Letter from Dan Keppen, KWUA Executive Director, to Rolling Stones Magazine, 12/22/03.

Letter from Dan Keppen, KWUA Executive Director, to California Dept of Fish and Game.

Letter to Interior Secretary Gale Norton from CA Congressmen John Doolittle and Wally Herger, and OR Congressman Greg Walden. This outlines initiatives that, if implemented, could lead to the delisting of  the sucker fish, provide deep, cold water storage, and lead to the use of sound science in better understanding fish die-off and other Klamath issues. posted to kbc 9/17/03.

Dan Keppen, KWUA, sends letter containing urgent recommendations regarding Klamath River management to Governor Ted Kulongoski, Secretary Gail Norton, and Mary Nichols. 8/27/03

KWUA response to Klamath River Basin Conservation Implementation Program, August 15, 2003

Connection not made, H&N 8/5/03. Dan Keppen, KWUA executive director, addresses Oregonian's blame.

Dan Keppen letter to Dave Sabo, Klamath BOR manager, regarding management of Project Irrigators' water bank water. Posted July 6, 2003.  Written May 20, 2003.

Dan Keppen response to Ca. Resource Sec. Mary Nichols letter to Interior Secretary Gail Norton, May 21, 2003

Cooperman and Markle of OSU
Response to Cooperman and Markle by William M. Lewis Jr., Chairman of the NRC Committee 

KWUA Dan Keppen writes Letter to the Editor in the Grants Pass Daily Courier, posted 7/31/03 "Local irrigators last spring voluntarily agreed to participate in an environmental water bank that left 17,000 acres of farmland fallow and that will provide 60,000 acre-feet of water to meet ESA requirements this year."