That's what it means to copromise oregonwild. You don't want compromise you really want it to be done the way you say. Even if this deal gets accomplished you will still spend years trying to overturn it or restict it more. Compromise for now but you'll be back.

I doubt the environmetalists will be happy with anything less than no farming in the basin at all and eventually no fishing in the Klamath River or at sea for any of it's fish.

(we were willing to agree to power subsidies for irrigators, a federal buy-out for willing sellers, and more).

Does any of "your" comprimises not call for my tax dollars to be given away to one or another effected party.

There seem to be several assumptions here that are shaky at best.
1. It still doesn't sound like dam removal is guaranteed, so compromise and then cross your fingers as it sounds like wishful thinking.
2. If the dams come out all the water will be sent to farms and none left for the fish.

7. As to j2cub612 comments about whether or not farming should happen in the Klamath Basin. The are gets about 7 inches of rain per year. Does that sound like a good place to farm? I don't think I need to answer that question. With climate change we need to be smart about where we farm and not farm in places where all of the water has to sucked out of rivers that provide salmon for downstream fishing communities.
J

Since it's no longer "Global Warming" we should be alright farming in dry climates as "Climate Change" could mean just about anything.

With all due respect to our many colleagues and friends there, Oregon Wild has been championing a great deal of highly inflated rhetoric blasting the KBRA that is SIMPLY NOT TRUE, particularly about the impact of the KBRA on the national wildlife refuges, some in these postings. As one of the Klamath Negotiations groups, we should set the record straight, with references to the KBRA itself (as just released) so people can check the facts for themselves.

8. For example, among other unsupported press statements, Oregon Wild has in the past said the following: The KBRA locks in continued agricultural leases on the Lower Klamath and Tule Lake National Wildlife Refuges for the next 50 years.

Actually, such agricultural leases have been allowed on certain National Wildlife Refuges in the Klamath Basin since the passage in 1964 of the Kuchel Act (PL 88-567)(16 U.S.C. Sec. 695m). However, this merely contractual KBRA Agreement cannot change that fact because it cannot repeal an Act of Congress. Only Congress can do that. This may be disappointing to some (including Oregon Wild) who once tried to make the lease land program a KBRA issue, but the remedy for those advocating an end to national wildlife refuge lease land farming is 9.. in CONGRESS, not attacking the KBRA.

KBRA critics also discount certain benefits the KBRA brings to these national wildlife refuges (listed above). These are not trivial benefits, but are deliberately ignored by many of the KBRA's critics who focus far more on what is not in the Agreement, rather than on what is. Those benefits include the following:

10. 1. In KBRA Sec. 15.1.2.E, a guaranteed minimum summer inflow water right for the Lower Klamath National Wildlife Refuge of between 48,000 and 60,000 acre-feet (scaled depending on the water year type). At present these National Wildlife Refuges have no water right assurances whatsoever, which means they can be (and have been)  completely dried up during previous low rainfall and drought years. This new KBRA refuge water right can be scaled down to no less than 24,000, but only in the most extreme water shortages under Sec. 15.1.2.F.i. In many past droughts the refuges have gotten NO WATER AT ALL. Without the KBRA reforms in place, this could happen again. In fact, Oregon Wild has some very dramatic pictures of dried up national wildlife refuges and dead birds in its archives to prove that very point.

2. The Agreement would provide for federal implementing legislation (See Appendix A-1, provision G) which would FOR THE FIRST TIME specifically add fish and wildlife and National Wildlife Refuges as legally authorized purposes of the Klamath Reclamation Project. Right now the Reclamation Project cannot include those protections because they are not in its original 1906 purpose statement. This change will legally institutionalize the requirement for the Bureau of Reclamation to provide reliable water supplies to the nearby National Wildlife Refuges.

 3. Under Sec. 15.4.4.B.iii of the KBRA, US Fish and Wildlife Klamath Refuge managers would for the first time have a dedicated funding stream (20% of future lease land revenues) to better provide for fish and wildlife needs on the wildlife refuges themselves, including enforcement and implementation of new mitigation measures required for the lease land program in accordance with the Kuchel Act. Refuge managers believe this will make much better management of the refuges for wildlife possible. At present, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service gets 11 none of these lease land revenues, and refuge managers must instead tap the U.S. Treasury for all of their refuge management funds, competing (sometimes unsuccessfully) against every other use of federal taxpayer dollars.

12. 4. An additional benefit to waterfowl generally from the KBRA will also be the reclaiming and addition of several thousands of new wetlands acres to the existing upper basin wetlands land base, to be used for additional water storage as well as waterfowl (KBRA Sec. 18.2).

Some refuge advocates are disappointed that the KBRA, a mere contract, cannot repeal the 1964 Kuchel Act (PL 88-567) 16 U.S.C. Sec. 695m by which Congress allows commercial lease land farming on parts of these refuges. However, neither will it overturn the Kuchel Act or any other laws wildlife protections. (KBRA Appendix A, Item L). No mere restoration agreement could do any of that, only Congress.

In short, Oregon Wild has the wrong target here. Oregon Wild should be working to change the Kuchel Act in Congress, not trying to discredit the KBRA and block its major benefits to the wildlife refuges simply out of spite or disappoint that the KBRA cannot be used for that purpose.

-- Glen Spain, Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen?s Associations (PCFFA)

There is also a need to correct another myth or bit of misinformation about the science underlying the KBRA-projected new flows for lower river salmon. Oregon Wild and some others have frequently said there is no science behind them -- a statement that is patently false and very easily disproved.

As the Co-Chair of the Technical Advisory Committee to the KBRA process, I invite them to really look at the impressive body of science, including two entirely independent modeling efforts using three separte models, all showing that the KBRA Flows, even alone and not coupled with dam removal (making them even more effective), are going to GREATLY benefit salmon restoration and recovery in the Basin, including benefiting ESA-listed coho salmon.
In fact, the KBRA water reallocation scheme is, in the opinions of most scientists, far less uncertain and risky than simply doing nothing. The status quo could easily lead to widespread salmon extinctions in the basin unless the water reforms that the KBRA will achieve are implemented.

A full explanation of the science behind the KBRA flow regime is contained in a "Science White Paper," with the daunting title of "Compilation of Information to Inform USFWS Principals on Technical Aspects of the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement Relating to Fish and Fish Habitat Conditions," US Fish and Wildlife Service. The final version of this Report is expected to be released soon and drafts are available. Please refer to that document for the detailed scientific analysis supporting the KBRA flow regimes.

13. Those KBRA flow targets are also solidly based on the so-called "Hardy Phase II Flow Study," considered the currently best available science on the flow recovery needs of salmonids in the Klamath River (Thomas B. Hardy, R. C. Addley, et al., Evaluation of Instream Flow Needs in the Lower Klamath River: Phase II Final Report, (US Dept. of Interior, July 31, 2006)). There are also various summaries of the modeling efforts done to test the KBRA flow recommendations in the KBRA itself (Appendix E-5) and to assure their benefits to salmon restoration referenced in the KBRA itself, at Sec. 12.2.7.A.

Under the KBRA, "Hardy flows" are closely matched and in some instances exceeded during the most biologically critical times of the year for Klamath River salmonids (spring juvenile outmigration and late summer spawning). The flows we receive today are clearly inadequate by comparison. All salmonid species (several chinook runs, coho and steelhead) were considered and will be benefited under these KBRA flow targets. Under the current ESA-mandated flow regime, all the ESA can provide is just enough water to prevent extinction -- not to mention that the ESA protections for salmon in the Klamath River could vanish with one bad Court ruling.

However, it is clear that improved flows alone cannot fully recover the Klamath's damaged salmon runs. Those improved flows must be coupled with dam removal to improve water quality as well. This is one major reason these two Settlement Agreements are coupled together. Both are necessary for full salmon recovery in the Klamath Basin, but neither is sufficient in itself to accomplish that goal.

Thus the so-called "dam removal alternative" that Oregon Wild and some others have been touting cannot, in itself, achieve full salmon restoration in the basin. Only dam removal coupled WITH THE KRBA can accomplish that greater purpose. Unless conservation group opponents of the KBRA have a viable, and most importantly achievable, alternative to the KBRA that will ALSO deliver between 14. 130,000 and 230,000 additional acre-feet to the salmon in the lower river, end water wars in the Klamath Basin, and result in a 50-year habitat restoration effort, their assertions that there are "better alternatives" to the KBRA are nothing more than wishful thinking.

Out of work commercial fishermen PCFFA represents support the KBRA because it will lead to both dam removal AND Klamath salmon recovery. We cannot rebuild our salmn-dependent communities and livelihoods on KBRA critics' wishful thinking.
 

-- Glen Spain, Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations (PCFFA)

 

I am a biologist working for the Klamath Tribes, at the upper end of the Klamath River. I have been working to restore healthy conditions to this river basin for more than 20 years now, and have spent the last 9 years focusing on restoring salmon and steelhead above the Klamath River dams, and restoring healthy conditions to the Upper Klamath watershed.

I will begin by saying that I support the two agreements without reservation. These agreements offer complex approaches to complex ecological, political, and socioeconomic issues, and are therefore difficult to understand. It is useful and appropriate to consider individual components of the agreements, but always in the context of the overall package, as well as in the context of the available alternative. This dynamic is consistently missing in the rhetoric that has been flowing from Oregon Wild in their attacks on the settlement efforts.

The agreements mark a fundamental change in approach to management of aquatic resources in the Klamath Basin. They move us from regulation based warfare with ESA based Biological Opinions and litigation as principle weapons, which can only address symptoms of our environmental problems, to innovative collaboration that address the real, foundational problems. Understand that I speak as one who worked hard for many years, trying to use the ESA to make real, lasting, beneficial change happen.

Oregon Wild consistently criticizes flow provisions of the agreements. It may be useful to readers to understand the context within which I, and I believe most other settlement parties, view the flow outcomes of the KBRA.

Picture a river system in which the following things have happened as a result of implementing the KBRA and KHSA:

1. The lower four Klamath River dams have been removed.

2. Spawning and rearing habitats in the Klamath River have been revitalized by restored gravel storage and movement dynamics, which the dams have all but eliminated.

3. The toxic Microcystis (algae) blooms in the hydro project reservoirs have been eliminated, and they no longer impact downstream river reaches.

4. The thermal impacts of the hydro project reservoirs have been removed, restoring a thermal regime similar to that measured in 1926. This is a big deal, because at present fall Chinook spawning runs are delayed (compared to historic timing) by weeks, and when they do run they face a river that gets warmer as they move upstream to spawn. Both are caused by the hydro project reservoirs slowly releasing heat stored during the summer. Late spawning leads to late fry emergence and then to late out-migration of smolts, which likely decreases their success.

5. Salmon and steelhead once again have access to the large concentrations of cold water, and the extensive spawning and rearing habitats that exist upstream of the dams.

6. The damage to the river caused by peaking, and by the diversion of most or all of the flow from the Klamath River within the hydro project, has been stopped.

7. Major efforts have been made to remove nutrients and organic matter before the water flows past Keno Dam. Under present conditions, these nutrients and organic matter cause big problems for salmon downstream.

8. Increased and reliable diversions into the Klamath National Wildlife Refuges are in place. The KBRA substantially improves the water supply for the refuges.

9. Diversions into the Klamath Irrigation Project have been reduced significantly, and capped.

10. An interim program for managing lake levels and river flows has been implemented; that is between now and when the dams come out, Project diversion cap is realized, etc.

11. A more collaborative approach to managing water in the lake and river is in place, one that will facilitate simultaneous consideration of upper and lower basin needs, which has never been possible under the ESA.

12. A plan for managing through droughts has been implemented, which will provide for increased water in the lake and river should it be necessary in the worst drought years.

15 13. Former wetlands have reconnected to Upper Klamath Lake,
restoring natural water storage and greatly expanding habitat for endangered suckers, waterfowl, etc.

16.14. Inflow to Upper Klamath Lake has been increased by 30,000 acre ft through retiring upstream water uses.

15. Major river restoration has been accomplished in the Klamath River, its tributaries, and above Upper Klamath Lake. This is the centerpiece of the KBRA as far as fish are concerned, and something that cannot be delivered by the ESA, or by litigation. River restoration will also greatly benefit waterfowl, and when combined with the reconnected wetlands around Upper Klamath Lake, and the large, reliable water deliveries to the Refuges, it is clear that settlement brings enormous benefits to the Pacific flyway.

I could go on if I had more time, but the point is that it is simply wrong to make sweeping statements about the flow outcomes of the KBRA and KHSA without taking all of the above into account. In my opinion, the flow outcomes of the settlement offer dramatic improvements to the flow regime in the Klamath River, and when combined with the removal of dams and massive restoration actions, provide the best possible achievable future for the Klamath ecosystem.

17. As an attorney representing the Klamath Tribes I have watched, and participate in, decades of litigation over Klamath Basin resources, especially water. Of all the interests involved, none of them has found a way to litigate their way to achievement of their goals. While litigation clearly has a role to play in ironing out resource issues, the current laws simply don't offer the tools for fixing all fo what's wrong in the Klamath Basin.

In recent years an impressive number of parties found a way to set aside their differences long enough to explore alternative paths to solutions. The resulting KBRA, and its partner the KHSA, offer more solutions to more problems than can possibly be offered by another decade or more of litigation.

Attacks on the KBRA and KHSA by groups like Oregon Wild are simply not well founded. The attacks seldom offer any meaningful alternatives and, when they do, they appear to assume there is an ability to simply dictate outcomes desired by particular interests. this isn't correct, and it will bring only more decades of litigation.

The Klamath Tribes, and other leaders resident in the Basin, are prepared to move beyond the old costly, divisive, and inconclusive ways of doing business, and they call on others to join and support this remarkable effort.