The Changing San Joaquin Valley

Ever since the construction of Friant Dam in 1946, the San Joaquin River has been little more than a ditch for salt-laden irrigation water draining from farms along the east side of the San Joaquin Valley. Virtually the entire natural flow of the San Joaquin, which rises just west of the Mammoth Lakes area in the central Sierra, has been diverted for farm use during the irrigation season. The San Joaquin’s salmon run has been decimated, and the polluted water that does reach the river’s historic outlet of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta contributes to the severe water-quality problems in the delta.

Blind to such facts, the U.S. Department of the Interior maintains there is no need to conduct a formal environmental study into the effects of renewing irrigation water contracts for San Joaquin waters for another 40 years. The department’s bureau of reclamation has argued that since the contract terms are essentially unchanged from those of four decades ago, there is no legal basis for triggering the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) into play.

The contracts may be essentially unchanged, but the river certainly is not. The effects of the irrigation project are dramatic and far-reaching. They are far-reaching enough for the Environmental Protection Agency to call for an environmental impact study under NEPA. With the two federal agencies at odds, the President’s Council on Environmental Quality has stepped into the issue. The council will hold hearings in Washington and Fresno before settling the dispute. It should not be difficult for the council to decide that a formal environmental impact study is in order.

The instant controversy involves the renewal, approved Tuesday by Secretary of Interior Manuel Lujan Jr., of an irrigation water contract between the bureau of reclamation and the 500-farm Orange Cove Irrigation District in Fresno and Tulare counties. The decision is expected to be extended to 28 similar water contracts coming up for renewal in the Friant Unit of the federal Central Valley Project. In all, about 1.5 million acre-feet of water are involved annually, which is nearly twice as much water used in the entire city of Los Angeles each year.

The Orange Cove case already has been argued in the courts, with a coalition of conservation groups suing to block contract renewal without an environmental impact statement. A federal judge permitted the bureau to proceed with the contracts with the understanding that any pact would be made subject to the final decision of the court.

In offering renewal of the contract, Lujan directed the bureau of reclamation to conduct an “environmental assessment” and to explore opportunities for recovery programs in the San Joaquin River basin. Such an assessment, however, would not provide for the extensive public comment required by the more rigorous environmental impact study.

During a court hearing, Richard Moss of the Friant Water Users Authority, argued that the challenge to the contract renewal poses a threat to California’s farm economy and the rural way of life enjoyed by farmers receiving heavily subsidized federal irrigation water.

But an environmental impact study by itself would pose no such threat, nor would it necessarily result in the farmers getting less water. The process is designed to identify environmental impacts of a proposed federal project and to propose mitigating actions that would offset such damage. One example cited by state Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp, who is pushing for an environmental study, is that the bureau might require farmers to adopt water conservation techniques. The water saved could then be used to help restore fisheries or riparian wildlife and waterfowl habitat on the San Joaquin.

The rural life and economy of the San Joaquin Valley cannot--and will not--be wiped out in an attempt to rectify half a century of environmental neglect. But the federal government cannot renew these contracts without an assessment of mitigation measures that could restore some vitality to an important California river.