Norton and Veneman’s appearance signals Klamath water war

by the Klamath Forest Alliance

The Klamath Basin water issue has been on the environmental radar for quite some time. The following article is a statement on recent government actions by Felice Pace, Director of Klamath Forest Alliance.

"Nowhere in America is there a better opportunity to restore an entire river system."
—Tim Palmer, author of "Wild & Scenic Rivers of America," on the Klamath River.

On Friday 29 March when two Bush Administration cabinet members Gale Norton and Ann Veneman personally attended to opening the irrigation headgates at Klamath Falls, they were trying to assure that Oregon Senator Gordon Smith will be reelected this November. They were also signaling to the people of the Klamath River Basin that they do not intend a balanced solution to the problem of too many federal commitments to deliver Klamath water. Norton and Veneman are not seeking the “broad Klamath Basin solution” which Ms. Norton claims in an editorial published this week in the Oregonian and other newspapers. Today the Bush Administration has condemned the Klamath Basin to a nasty and divisive water war.

Norton and Veneman are working hard to turn back the hands of time, to return to a regime in which the Klamath Basin is treated not as a single river basin but as two basins: an Upper Basin where irrigators get all the water they desire, subsidized power, generous crop payments and even government workers to scare birds out of their fields, and a Lower Basin which must suffer a summertime trickle of highly polluted irrigation tailwater.

The Bush Administration has declared its allegiance; they seek to determine the winners and the losers. If Bush and his people have their way, the Lower Klamath River Basin will be a sacrifice area. Joining the river on the Norton-Veneman sacrificial altar are the river’s salmon and steelhead, along with the interests and incomes of commercial salmon fishermen, coastal ports, river communities, white water enthusiasts, lodge owners and especially the rights of Lower Basin tribes the Karuk, Yurok, Hoopa and Quartz Valley Indians. If the Bush Administration has its way, Lower Basin interests will get a few million for “restoration” and will be asked to demonstrate that fish can live without water. Upper Basin irrigators will get all the water they want.

Today we should all be celebrating the fact that nature has given us a good water year. We should all conservationists and irrigators, tribes, fishermen and recreationists be opening the headgates together under a plan in which all interests are honored and the waters of the Klamath River are balanced. But that is not what Ms. Norton and Ms. Veneman bring to the Klamath Basin today. Today a narrow, partisan, political agenda is being elevated over what is right and just. Norton and Veneman will return to their posh offices in Washington DC and the people of this river basin will suffer years of turmoil.

For more information on the Klamath Forest Alliance please visit their website at klamathforestalliance.org.

This column originally appeared in March 2002 in the Chico Examiner.