Big opportunity (and big misperceptions) in the Yakima River basin

November 23, 2010 | Dams & Dam Removal, Floods & Floodplains, Global Warming, Greening Water Infrastructure, Restoring Rivers, Wild and Scenic Rivers, Small Streams & Wetlands, Water Supply, Water Efficiency, Protecting Rivers

Michael Garrity
Washington State Conservation Director

Statement of American Rivers, National Wildlife Federation, The Wilderness Society, Conservation Northwest, and Washington Environmental Council on Yakima River water and salmon plan

Brock Evans’ article “Bumping Lake Ancient Forest – One of a Kind” in the summer/fall issue of The Wild Cascades accurately describes the magnificence of the old growth forest surrounding the upper end of Bumping Lake, located east of Mount Rainier in Washington state.  We’ve hiked that forest -- it is indeed a very special place.  But his article mischaracterizes the discussions about water management, native fish recovery and land protection and restoration in the Yakima Basin.  And it certainly mischaracterizes the positions of our organizations on the issue of expanding Bumping Lake for water supply.  

Allow us to set the record straight. 

Western water issues are complex and the Yakima River basin is one of the rare places where we see all of the water conflicts concentrated.  Here, we have salmon and steelhead runs on the brink of extinction; an economy dependent on irrigated agriculture; recent droughts; a politically active Indian Tribe that both defends salmon and is a major irrigator; and a water supply particularly sensitive to climate change.  All of which is a recipe for a fight.
The most recent round of controversy involved several years of efforts to build the Black Rock project, a pipeline and new reservoir that would pump water from the Columbia River to the Yakima.  This $7 billion federal project made no economic or environmental sense and threatened to spread radioactive groundwater from the Hanford Reach Nuclear Reservation to the Columbia River.  In late 2008, this project suffered the fate of most bad water projects – it became a zombie, not quite dead, but hardly vital. 

The failure of the project prompted the Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology), to call together basin interests, including the Yakama Nation, irrigation districts, the counties, agencies and others to look for feasible ways both to improve water supply reliability and to increase the few thousand remaining salmon and steelhead to several hundred thousand.   One conservation organization, American Rivers, has a seat at table, with National Wildlife Federation serving as its alternate.  These stakeholders recognized the need to position the basin--both farmers and fish -- for a changing climate.  The result was a December 2009 outline for a water and salmon management plan with three main goals:

1. Increasing the salmon and steelhead populations from a few thousand fish to several hundred thousand by:

• Providing fish passage around the Yakima Basin’s six federal reservoirs to allow access to cold water and high quality habitat above the dams
• Improving instream flows and river, tributary and floodplain habitat between the Columbia River and the reservoirs

2. Making better use of existing water supplies and infrastructure by:

• Increasing agricultural and residential water efficiency and conservation
• Creating robust water markets to help move water from willing sellers to willing buyers
• Improving existing infrastructure by changing operations, adding features that improve system reliability and performance and potentially removing some dams that may no longer be necessary

3. Enhancing water supply reliability in drought years to withstand the effects of climate change by:

• Developing groundwater recharge and management projects
• Increasing surface storage

During 2010, the stakeholders, Ecology and the Federal Bureau of Reclamation are working through the details of how such an integrated package would be crafted and which projects should be included. The culmination of this work will be the development of a proposal that will go before Congress for authorization and funding.  While the stakeholders have agreed to participate in the process, doing so does not constitute support for the final package – they reserve the right to support or oppose the plan, once finalized.   With the package being far from complete, none of the stakeholders have yet taken a formal position on it. 

Brock’s article made it sound like our organizations support the expansion of Bumping Lake for water supply.  He could not be more wrong.  American Rivers and the National Wildlife Federation have repeatedly stated that we would not support new storage at Bumping Lake or anywhere else unless it made environmental and economic sense, and is part of a package of improvements with overwhelming environmental benefit.  The two organizations have not walked out of the process over Bumping Lake because we hope a proposal can be crafted that includes the very environmentally beneficial parts of an integrated package, but excludes Bumping and other potentially troubling elements.

American Rivers, the National Wildlife Federation, and several national and state land conservation organizations are seeking to include protection of land that would further salmon restoration goals and watershed protection and restoration in the integrated package. This land protection might include consolidation of checkerboard forest ownership, land swaps, regulatory protections (such as wilderness or Wild and Scenic River designations) and outright acquisitions.  Politics have stalled such land protection in the area for years – this might be an opportunity to get it moving again.  Over 40,000 acres threatened by residential and resort development in the Teanaway River basin are among the lands under consideration.  The Teanaway has high salmon and steelhead restoration potential, contains valuable forest habitat for wildlife, and the owner wants to either sell the land or develop it.  We are working towards a truly innovative marriage of land and water resource conservation in the Yakima River basin -- a point Brock missed in his haste to fault the effort and the people involved.
We respect Brock’s passion and his substantial record of defending wilderness, wild rivers and endangered species.  In this case, we wish his passion was matched with accuracy in reporting facts, motivations and strategy.

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