Massive Support Needed to Pass Delta Restoration Legislation Through California Senate: Water Interests Opposing Bill

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Dan Bacher

Lois Wolk's AB 1806, the Fish Rescue Plans Bill, aims to stop future environmental disasters like November 2007's Prospect Island Fish Kill from taking place. The bill also requires full mitigation for the fish-killing impacts of the federal and state water projects upon California Delta fish. Photo by Dan Bacher.

The California State Assembly voted 41-31 on May 29 for Assembly Bill 1806, the Fish Rescue Plans Bill sponsored by Assemblywoman Lois Wolk (D-Davis) to protect the declining fisheries in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The bill was originally set to be heard by the Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee on June 10, but the hearing has been re-scheduled for Tuesday, June 24. A massive outpouring of letters and phone calls is needed to push this bill through the State Senate. We also need to pack the hearing room at the State Capitol on June 24.

Passage of this bill becomes increasingly crucial when you consider the closure of California and Oregon ocean waters and Central Valley rivers for the first time in history this year. The closure is a result of the collapse of the Sacramento River fall chinook salmon population, the driver of West Coast salmon fisheries.

Although the Bush and Schwarzenegger administrations blame "ocean conditions" for the collapse, the real causes of the dramatic fishery decline are massive increases in water exports out of the California Delta and increasing water pollution by a toxic brew of pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, selenium and other salts and domestic sewage discharge, including high levels of ammonia. These problems were compounded by the failure of the Department of Fish and Game to put hatchery salmon smolts in acclimation pens on San Pablo Bay two years in a row.

At the same time, four open water species - delta smelt, longfin smelt, threadfin shad and juvenile striped bass - have declined to record low population levels. The top cause of the decline is record increases in water exports, followed by toxics and invasive species.