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Water users file third suit on water cuts for smelt

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on March 18, 2009 at 8:01 am

From the California Farm Bureau Federation:

A third lawsuit has been filed, challenging measures aimed to benefit the delta smelt. The Kern County Water Agency and water users represented by the group Coalition for a Sustainable Delta filed the suit last Friday in U.S. District Court in Fresno.

The suit mirrors two others filed previously by customers of the State Water Project and the federal Central Valley Project.

In each case, the lawsuits charge that federal agencies have ignored or overlooked scientific evidence that points to multiple causes for the decline in delta smelt populations. Instead, the lawsuits say, federal agencies have focused solely on the pumps that deliver water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to farms, homes and businesses in the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California.

Both the state and federal water projects have been required to reduce pumping to aid the delta smelt, which is protected as a threatened species under the federal Endangered Species Act and was classified as an endangered species this month under the state ESA.

Operation of the water projects’ pumping plants must conform to restrictions described in a “biological opinion” written by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The biological opinion has been enmeshed in litigation for years. Environmental groups sued to overturn the original opinion, leading to a revised document that has now been challenged by water agencies.

In announcing their lawsuit, the Kern County Water Agency and the Coalition for a Sustainable Delta said federal agencies “continue to ignore scientific data that point to a growing list of other factors or ’stressors’ that are impacting the Bay-Delta and the native fish that live there.” They say federal agencies “have done nothing” to address predation by non-native fish, habitat destruction, discharges of wastewater and storm water, and other factors harming the smelt.

Read more from the California Farm Bureau Federation by clicking here.

March 18, 2009 · Filed Under Delta smelt, Judge Wanger delta smelt ruling

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