danbacher “From Assemblymember Bill Berryhill (R-26th District) to Congressman Jerry McNerney (D-11th District), from Delta farmers and business leaders to Delta environmentalists, all who attended our benefit recognize that the proposed peripheral canal, dressed up as the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP), will deal the final deathblow to the estuary, to our local economy, and to our way of life,” said Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta.
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by Dan Bacher
The campaign to stop the peripheral canal and restore the California Delta received an enormous financial boost at a historic fundraiser held in Stockton on August 25.
The Restore the Delta Benefit, an event hosted by Dino and Joan Cortopassi and Alex and Faye Spanos that over 600 people attended, raised over $640,000 for the organization to continue its advocacy work on behalf of Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta fisheries and communities.
“The Cortopassi/Spanos Benefit for Restore the Delta was attended by perhaps one of the most politically diverse group of Californians working together presently in the State,” said Restore the Delta Executive Director Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla. “From Assemblymember Bill Berryhill (R-26th District) to Congressman Jerry McNerney (D-11th District), from Delta farmers and business leaders to Delta environmentalists, all who attended our benefit recognize that the proposed peripheral canal, dressed up as the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP), will deal the final deathblow to the estuary, to our local economy, and to our way of life.”
At the event, State Senator (retired) Mike Machado presented Tom Zuckerman of the Central Delta Water Agency and Dino Cortopassi of San Tomo Group with Restore the Delta’s Delta Advocacy Award.
As Senator Machado, now head of the Delta Protection Commission, explained, “This award is to honor Tom Zuckerman and Dino Cortopassi’s work to preserve, restore, and create a positive environmental future for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.”
In his remarks to the audience, Tom Zuckerman made note of the new generation of advocates prepared to defend the Delta for the future. Dino Cortopassi elaborated on several metaphors to explain how those who seek to take water out the Delta understand only limited parts of the region, but not how the Delta works as a whole.
Dino Cortopassi also gave special recognition to Central Delta Water Agency’s Dante Nomellini for his extraordinary efforts to bring community support to Restore the Delta.
Cortopassi has become legendary for the strongly-worded print, radio and TV ads against the peripheral canal that he has run in numerous media outlets. He has blasted both Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Governor Jerry Brown for fast-tracking plans to build the canal to divert more water to agribusiness on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley and southern California.
Barrigan-Parrilla said proceeds from the event will be used to cover staffing and general operating expenses for the next two to three years. Specifically, funds raised from the event will be used to complete the Open Ocean Productions film Over Troubled Waters – a documentary that looks at recent debates on the future of the Delta from multiple perspectives, including the Delta perspective.
“You’ve probably heard the story of the Delta told by people who want to reshape it to take the water and create corporate wealth in other parts of California,” stated Over Troubled Waters producer Russ Fisher. “So much of what you have heard is misleading, even wrong. That is the reason for making this documentary.”
“This event was like Restore the Delta’s debutante ball, a coming out as a coalition,” said Bill Jennings, executive director/chairman of the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance and member of the Restore the Delta Board’s Executive Committee.
“At the fundraiser, the business, agricultural, environmental, fishing and recreational communities of the Delta came together to stand shoulder against the common threat of a peripheral canal,” emphasized Jennings. “We had three Congressman including George Miller, John Garamendi and Jerry McNerney, virtually all of the Stockton City Council and San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors, state legislators and numerous other elected officials at the event. That this fundraiser was put together in three weeks shows the resolve of the Delta family to fight water speculators who would kill this estuary to ship more water south.”
The Obama and Brown administrations are forging ahead with the Bay Delta Conservation Plan to build a peripheral canal to export more water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to corporate agribusiness interests on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California water agencies.
On August 11, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the California Natural Resources Agency announced that they have reached “two significant milestones toward assuring a sustainable water supply for California and a healthy Delta ecosystem.”
The agencies have agreed to a schedule for completing an effects analysis and a combined environmental impact report/environmental impact statement (EIR/EIS) as part of the BDCP by June 2012; and to “a suite of alternatives,” including the peripheral canal, “for evaluation in identifying a proposed project.”
Canal opponents believe that the peripheral canal’s construction will likely result in the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, green sturgeon and other imperiled species. The canal would take vast tracts of Delta farmland, some of the most fertile and productive on the planet, out of production to divert water to irrigate drainage impaired land on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley.
California voters overwhelmingly defeated a peripheral canal proposal at the ballot box in November 1982, but Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger revived plans to build the canal through the Delta Vision process, Bay Delta Conservation Plan and the water policy/water bond package that passed through the State Legislature in November 2009. Governor Brown, like Schwarzenegger, supports “new conveyance facilities” to export more northern California water to southern California.
To see a clip of Open Ocean Production’s documentary work to date, endorsements, and work in progress, visit the new documentary websitehttp://www.overtroubledwaters.org.
For more information about Restore the Delta, go to: http://www.restorethedelta.org.
danbacher “Hardworking farmworker families with annual incomes well below the poverty line are often forced to pay twice for water – once for a monthly water bill for water they can’t drink and then again when they are forced to seek alternative water sources, usually from neighboring towns,” says Maria Herrera, the community outreach coordinator for the Community Water Center in Visalia.
Photo: In conclusion of her 11-day mission to the United States, United Nations Independent Expert on the Human Right to Water and Sanitation Catarina de Albuquerque shared her recommendations for the government. Photo courtesy of Unitarian Universalist Service Committee.
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U.N. water report focuses on California problems
by Dan Bacher
California has acquired a reputation over the years as a national “leader” in environmental policy, but this reputation proves to be false when one considers the state’s often deplorable record on water, fisheries and environmental justice.
In fact, California’s failure to provide clean, safe drinking water to its residents is so alarming that it captured the attention of the United Nations in a special report released in August as a package of “human right to water” bills proceeds through the State Capitol.
Reporting on her mission to the United States last winter, Catarina de Albuquerque, the U.N. Special Rapportuer on the Human Right to Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation, cited a host of worrisome drinking water supply and sanitation conditions in California.
“Ensuring the rights to water and sanitation for all requires a paradigm shift towards new designs and approaches that promote human rights, that are affordable and that create more value in terms of public health improvements, community development, and global ecosystem protection,” de Albuquerque wrote.
While her mission and report touched on issues around the nation, the bulk of her findings addressed problems in California, specifically the San Joaquin Valley, where she cites “enormous challenges” particularly with nitrate contamination of drinking water. While occurring naturally, nitrate levels are elevated by crop fertilizers and animal manure and are known to harm respiratory and reproductive systems as well as the kidney, spleen and thyroid, according to a news release from the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee and Community Water Center in Visalia.
“Because it is difficult to assign responsibility for this type of pollution (non-point source pollution), no one is obliged to pay for the clean-up costs. In these circumstances, the affected community inevitably bears these costs,” she reported.
Central Valley groundwater is contaminated with nitrates
De Albuquerque pointed out this is especially disturbing because groundwater, which is vulnerable to nitrate contamination, serves as the primary source of drinking water for almost 90 percent of Central Valley residents. For instance, in Tulare County she reported that approximately 20 percent of the small public water systems are unable to meet the nitrate maximum contaminant level (MCL) on a regular basis and another 20 percent are over half the nitrate MCL.
“The goal of universal access to clean and safe water has yet to be attained. Infants, older persons, persons with certain medical conditions and other vulnerable groups remain at risk from exposure to water that does not meet federal standards. Moreover, hundreds of substances found in water remain unregulated, and some sources of water, namely private drinking-water supplies, are also unregulated,” she wrote.
The Community Water Center in Visalia, an advocate for safe drinking water in the Central Valley, is especially familiar with this reality.
“Hardworking farmworker families with annual incomes well below the poverty line are often forced to pay twice for water – once for a monthly water bill for water they can’t drink and then again when they are forced to seek alternative water sources, usually from neighboring towns,” said Maria Herrera, the Center’s community outreach coordinator.
The U.N. noted this disturbing reality in their report and pointed out that affected households in these small rural areas are paying as much as 20 percent of their income to water and sanitation.
“While there is no federally recognized right to safe drinking water and sanitation, individual states have taken the initiative to consecrate this right,” de Albuquerque says.
Massachusetts and Pennsylvania have a right to clean water in their constitutions and the United States joined international consensus in 2010, recognizing the human right for water and sanitation.
Environmental justice advocates campaign to pass Human Right to Water bill package
In California, the State Legislature is presently considering AB 685 (Eng-D Monterey Park), the Human Right to Water Measure. If passed, proponents say this would be a fundamental first step to addressing many of the recommendations and concerns in the U.N. report.
“A holistic, systemic approach is required, whereby the water sector is not viewed in isolation from the agricultural, chemical, industrial and energy sectors,” de Albuquerque said. “The absence of political will inevitably means poor planning and scarce funding, and ultimately leads to pollution that jeopardizes water quality and increases costs.”
“It is shocking that in California we have communities where the sole water supply is contaminated, and where families unable to afford treatment are left entirely without safe water,” said Assemblyman Mike Eng, in explaining why he authored his bill. “It is critical that we help communities throughout the state gain access to clean, affordable water.”
AB 685 was held in the Senate Appropriations Commiteee last week. This same bill with almost identical language made it all the way through the Legislature and to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s desk in 2009 in the form of AB 1242 (Ruskin). Schwarzenegger, bowing to pressure from corporate interests, vetoed the bill.
Four other bills, AB 938 (VM Perez), AB 983 (Perea), AB 1221 (Alejo), and SB 244 (Wolk), are still moving through the Legislative process. They will all be up for floor votes over the next two weeks.
The human right to water bill package, including AB 685, is co-sponsored by the California Center for Public Health Advocacy; California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation; Catholic Charities Diocese of Stockton; Clean Water Action; Community Water Center; Environmental Justice Coalition for Water; Food and Water Watch; Southern California Watershed Alliance; Unitarian Universalist Legislative Ministry Action Network, CA; Unitarian Universalist Service Committee; Urban Semillas, and Winnemem Wintu Tribe.
AB 685 is opposed by the Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA), the Western Growers Association and several other water service providers, who contend the bill “may lead to a requirement that water agencies provide water service without consideration to affordability, thereby increasing water bills and have other unintended consequences,” according to the Legislative Analysis.
Winnemem Wintu Tribe: ‘Water is sacred’
“Water is sacred, water is Life for all,” commented Caleen Sisk-Franco, Chief and Spiritual Leader of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe. “Just as all need to breathe Air, so should be the waters be for all, not just those who market water and ruin the rest in poor planning.”
The UN report was released as the Obama and Brown administrations are fast-tracking the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDC) to build a peripheral canal to export more water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to corporate agribusiness interests on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California water agencies.
Canal opponents note that the peripheral canal’s construction is likely to result in the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, green sturgeon and other species. The canal would take vast tracts of Delta farmland, some of the most productive on the planet, out of production to divert water to irrigate drainage impaired land on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley.
At the same time, the peripheral canal would do nothing to provide clean, safe drinking water for rural communities in the San Joaquin Valley plagued by the contamination of drinking water systems.
More than 11.5 million Californians rely on water from suppliers that experienced at least one violation of State Drinking Water Standards as reported to the Department of Public Health in 2004, according to supporters of the legislative package. As many as 8.5 million Californians rely on supplies that experienced more than five instances of unsafe levels in a single year.
The U.N. mission was coordinated by the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC). For additional information on the U.N. mission and corresponding recommendations, contact Patricia Jones, UUSC Environmental Justice Program Manager at (617) 301 4393 or email pjones [at] uusc.org. The full U.N. report is available online at:http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/18session/A-HRC-18-33-Add4_en.pdf.
For more information about the legislative package and UN report, contact: Maria Herrera, Community Water Center, (559) 733-0219, or Michael Miller, Brown∙Miller Communications, (800) 710-9333.
danbacher “Whatever the OAL’s issues with the South Coast MPAs may be – we don’t yet know what their questions to the Commission are at this point – it is clear to us that these regulations are the result of a flawed process, and should be overturned,” said David Elm, chairman of United Anglers of Southern California.
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Sacramento, CA – A delay in the approval of California’s controversial South Coast Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative regulations “means that anglers will now have more time on the water,” reported a news release from United Anglers of Southern California on August 29. October 1, 2011 was the date that the no-fishing zone regulations were to have gone into effect.
California’s Office of Administrative Law (OAL), which must first review and approve the regulations before they go into effect, informed the California Fish and Game Commission that it has additional questions and requests for more information, according to a press release issued by the California Department of Fish and Game on August 25,
After the Commission responds to the OAL’s issues, it may be required to re-notice the regulatory package. The Fish and Game Commission will meet on September 15 to discuss alternative effective dates for implementation of the Southern California “marine protected areas.”
Adding further uncertainty to the timeline for these regulations is a pending lawsuit filed by members of the Partnership for Sustainable Oceans (PSO), a coalition of fishing groups representing the interests of California’s recreational anglers and boaters in the MLPA process.
The lawsuit seeks to set aside the MLPA regulations for the North Central and South Coast study regions, citing “a lack of statutory authority” for the Fish and Game Commission to adopt the regulations, and, in the case of the South Coast regulations, numerous violations of the California Environmental Quality Act in the commission’s environmental review of the regulations.
A hearing on the North Central Coast portion of the case has been set for September 26, in San Diego. The opening brief describing the petitioners’ claims in the lawsuit is available on the KeepAmericaFishing.org Web site.
“The delay in approving the MLPA South Coast regulations should provide some comfort to the many anglers and commercial fishermen who may have had concerns about whether come October 1, they’d be able to fish in their favorite areas,” said Bob Fletcher, former president of the Sportfishing Association of California and a plaintiff in the lawsuit.
“For example, lobster fishermen can now set traps in areas they have historically used with confidence that they won’t be forced off the water on October 1. The outcome of the OAL’s questions to the Commission, and eventually the lawsuit itself, may enable anglers to continue to enjoy tremendous fishing,” he explained.
“Whatever the OAL’s issues with the South Coast MPAs may be – we don’t yet know what their questions to the Commission are at this point – it is clear to us that these regulations are the result of a flawed process, and should be overturned, said David Elm, chairman of United Anglers of Southern California, also a plaintiff. “I urge all anglers, and anyone who supports public access to public resources, to join our fight against the MLPA process in the courts by visiting http://www.OceanAccessProtectionFund.organd making a donation today.”
For more information, contact: Dave Elm, United Anglers of Southern California, (949) 660-8757.
North Coast environmental leader continues to urge support for lawsuit
Grassroots environmental leaders, including John Lewallen, the co-founder of the Ocean Protection Coalition and the North Coast Seaweed Rebellion, are supporting the litigation against the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative.
“A California Superior Court lawsuit challenging the authority of the state to let the private Resources Legacy Fund Foundation operate a process of setting up Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in violation of the 1999 Marine Life Protection Act, the California Environmental Quality Act, the Coastal Act, and other state laws, deserves the support of all Californians,” said Lewallen.
Lewallen said United Anglers of Southern California, et.al., versus the California State Fish and Game Commission, has an “excellent legal team which has won a string of victories.”
“If successful, the United Anglers lawsuit will invalidate all Marine Protected Areas created by the illegal and corrupt process financed and run by the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation on California’s South Coast and North Central Coast, probably leading to the invalidation of Marine Protected Areas declared on the Central Coast and proposed for the North Coast,” emphasized Lewallen.
Lewallen has been in the forefront of grass roots campaigns against oil drilling, the clear cutting of ancient forests, wave energy projects and military testing off the coast and other environmental battles for over three decades. Unlike some well-funded initiative advocates who support greenwashing under the privatized MLPA process, Lewallen sees the MLPA Initiative for what it truly is – a resource grab by corporate interests.
Lewallen is the author of “Ecology of Devastation: Indochina” (Penguin Books, 1971) and “The Grass Roots Primer: How to Organize for Local Environmental Action,” co-authored with James Robertson (Sierra Club Books,1975). He has written numerous articles on environmental issues for an array of publications since then.
Lewallen urges all anglers, and anyone who supports public access to public resources, to help fight the severely flawed MLPA process in the courts by visitinghttp://www.OceanAccessProtectionFund.org and making a donation today.
MLPA Initiative Background:
The Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) is a law, signed by Governor Gray Davis in 1999, designed to create a network of marine protected areas off the California Coast. However, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004 created the privately-funded MLPA “Initiative” to “implement” the law, effectively eviscerating the MLPA.
The “marine protected areas” created under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from oil spills and drilling, water pollution, military testing, wave and wind energy projects, corporate aquaculture and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering.
The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Forces that oversaw the implementation of “marine protected areas” included a big oil lobbyist, marina developer, real estate executive and other individuals with numerous conflicts of interest. Catherine Reheis Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association who is pushing for new oil drilling off the California coast, served as the chair of the MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the South Coast.
The MLPA Initiative operated through a controversial private/public “partnership funded by the shadowy Resources Legacy Fund Foundation. The Schwarzenegger administration, under intense criticism by grassroots environmentalists, fishermen and Tribal members, authorized the implementation of marine protected areas under the initiative through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the foundation and the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG).
Tribal members, fishermen, grassroots environmentalists, human rights advocates and civil liberties activists have slammed the MLPA Initiative for the violation of numerous state, federal and international laws. Critics charge that the initiative, privatized by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004, has violated the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, Brown Act, California Administrative Procedures Act, American Indian Religious Freedom Act and UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
MLPA and state officials refused to appoint any tribal scientists to the MLPA Science Advisory Team (SAT), in spite of the fact that the Yurok Tribe alone has a Fisheries Department with over 70 staff members during the peak fishing season, including many scientists. The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force also didn’t include any tribal representatives until 2010 when one was finally appointed to the panel.
danbacher Photo of Tijuana River mouth courtesy of Lis Cox, US Fish and Wildlife Service.
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Effective date for South Coast marine reserves delayed
by Dan Bacher
The California Fish and Game Commission will discuss alternative effective dates for implementation of the Southern California marine protected areas (MPAs) created under the controversial Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative at its next meeting.
“The MPAs were previously expected to go into effect on Oct. 1, 2011, after the Commission chose that date at its June meeting,” according to a Fish and Game Commission news release on August 25. “They will now discuss a new implementation date at the Sept. 15 meeting in Redding.”
“This decision comes after the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) informed the Commission that they will not approve the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) south coast MPAs regulatory package in time to make it effective Oct. 1, 2011 as anticipated. It is a complicated package and OAL informed the Commission that it has additional questions and requests for more information that will require a re-notice,” the Commission stated.
On Dec. 15, 2010 the Commission adopted regulations to create a suite of MPAs in the South Coast Study Region, which spans which spans state waters from Point Conception in Santa Barbara County to the U.S./Mexico border. Developed under the MLPA Initiative planning process, this network of 36 MPAs will be added to the 13 existing MPAs and two special closures in the Northern Channel Islands, which were established in 2003. Combined, the 49 MPAs and two special closures cover approximately 354 square miles of state waters and represent approximately 15 percent of the region.
MLPA Initiative Background:
The Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) is a law, signed by Governor Gray Davis in 1999, designed to create a network of marine protected areas off the California Coast. However, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004 created the privately-funded MLPA “Initiative” to “implement” the law, effectively eviscerating the MLPA.
The “marine protected areas” created under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from oil spills and drilling, water pollution, military testing, wave and wind energy projects, corporate aquaculture and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering.
The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Forces that oversaw the implementation of “marine protected areas” included a big oil lobbyist, marina developer, real estate executive and other individuals with numerous conflicts of interest. Catherine Reheis Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association who is pushing for new oil drilling off the California coast, served as the chair of the MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the South Coast.
The MLPA Initiative operated through a controversial private/public “partnership funded by the shadowy Resources Legacy Fund Foundation. The Schwarzenegger administration, under intense criticism by grassroots environmentalists, fishermen and Tribal members, authorized the implementation of marine protected areas under the initiative through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the foundation and the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG).
Tribal members, fishermen, grassroots environmentalists, human rights advocates and civil liberties activists have slammed the MLPA Initiative for the violation of numerous state, federal and international laws. Critics charge that the initiative, privatized by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004, has violated the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, Brown Act, California Administrative Procedures Act, American Indian Religious Freedom Act and UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
MLPA and state officials refused to appoint any tribal scientists to the MLPA Science Advisory Team (SAT), in spite of the fact that the Yurok Tribe alone has a Fisheries Department with over 70 staff members during the peak fishing season, including many scientists. The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force also didn’t include any tribal representatives until 2010 when one was finally appointed to the panel.
danbacher by Dan Bacher
Governor Jerry Brown has appointed Charlton “Chuck” Bonham, 43, of Albany, as director of the California Department of Fish and Game
Bonham has served in multiple positions at Trout Unlimited, a national trout advocacy organization, since 2000, including California director and senior attorney, according to a August 26 news release from Governor Jerry Brown’s Office.
He was an instructor and trip leader for the Nantahala Outdoor Center from 1994 to 1997 and was a small business development agent for the United States Peace Corp in Senegal, West Africa from 1991 to 1993.
Bonham was not available for comment at press time, but representatives of recreational and commercial fishing groups praised his appointment by Brown.
“I think he’s a good choice,” said Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA). “I hope that he’s able to resolve the funding issues that plague the Department of Fish and Game. How can you run a department when there is no money for research and enforcement?
Grader has worked with Bonham on Klamath River dam removal and hydroelectric relicensing. “We both appeared before Public Utility Commission to testify regarding permits needed for dam removal,” said Grader.
He said he believes that Bonham is somebody that both recreational and commercial fishermen “can work with.”
“I have known and worked with Chuck for a number of years,” said Dick Pool, administrator of http://www.water4fish.org and Secretary/Treasurer of the Golden Gate Salmon Association (GGSA). “I have great respect for his capabilities and dedication to fishery issues. We look forward to working with him.”
Troy Fletcher, acting Executive Director of the Yurok Tribe, also was pleased with Bonham’s appointment.
“I’ve worked closely with Chuck for years,” said Fletcher. “He’s been very instrumental in working on Klamath River dam removal and other agreements. I’ve enjoyed working with Chuck as a person and a professional. I think he’ll make a good fit and the Yurok Tribe looks forward to working with him in his new role.”
Bonham has a number of controversial issues to deal with in his new position, lead by the deaths of millions of Sacramento splittail and hundreds of thousands of other fish species at the Delta pumps this year because of record water exports out of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.
Other controversial issues Bonham will have to address include the privately-funded Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative, the campaign by the state and federal governments to build a peripheral canal, and the massive dewatering of the Scott and Shasta rivers every year by irrigators.
This position requires Senate confirmation and the compensation is $150,112. Bonham is a Democrat.
danbacher 
by Dan Bacher
The Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA), a national recreational fishing organization, says angler and business response to the group’s call for a nationwide Wal-Mart boycott have been overwhelming, to the point that coastal communities can expect to see some grassroots protests begin very soon outside of their local Wal-Mart corporate chain location.
Not only have recreational fishermen responded to the boycott, but so have grassroots environmental activists and commercial fishermen.
“We’ve had calls of support from both coasts, even from a few Midwest bass fishermen; our nation’s anglers are extremely agitated by the Walton Family Foundation’s actions,” said RFA executive director Jim Donofrio. “When you spend your hard-earned money on fishing tackle only to learn that the profits are being used to close down fishing access, it gets folks justifiably upset.”
RFA recently called for an angler boycott of Wal-Mart after learning that the Walton Family Foundation had awarded more than $36 million to groups including the Ocean Conservancy, Conservation International Foundation, Marine Stewardship Council, World Wildlife Fund and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), in support of marine protected areas such as California’s Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative and catch share programs.
The five top grantees were: Conservation International, $18,640,917; the Nature Conservancy,$9,305,449; Environmental Defense Fund
$7,086,054; the Marine Stewardship Council, $4,500,000; and the Ocean Conservancy, $3,757,768 ((http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/walton-family-foundation-invests-718-million-in-environmental-initiatives-in-2010-127835788.html).
Critics of Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the world, have blasted the company for decades for being able to sell its products at cheap prices only by employing sweatshops, undercutting competitors, wielding its market power to cripple both competitors and suppliers, and flouting national and international health, safety, labor, and environmental standards. Anti-corporate globalization opponents have long regarded Wal-Mart as a virtual “Darth Vader” of retailers, as documented in the film, “The High Price of Low Cost.” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJMYZwL8sPA).
Coincidentally, the Walton Family Foundation announcement came the same day that Wal-Mart stores’ CEO announced to shareholders a 5.5% increase in net sales to $108.6 billion.
While RFA said it received hundreds of positive responses literally overnight in support of the national boycott, there was opposition from at least two supporters of blanket marine reserves.
“One gentleman emailed to say he’d gladly give up fishing today so that his great-grandkids will know what a fish looks like tomorrow,” Donofrio said. “The problem of course is that these groups who want to get us off the water today don’t want us on the water tomorrow either. The real sacrifice for our future fishermen is from those who are willing to fight right now for open access while it’s under direct threat by anti-fishing efforts.”
“The fishing community supports conservation, but we’re not willing to accept preservation, exclusion or privatization,” Donofrio added.
RFA said the EDF public relations department was also quick to respond in defense of their $7,086,054 Walton Family Foundation donation.
Tom Lalley, communications director for the Oceans Program, Environmental Defense Fund, claimed, “RFA’s contention that the contribution in question was made by Wal-Mart is just wrong.”
“The contribution was made by the Walton Family Fund and not Wal-Mart,” he told http://www.fishnewseu.com. “These are two different entities. There is no connection between the two other than the fact that the fund’s money comes from private holdings of the same Waltons who started and managed Wal-Mart, but none of the money comes from the existing company. So it was the family, and specifically the family’s foundation, that made a contribution for sustainable fishing and ocean conservation, and not the store.”
According to RFA managing director Jim Hutchinson, Jr., the marketing executives at EDF are “some of the best in the ‘astroturfing’ business,” but he calls Lalley’s claims “almost comical.”
“So I leave you a $1,000 bill in the cereal aisle at Wal-Mart, tucked under a box of sugar coated corn flakes, does that mean that Wal-Mart actually gave you the $1,000, or maybe EDF would argue it was really a contribution from Tony the Tiger himself,” Hutchinson laughed.
“The heirs to the corporate fortune have spent two decades successfully building back their stake in this publicly held company to the point they now own over 50% of the Wal-Mart operation. The Walton Family Foundation is Wal-Mart, and the Walton family itself is making billions in our local communities, so to say that the two are separate entities is simply ridiculous. Actually expecting us to believe that statement is borderline insanity,” Hutchinson said.
RFA is reminding anglers who are interested in organizing grassroots protests outside their local Wal-Mart store to consult with local authorities first. “We encourage peaceful protest, but every municipality has its own rules and regulations regarding active protest,” said Donofrio.
Grassroots environmental leaders including John Lewallen, North Coast California environmental leader, founder of the Ocean Protection Protection Coalition and the Seaweed Rebellion and persistent critic of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) process, welcomed the Wal-Mart boycott.
“An unholy alliance of large corporations, ocean industrialists and foundation-funded corporations such as the Environmental Defense Fund, Ocean Conservancy and NRDC are all determined to remove independent ocean food providers from the world’s oceans,” said Lewallen. “Real environmentalists should defend independent fishermen and seaweed harvesters and resist their deadly attack on our source of ocean food that is essential for human health.”
Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA), praised the RFA for criticizing the Walton Family’s contributions to ocean privatization efforts and welcomed the organization’s call for a Wal-Mart boycott.
“Wal-Mart is wrong on this issue, just as it has been in the past on labor and community issues,” said Grader. “The privatization of public trust resources is the antithesis of conservation.”
“I’ve been boycotting Wal-Mart for decades and it’s absolutely great that recreational and commercial fishermen are together on this,” noted Grader.
RFA is reminding anglers who are interested in organizing grassroots protests outside their local Wal-Mart store to consult with local authorities first. “We encourage peaceful protest, but every municipality has its own rules and regulations regarding active protest,” said Donofrio.
“If you’re interested in picketing outside of Wal-Mart to express your anger over their support of anti-fishing efforts, call the local police department first to explain what you’re doing and be sure to keep it respectful and follow the law,” Donofrio added.
It is worth noting that Conservation International and the Nature Conservancy, the two top recipients of Walton Family Foundation funds, are known throughout the world for their top-down “environmental” programs that run roughshod over local communities to achieve their corporate greenwashing goals.
The Nature Conservancy in California is a strong backer of state and federal plans to build a peripheral canal or tunnel to export more Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta water to corporate agribusiness and southern California water agencies. Canal opponents, including recreational anglers, commercial fishermen, Delta residents, family farmers and California Indian Tribes, believe the construction of the canal would result in the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt and other imperiled fish populations.
Catch Shares Background:
A broad coalition of commercial and recreational fishing, consumer and environmental groups is opposing the catch shares programs being pushed by NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco, a former vice-chair of the Board of Directors of Environmental Defense, because these programs amount to the privatization of public trust resources by concentrating fisheries in the hands of a few corporate hands. Wherever catch shares have been introduced, local fishing communities, fish populations and the environment have been devastated.
“A catch share, also known as an individual fishing quota, is a transferable voucher that gives individuals or businesses the ability to access a fixed percentage of the total authorized catch of a particular species,” according to Food and Water Watch. “Fishery management systems based on catch shares turn a public resource into private property and have lead to socioeconomic and environmental problems. Contrary to arguments by catch share proponents – namely large commercial fishing interests – this management system has exacerbated unsustainable fishing practices.”
“Fish are a public resource,” explained Wenonah Hauter, Food & Water Watch Executive Director. “Unfortunately, private investment groups and even some public interest groups have shamelessly and publicly compared access to fish to the stock market and are treating it like an investment that can be bought and sold for personal profit. They’re aiming to model the fishing business after big agribusiness on land, with giant commercial operations controlling the market.” (http://www.fishnewseu.com/latest-news/world/6013-food-a-water-watch-launches-campaign-against-catch-shares.html)
MLPA Initiative Background:
The Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) is a law, signed by Governor Gray Davis in 1999, designed to create a network of marine protected areas off the California Coast. However, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004 created the privately-funded MLPA “Initiative” to “implement” the law, effectively eviscerating the MLPA.
The “marine protected areas” created under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from oil spills and drilling, water pollution, military testing, wave and wind energy projects, corporate aquaculture and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering.
The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Forces that oversaw the implementation of “marine protected areas” included a big oil lobbyist, marina developer, real estate executive and other individuals with numerous conflicts of interest. Catherine Reheis Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association who is pushing for new oil drilling off the California coast, served as the chair of the MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the South Coast.
The MLPA Initiative operated through a controversial private/public “partnership funded by the shadowy Resources Legacy Fund Foundation. The Schwarzenegger administration, under intense criticism by grassroots environmentalists, fishermen and Tribal members, authorized the implementation of marine protected areas under the initiative through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the foundation and the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG).
Tribal members, fishermen, grassroots environmentalists, human rights advocates and civil liberties activists have slammed the MLPA Initiative for the violation of numerous state, federal and international laws. Critics charge that the initiative, privatized by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004, has violated the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, Brown Act, California Administrative Procedures Act, American Indian Religious Freedom Act and UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
MLPA and state officials refused to appoint any tribal scientists to the MLPA Science Advisory Team (SAT), in spite of the fact that the Yurok Tribe alone has a Fisheries Department with over 70 staff members during the peak fishing season, including many scientists. The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force also didn’t include any tribal representatives until 2010 when one was finally appointed to the panel.
About the Recreational Fishing Alliance:
The Recreational Fishing Alliance is a national, grassroots political action organization representing recreational fishermen and the recreational fishing industry on marine fisheries issues. The RFA Mission is to safeguard the rights of saltwater anglers, protect marine, boat and tackle industry jobs, and ensure the long-term sustainability of our Nation’s saltwater fisheries. For more information, call 888-JOIN-RFA or visit http://www.joinrfa.org.
danbacher “Governor Brown is continuing to promote Schwarzenegger’s peripheral canal,” Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, executive director of Restore the Delta, responded to Brown’s latest affirmation of support for the canal. “That is too bad. He is another career politician clinging to ideas from the past that will not serve the present. It’s a shame that he is not looking at cutting edge technology and new solutions to create a positive environmental and economic legacy for California.”
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by Dan Bacher
Governor Jerry Brown, in his remarks to the editorial board of the Fresno Bee on Wednesday, August 17, reaffirmed his support for a peripheral canal or tunnel to facilitate the export of more California Delta water to corporate agribusiness and southern California water agencies.
The Bee piece focused on Brown’s support for high speed rail – and provided little detail about Brown’s plan to build the canal, a project opposed by a broad coalition of Delta residents, fishermen, family farmers, Indian Tribes and environmental justice communities.
“The rail project is one of two major infrastructure projects on Brown’s agenda,” according to the Bee. “He said today that he will have a plan for the other project – a peripheral canal or other way to move water through or around the Delta – within a year.” (http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2011/08/jerry-brown-calls-for-high-spe.html#ixzz1VKloTwTj)
On August 11, California Natural Resources John Laird and Department of the Interior Deputy Secretary David J. Hayes unveiled their “aggressive schedule” to build Delta “conveyance” through Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP).
The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the California Natural Resources Agency agreed to a schedule for completing an effects analysis and a combined environmental impact statement/environmental impact report (EIR/EIS) as part of the BDCP by June 2012. (http://resources.ca.gov/docs/Final_-_DOI_CNRA_BDCP_Schedule_Release.pdf)
They also agreed to considering a “suite of alternatives” for evaluation in identifying a proposed Delta conveyance project. Those alternatives include a variety of conveyance facilities with capacities ranging from 3,000 to 15,000 cubic feet per second.
“Governor Brown is continuing to promote Schwarzenegger’s peripheral canal,” Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, executive director of Restore the Delta, responded to Brown’s latest affirmation of support for the canal. “That is too bad. He is another career politician clinging to ideas from the past that will not serve the present. It’s a shame that he is not looking at cutting edge technology and new solutions to create a positive environmental and economic legacy for California.”
Likewise, Calleen Sisk-Franco, the Chief and Spiritual Leader of the Winnemem Wintu Tribe, said, “The Tribe is totally against the canal in any form.”
“Governor Brown has put the canal, a huge project to take water from the Delta, on the fast track,” explained Sisk-Franco. “But both the little salmon and adult chinooks need the fresh water in the estuary to acclimate when they go up and down the river.”
She emphasized, “Many people assume that the Governor is doing the best job for us. However, what he is really doing is the best job he can for the corporations.”
The corporate agenda behind the peripheral canal and general obligation water bonds is revealed in the ground-breaking two part investigative report, “Budgets, Billionaires, Bonds, Big Profits and the Brown Family,” written by Patrick Porgans and Lloyd G. Carter. (http://www.lloydgcarter.com/files_lgc/Billionaires%20and%20Bonds.pdf)
“Part One focuses on how the wealthy and landed have used the public bond process in California to further their own interests, while promoting and profiting from the state’s “budget crisis.” Part Two focuses on the family legacy of Gov. Edmund G. “Pat” Brown, who first mastered the art of selling water bonds half a century ago, to finance the construction of the State Water Project, which was sold as a project that would pay for itself. It never has,” explained Porgans and Carter.
Brown’s support for the peripheral canal should come as no surprise, since he backed the earlier version of the peripheral canal during his previous term as Governor. The voters overwhelmingly voted down the peripheral canal proposal during the election of November 1982.
Canal opponents believe the construction of the canal, designed to divert massive quantities of badly needed fresh water out of the Delta, would likely result in the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, green sturgeon and other imperiled fish species.
The fish-killing canal is teamed up with an equally destructive “habitat restoration” plan to convert vast areas of Delta farmland, some of the most productive agricultural land on the planet, into marshland so that drainage-impaired land on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley can continue to be irrigated by corporate agribusiness interests.
The campaign to build the peripheral canal is not the only program of the Schwarzenegger administration that Governor Brown has embraced. He has also decided to forge ahead with Schwarzenegger’s widely-contested Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative, a privately funded process to create so-called “marine protected areas” characterized by numerous conflicts of interest, institutional racism and the violation of numerous federal, state and international laws.
The Brown administration has also decided to allow record water export pumping out of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta this year, resulting in a massive, unprecedented fish kill at the state and federal pumps.
A horrific 8,966,976 splittail, 35,556 chinook salmon, 430,289 striped bass, 54,412 largemouth bass, 69,383 bluegill, 76,570 white catfish, 28,301 channel catfish, 233,174 threadfin shad, 264,171 American shad, 1,642 steelhead and 51 Delta smelt were “salvaged” in the state and federal water export facilities from January 1 to August 2, 2011, according to Department of Fish and Game (DFG) data. As if that isn’t bad enough, the overall loss of fish in and around the State Water Project and Central Valley Project facilities is believed to dwarf the actual salvage counts (http://www.counterpunch.org/bacher08052011.html).
For more information, go to: http://www.restorethedelta.org.
danbacher In a August 16th news release from Wal-Mart corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Walton Family Foundation announced investments totaling more than $71.8 million awarded to various environmental initiatives in 2010, with over $36 million alone handed over to Marine Conservation grantees including Ocean Conservancy, Conservation International Foundation, Marine Stewardship Council, World Wildlife Fund and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
Photo of Wal-Mart truck courtesy of http://www.care2.com/causes/wal-mart-going-green-or-greenwashing.html.
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by Dan Bacher
The Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA), a national grassroots recreational fishing organization, on August 17 slammed the Walton Family Foundation’s contribution of $36 million to ocean privatization efforts through “catch shares” programs and the creation of so-called “marine protected areas.”
The foundation, set up by the family who founded Wal-Mart, announced this week “its efforts to help fund the demise of both the recreational and commercial fishing industry while also working to ensure that the next generation of sportsmen will have less access to coastal fish stocks than at any point in U.S. history,” according to a news release from RFA.
In a August 16th news release from Wal-Mart corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Walton Family Foundation announced “investments” totaling more than $71.8 million awarded to various environmental initiatives in 2010. The foundation handed over $36 million alone to Marine Conservation grantees including Ocean Conservancy, Conservation International Foundation, Marine Stewardship Council, World Wildlife Fund and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
The five top grantees were: Conservation International, $18,640,917; the Nature Conservancy,$9,305,449; Environmental Defense Fund
$7,086,054; the Marine Stewardship Council, $4,500,000; and the Ocean Conservancy, $3,757,768 ((http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/walton-family-foundation-invests-718-million-in-environmental-initiatives-in-2010-127835788.html).
Critics of Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the world, have blasted the company for decades for being able to sell its products at cheap prices only by employing sweatshops, undercutting competitors, wielding its market power to cripple both competitors and suppliers, and flouting national and international health, safety, labor, and environmental standards. Anti-corporate globalization opponents have long regarded Wal-Mart as a virtual “Darth Vader” of retailers, as documented in the film, “The High Price of Low Cost.” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJMYZwL8sPA).
Greenwashing Wal-Mart’s image
However, in 2006 the retail giant hired Adam Werbach, former Sierra Club president, to “polish” its image (http://reclaimdemocracy.org/walmart/2006/green_greenwashing.php). This latest release is apparently part of a carefully orchestrated campaign to greenwash its image – and extend control over public trust resources.
According to the release, the Walton Family Foundation “focuses on globally important marine areas and works with grantees and other partners to create networks of effectively managed protected areas that conserve key biological features, and ensure the sustainable utilization of marine resources – especially fisheries – in a way that benefits both nature and people.”
“We focus our work in the United States’ primary river systems and in some of the world’s most ecologically significant marine areas,” said Scott Burns, director of the foundation’s Environment Focus Area and the former director of marine conservation at the World Wildlife Fund. “It’s important to us to protect and conserve natural resources while also recognizing the roles these waters play in the livelihoods of those who live nearby.”
The RFA countered that these specially managed areas of coastal waters are also referred to as “marine protected areas” or “marine reserves,” and the end result is denied angler access, of little or no benefit to the very people whom Wal-Mart claims to benefit.
Marine protected areas without real protection
“A quick visit to the Ocean Conservancy website should be telling enough for anglers interested in learning where Wal-Mart’s profits are being spent,” said RFA executive director Jim Donofrio. “These folks are pushing hard to complete California’s network of exclusionary zones throughout the entire length of coastline, and they’ve made it very clear that they would like to see the West Coast version of the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) extended into other coastal U.S. waters.”
Grassroots environmentalists, fishermen, California Indian Tribes, civil liberties activists and environmental justice advocates have criticized Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative, privately funded by the shadowy Resources Legacy Fund Foundation, for its numerous conflicts of interest, institutional racism and the violation of numerous state, federal and international laws.
The so-called “marine protected areas” established under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from oil drilling and spills, water pollution, wave and wind energy projects, military testing, corporate aquaculture, habitat destruction and all other human impacts upon the ocean other than fishing and gathering. In an extreme case of corporate greenwashing, Catherine Reheis-Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association, served as chair of the MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force that created these questionable “marine protected areas.”
The release also said that targeted marine protected areas moving forward include Indonesia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Panama, the Gulf of California and the Gulf of Mexico. It will be interesting to see if these marine protected areas, like California’s MLPA Initiative, will disrespect and fail to acknowledge the sovereign gathering rights of the indigenous people of these countries and regions.
Will these marine protected areas be like the one imposed by the Mexican government that denied members of the Cucapa Tribe the right to fish in the Colorado River Delta, spurring the Zapatistas (EZLN) and the Tribe to set up a “peace camp” from February to May 2007 to affirm their sovereign rights? (http://www.counterpunch.org/bacher04212007.html)
Donofrio said of Ocean Conservancy in particular, “Here’s an organization which has publicly opposed creation of artificial reefs used by Wal-Mart’s tackle buyers, in some cases openly advocating for their removal, yet the Walton family is handing over tons of money for support.”
Wal-Mart boycott follows Safeway boycott
“Shopping for fishing equipment at Wal-Mart is contributing directly to the demise of our sport, it’s supporting lost fishing opportunities and decreased coastal access for all Americans,” Donofrio said. “I hope all RFA members across the country will remember that when it’s time to gear up, but I would also wonder if perhaps our industry can help spread the message and support our local tackle shops by also pulling product off Wal-Mart’s shelves.”
RFA in April announced its support of a national boycott of the Safeway Supermarket chain, including Genuardi’s in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware, because of that corporation’s support for California’s widely-contested MLPA initiative.
“Apparently Safeway has gotten some bad advice from the people in the ocean protection racket, a community to which the California-based mega-corporation is now donating profits,” said Jim Martin, West Coast Regional Director of the RFA. “Safeway says it is supporting groups that make a difference like the Food Marketing Institute’s Sustainable Seafood Working Group, the Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions and the World Wildlife Fund’s Aquaculture Dialogues, but it’s little more than corporate greenwashing.”
Donofrio believes it’s time that Wal-Mart was added to the angler boycott list as well.
“The Walton family created this huge corporate entity that has threatened the vibrancy of our local retail outlets, and now they’re essentially doing the same thing with our fishing communities,” Donofrio said.
“Much like Safeway has done with their financial investment in the environmental business community, Wal-Mart apparently prefers customers buy farm-raised fish and seafood caught by foreign countries outside of U.S. waters, while denying individual anglers the ability to head down to the ocean to score a few fish for their own table,” noted Donofrio.
Foundation pushes catch shares program
The Walton Family Foundation is also working “to create economic incentives for ocean conservation,” while candidly pledging their support for “projects that reverse the incentives to fish unsustainably that exist in ‘open access fisheries’ by creating catch share programs,” according to the official news release.
A broad coalition of commercial and recreational fishing, consumer and environmental groups is opposing the catch shares programs being pushed by NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco, a former vice-chair of the Board of Directors of Environmental Defense, because these programs amount to the privatization of public trust resources by concentrating fisheries in the hands of a few corporate hands. Wherever catch shares have been introduced, local fishing communities, fish populations and the environment have been devastated.
“A catch share, also known as an individual fishing quota, is a transferable voucher that gives individuals or businesses the ability to access a fixed percentage of the total authorized catch of a particular species,” according to Food and Water Watch. “Fishery management systems based on catch shares turn a public resource into private property and have lead to socioeconomic and environmental problems. Contrary to arguments by catch share proponents – namely large commercial fishing interests – this management system has exacerbated unsustainable fishing practices.”
“Fish are a public resource,” explained Wenonah Hauter, Food & Water Watch Executive Director. “Unfortunately, private investment groups and even some public interest groups have shamelessly and publicly compared access to fish to the stock market and are treating it like an investment that can be bought and sold for personal profit. They’re aiming to model the fishing business after big agribusiness on land, with giant commercial operations controlling the market.” (http://www.fishnewseu.com/latest-news/world/6013-food-a-water-watch-launches-campaign-against-catch-shares.html)
Donofrio emphasized, “Our local outfitters and tackle shops along the coast have had to face an immense challenge by going up against Wal-Mart’s purchasing power during the last decade, but now that the Walton family is so up front about their opposition to open access fisheries, it’s hard for me to believe that any sportsmen would ever be interested in shopping there again.”
“California anglers have been outraged to learn that money they spend at a Safeway grocery store might end up in the hands of anti-fishing groups like the EDF and the Ocean Conservancy, so I hope more anglers will join the national boycott by sending a message to Wal-Mart as well as Safeway,” Martin added.
Sam and Helen Walton launched their “modest retail business in 1962″ with the guiding principle of helping “increase opportunity and improve the lives of others along the way,” according to the Walton Family Foundation website. It is that principle the foundation says, that makes them “more focused than ever on sustaining the Walton’s timeless small-town values and deep commitment to making life better for individuals and communities alike.”
RFA said grassroots efforts to combat the corporate anti-fishing, pro-privatization agenda are more than just an uphill climb.
“The EDF catch share coffers are already filled to the top, while Pew Charitable Trusts has billions in reserve,” Donofrio said. “When you add another $36 million annual commitment from the Walton family each year, I can’t see how our local efforts can get anywhere unless the national manufacturers step up and openly denounce this corporate takeover once and for all.”
“The individual anglers and local business owners are being denied opportunity, and I hope the federal trade representatives are willing to get onboard with their support of real small-town values,” Donofrio said, adding that Ocean Conservancy and EDF combined received more than $10 million in Walton Family Foundation grants in 2010.
EDF: RFA is ‘just wrong’
Tom Lalley, communications director for the Oceans Program, Environmental Defense Fund, responded to RFA’s release by claiming, “RFA’s contention that the contribution in question was made by Wal-Mart is just wrong.”
“The contribution was made by the Walton Family Fund and not Wal-Mart,” he told http://www.fishnewseu.com. “These are two different entities. There is no connection between the two other than the fact that the fund’s money comes from private holdings of the same Waltons who started and managed Wal-Mart, but none of the money comes from the existing company. So it was the family, and specifically the family’s foundation, that made a contribution for sustainable fishing and ocean conservation, and not the store.”
“That’s B.S.,” Martin said, responding to Lalley’s statement. “The foundation money is Wal-Mart money sheltered from taxation to push the Walton’s family agenda.”
“Mr. Lalley is putting a false spin on this issue,” added Donofio. “The fact is that the Walton family’s money comes from the profits on the Wal-Mart stores that they founded. The Waltons are still in the top management tier of the company.”
Commercial fishermen join recreational anglers in denouncing Wal-Mart and Walton Family Foundation
Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA), praised the RFA for criticizing the Walton Family’s contributions to ocean privatization efforts and welcomed the organization’s call for a Wal-Mart boycott.
“Wal-Mart is wrong on this issue, just as it has been in the past on labor and community issues,” said Grader. “The privatization of public trust resources is the antithesis of conservation.”
“I’ve been boycotting Wal-Mart for decades and it’s absolutely great that recreational and commercial fishermen are together on this,” noted Grader.
It is worth noting that Conservation International and the Nature Conservancy, the two top recipients of Walton Family Foundation funds, are known throughout the world for their top-down “environmental” programs that run roughshod over local communities to achieve their corporate greenwashing goals.
The Nature Conservancy in California is a strong backer of state and federal plans to build a peripheral canal or tunnel to export more Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta water to corporate agribusiness and southern California water agencies. Canal opponents, including recreational anglers, commercial fishermen, Delta residents, family farmers and California Indian Tribes, believe the construction of the canal would result in the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt and other imperiled fish populations.
About the Recreational Fishing Alliance:
The Recreational Fishing Alliance is a national, grassroots political action organization representing recreational fishermen and the recreational fishing industry on marine fisheries issues. The RFA Mission is to safeguard the rights of saltwater anglers, protect marine, boat and tackle industry jobs, and ensure the long-term sustainability of our Nation’s saltwater fisheries. For more information, call 888-JOIN-RFA or visit http://www.joinrfa.org.
MLPA Initiative Background:
The Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) is a law, signed by Governor Gray Davis in 1999, designed to create a network of marine protected areas off the California Coast. However, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004 created the privately-funded MLPA “Initiative” to “implement” the law, effectively eviscerating the MLPA.
The “marine protected areas” created under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from oil spills and drilling, water pollution, military testing, wave and wind energy projects, corporate aquaculture and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering.
The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Forces that oversaw the implementation of “marine protected areas” included a big oil lobbyist, marina developer, real estate executive and other individuals with numerous conflicts of interest. Catherine Reheis Boyd, the president of the Western States Petroleum Association who is pushing for new oil drilling off the California coast, served as the chair of the MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force for the South Coast.
The MLPA Initiative operated through a controversial private/public “partnership funded by the shadowy Resources Legacy Fund Foundation. The Schwarzenegger administration, under intense criticism by grassroots environmentalists, fishermen and Tribal members, authorized the implementation of marine protected areas under the initiative through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the foundation and the California Department of Fish and Game (DFG).
Tribal members, fishermen, grassroots environmentalists, human rights advocates and civil liberties activists have slammed the MLPA Initiative for the violation of numerous state, federal and international laws. Critics charge that the initiative, privatized by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004, has violated the Bagley-Keene Open Meetings Act, Brown Act, California Administrative Procedures Act, American Indian Religious Freedom Act and UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
MLPA and state officials refused to appoint any tribal scientists to the MLPA Science Advisory Team (SAT), in spite of the fact that the Yurok Tribe alone has a Fisheries Department with over 70 staff members during the peak fishing season, including many scientists. The MLPA Blue Ribbon Task Force also didn’t include any tribal representatives until 2010 when one was finally appointed to the panel.
danbacher “To have such a large animal in our presence for so long was a great gift, but now nature has taken its course,” said Yurok Tribal Chairman Thomas O’Rourke Sr. “It is truly unfortunate that she didn’t try to make it back to her home.”
Photo of gray whale courtesy of Ashala Taylor.
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by Dan Bacher
The female gray whale that drew considerable public attention by staying the greater part of this summer in the lower Klamath River died of natural causes in the early morning of Tuesday, August 16.
The 40-foot long whale beached herself around 6:30 p.m. Monday and perished at 4:19 a.m. Tuesday. The cetacean’s health had been deteriorating in the past two days, most likely because of the lengthy stay outside of its natural, saline habitat, according to a news release from the Yurok Tribe. This is the apparently the longest time that a whale has ventured outside of its normal saltwater habitat in California waters.
“To have such a large animal in our presence for so long was a great gift, but now nature has taken its course,” said Yurok Tribal Chairman Thomas O’Rourke Sr. “It is truly unfortunate that she didn’t try to make it back to her home.”
This is not the first whale to swim up a river or estuary in California. “Humphrey the Whale,” a humpback whale, ventured up the Sacramento River near Rio Vista in 1984. “Delta and Dawn,” a mother humpback whale and her calf, went up the Sacramento into the Sacramento Deepwater Channel as far as West Sacramento in early May 2007. Fortunately, all three of those whales eventually returned to the ocean.
The last time a whale entered the Klamath River was in 1989. That whale exited the river without incident.
The whale that perished this morning entered the river with a calf on June 24. The calf, which likely weaned, returned to the ocean on July 23, but the mother stayed.
“The Yurok Tribe has assisted NOAA and Humboldt State University scientists monitor the baleen whale since it swam up the Klamath River on June 24 and will continue to aid the federal agency and the university,” according to Matt Mais of the Yurok Tribe. “The group tried in several ways ranging in intensity to encourage the marine mammal to go back to the ocean with no success.”
Mais said thousands of motorists took the opportunity to whale watch from the Highway 101 bridge just south of the town of Klamath where the baleen beauty spent most of her time. The rare occurrence raised awareness about gray whales in California waters.
Members of the Yurok Tribe’s Fisheries Program helped facilitate the sampling of the whale’s skin and breath in an effort to determine its condition during her stay, according to Mais. The team from the tribe, federal government and university also did tests to find out if there was enough food for the whale in the river and if the water was deep enough if she chose to return to the ocean.
Most gray whales migrate 10,000 miles from the arctic to Baja California. Every year, a small number of Eschrichtius Robustus don’t make the entire migration back and linger from Northern California to British Columbia. It is believed that the mother and calf were part of this small group.
“Biologists hypothesize that the mother might have brought the yearling into the river to avoid a predator such as killer whale or a great white shark,” according to a statement earlier this summer by the Yurok Tribe. ” The highly intelligent mammals could also simply be curious.”
When a whale enters the river it is an indicator, according to Yurok culture.
“It’s a sign that things are working good,” said Yurok Elder Walt Lara Sr. “It’s a part of the world renewal structure when they come and visit us. It’s pretty touching to me. It’s something that’s supposed to happen.”
Unfortunately, the gray whale’s health deteriorated after spending too much time away from its saltwater habitat and the cetacean passed away. The Yurok Tribe, NOAA and HSU are putting together a plan to remove the cetacean.
Craig Tucker, the Klamath Campaign Coordinator for the Karuk Tribe, his wife, Amy Sprowles, and his two sons, 7-year-old Carson and 4-year-old Calhoun, went to see the whale over the weekend.
“We’ll really miss her,” said Tucker. “It was a remarkable thing seeing her in the river. She came to the river to tell us something; we should think about the message she was trying to send us.”
The Yurok Tribe’s commercial salmon fishery on the Klamath River is set to start Sunday and the Yurok Tribal Council passed a plan to shut down the fishery if the whale started heading back to sea. For more information, go to: http://yuroktribe.org/documents/whale_press_release_000.pdf ments/whale_press_release.pdf
danbacher “This is an aggressive schedule that will allow us to move clearly forward with BDCP and take the guess work out of next steps,” said California Secretary for Natural Resources John Laird. “Meeting the dual goals of ecosystem restoration and water supply reliability demand a deep commitment from all parties involved.”
Photo of John Laird courtesy of California Natural Resources Agency.
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by Dan Bacher
State and federal officials announced in a joint statement on Thursday, August 11 that they have reached “two significant milestones toward assuring a sustainable water supply for California and a healthy Delta ecosystem.”
Translation? The Brown and Obama administrations are aggressively forging ahead with one of the most widely-criticized environmental policies of the Arnold Schwarzenegger administration – the plan to build a peripheral canal to export more water to corporate agribusiness and southern California water agencies.
The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the California Natural Resources Agency have agreed to a schedule for completing an effects analysis and a combined environmental impact statement/environmental impact report (EIR/EIS) as part of the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) by June 2012. They also agreed to considering a “suite of alternatives,” including a controversial peripheral canal or tunnel, for evaluation in identifying a proposed project.
“This is an aggressive schedule that will allow us to move clearly forward with BDCP and take the guess work out of next steps,” said California Secretary for Natural Resources John Laird. “Meeting the dual goals of ecosystem restoration and water supply reliability demand a deep commitment from all parties involved.”
“California’s complex water problems require science-based solutions developed as part of a close partnership between the federal and state government, as well as all key stakeholders,” said Department of the Interior Deputy Secretary David J. Hayes. “We share the state’s urgency in moving forward with the BDCP as quickly as possible to address the all-important goals of a healthy Bay Delta ecosystem and a reliable water supply for California.”
The Brown and Obama administrations outlined the agreement regarding the schedule in an exchange of letters between the California Natural Resources Agency and DOI.
“Additionally, state and federal water officials today laid out a broad range of alternatives that are being evaluated in order to enable the California Department of Water Resources to identify a proposed project that will serve as the basis for federal and state permit applications and environmental review,” according to Laird and Hayes. “Those alternatives include a variety of conveyance facilities with capacities ranging from 3,000 to 15,000 cubic feet per second. A range of proposals for habitat restoration is also under consideration.”
The peripheral canal or tunnel is strongly opposed by a broad coalition of fishing groups, family farmers, grassroots environmentalists, California Indian Tribes, environmental justice communities and Delta residents. Canal opponents believe the project would result in the likely extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, Sacramento splittail, green sturgeon and other imperiled fish species.
“The agencies would like to get the deed done as soon as possible and we intend to put crowbars in the spokes until they address the full range of reasonable alternatives to this boondoggle, which would end the Delta as we know it,” said Bill Jennings, chairman/executive director of the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance (CSPA). “Diverting 3,000 to 15,000 cfs from the estuary would exacerbate water quality impacts, devastate fisheries and virtually eliminate Delta agriculture and recreation.”
In addition, canal opponents point out that the range of proposals for “habitat restoration” focus on taking Delta agricultural land, among the most fertile on the planet, out of production in order to continue irrigating drainage-impaired land on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley.
Laid also announced that water contractors depending upon Delta water have potentially committed around $100 million to the BDCP process.
“With an agreed upon schedule and impending potential financial commitments of roughly $100 million, the state along with our federal partners can bring us much closer to making our planning efforts a reality,” stated Laird.
Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, executive director of Restore the Delta, responded to Laird’s statement with alarm that more California water ratepayer money was being wasted on the BDCP.
“In this era of fiscal austerity, it’s mind boggling that BDCP officials would try to raise $100 million from California water ratepayers to finance the planning of this boondoggle,” said Barrigan-Parrilla.
While Laird has claimed he would make the BDCP process “more inclusive,” BDCP critics believe the actions of Laird, and Jerry Meral, Deputy Secretary of the California Natural Resources Agency, prove otherwise.
For example, the BDCP Management Committee has excluded fishing groups, California tribal nations, California’s environmental justice community, Delta agriculture, Delta recreation, Delta reclamation districts, Delta water agencies, the Delta Protection Commission, Delta business groups and Delta marina interests.
The Management Committee includes officials from the Natural Resources Agency, Department of Water Resources, Bureau of Reclamation, Westlands Water District, the State Water Contractors Association, Metropolitan Water District, Kern County Water Agency, Santa Clara Valley Water District, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the Nature Conservancy. These are the same agencies and organizations that have presided over the collapse of Central Valley salmon and Delta fish populations, due to record water exports out of the Delta in recent years.
Meanwhile, staggering losses of Sacramento splittail and other fish species in the death pumps of the state and federal water projects on the California Delta continue as the Brown and Obama administrations export record volumes of water to corporate agribusiness and southern California water agencies.
An astounding 8,966,976 splittail, 35,556 chinook salmon, 430,289 striped bass, 54,412 largemouth bass, 69,383 bluegill, 76,570 white catfish, 28,301 channel catfish, 233,174 threadfin shad, 264,171 American shad, 1,642 steelhead and 51 Delta smelt were “salvaged” in the state and federal water export facilities from January 1 to August 2, 2011, according to Department of Fish and Game (DFG) data. However, the overall loss of fish in and around the State Water Project and Central Valley Project facilities is believed to dwarf the actual salvage counts (http://www.counterpunch.org/bacher08052011.html).
For more information about the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance, go to: http://www.calsport.org. For more information and action alerts from Restore the Delta, go to:http://www.restorethedelta.org.
About the BDCP:
According to the Natural Resources Agency, “The BDCP is a conservation plan for the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, and falls under the federal Endangered Species Act and California Natural Communities Conservation Planning Act. The BDCP is intended to help meet California’s co-equal goals for Delta management: water supply reliability and ecosystem restoration. The public draft BDCP, while still under development, includes a set of actions to redesign and re-operate state and federal water projects in the Delta and to restore native fish, wildlife and plant habitat; and address other ecological stressors in the Delta such as invasive plant species, barriers to fish migration, and predation of native fish.”
The BDCP environmental review process is being conducted by five state and federal agencies. The California Department of Water Resources is the state lead agency under CEQA, while the Bureau of Reclamation, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the National Marine Fisheries Service are serving as the federal co-leads under NEPA.
The EIR/EIS is also being developed in close coordination with the California Department of Fish and Game, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. These agencies will analyze BDCP proposed actions and alternatives to those actions, including alternative water conveyance options, in fulfillment of multiple state and federal permitting processes.
For more information, go to: http://resources.ca.gov/docs/Final_-_DOI_CNRA_BDCP_Schedule_Release.pdf
