[2] Washington Politicians Hammer Out Agreement On Columbia Water
Washington politicians have hammered out last-minute compromise legislation over management of new water resources from the Columbia River. The new bill captured nearly every vote from both sides of the aisle last week and Gov. Chris Gregoire has promised to sign it soon. It will make legal the "no-net-loss plus" water option that has been pushed by the state's Department of Ecology for years and ends the first phase of an initiative started in 2001 by then-Gov. Gary Locke to end the gridlock over the issuance of new water rights for the Columbia River.
The bill calls for two-thirds of any new water supplies developed with funding from a Columbia Basin water supply account to be reserved for out-of stream uses like agriculture or municipal water supplies, and one-third to go in the state's water rights trust program to enhance instream flows for fish. The 2/3-1/3 rule will not apply to transfers of existing water rights.
A $200 million account will be created to fund studies ($132 million) and pay for conservation projects ($68 million) over the next 10 years
Not everybody was satisfied with the results.
"It codifies the no-net-loss plus option," said Darryll Olsen, who works with the Columbia-Snake Irrigators Association. He said it means that non-measurable impacts to fish from small changes in flow is now embedded in official state policy, even though federal scientists have found flow/survival relationships weak and inconsistent, with water temperature likely a much more important factor in fish survival.
The legislation also calls for voluntary agreements between user groups and the DOE to establish conditions under which the withdrawn water can be approved. These agreements will be based on conserved water that shall be allocated in a way that ensures it is provided for out-of-stream uses, while no reduction in Columbia mainstem flows occurs from the new appropriation.
However, John Stuhlmiller, assistant director of public relations for the Washington State Farm Bureau, said the bill doesn't include the "no-net-loss" language, but only says these new water agreements must be structured to ensure there are no negative impacts to flows in July and August.
Stuhlmiller said the bill also keeps any new water rights developed by agreement in the area where the parties are located, to keep benefits local. He said some agricultural users in Northeast Washington were concerned that conservation efforts they developed might be siphoned off by municipalities like the Quad Cities area downstream.
He also said the bill calls for an inventory of water uses, an element pushed by environmental groups.
The bill focuses on using some of the conserved water to replace deep well irrigation in the Odessa area, where the aquifer is rapidly diminishing, with $6 million dedicated to that end and another $10 million for immediate studies and development of water conservation projects.
The bill also calls for the Department of Ecology to develop water supplies for municipalities with pending applications, along with creating new, uninterruptible supplies for junior water rights holders on the Columbia mainstem and for towns, residential, industrial and agricultural uses.
The legislation tasks DOE to monitor and evaluate the new water for instream uses and to submit a report every two years on the status of the program and a review of its overall effectiveness every 10 years.
But just where will most new water come from?
That's still in the works and will probably be for many years to come. Insiders say only a modest amount will come from conservation efforts. Previous talks have focused on getting another foot of elevation out of Lake Roosevelt, possibly buying some non-treaty storage from Canada, or developing huge new storage reservoirs near Chief Joseph Dam and in the Yakima Basin that could cost up to $8 billion or more.
The Farm Bureau's Stuhlmiller said the legislature still has to vote for the bonding authority to come up with the $200 million for the next 10 years. But right now, legislators had a more immediate problem, and were scrambling to fix the water bill since it was discovered the $2 million operating budget for DOE's work in these areas for the coming year had been inadvertently left out. -B. R.
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