Heavily slanted message from the D's. Doesn't stand in comparison with eyewitness account.  There is not much support for the green's position in the news.  This is about as factual as it gets. However,  this needs to be shown in the forum -- for balance -- people can judge for themselves.   George   ----

The word balance covers it George. Just say that wrongs were committed, a slow process of correction with minimum impact to the present population would seem prudent. We've been there, how many wrongs does it take to make a right? --- Vic ----

Editorials & Opinion : Thursday, July 12, 2001

Government made right call on Klamath Basin irrigation

By Elizabeth Furse:

A congressional hearing in Oregon last month provided a glimpse of how a handful of politicians intend to exploit a severe drought in the Klamath Basin to further their long-standing goal of repealing the Endangered Species Act. The American people, however, overwhelmingly support the act and efforts to protect the nation's imperiled fish and wildlife. Some farmers in the Klamath Basin, an area that straddles the California-Oregon border, will not be able to use the amount of water they typically receive from the government. There is a reason for that; there is too little water. The region is a high, dry desert to begin with, and 2001 is the driest year in the basin since record keeping began. This spring the government decided that federally subsidized irrigation would have to be substantially reduced to avoid the extinction of several species of fish, including wild Klamath River coho salmon. That decision, although difficult and controversial, was absolutely correct. In 1909, the federal government began a foolish and ill-conceived policy of replumbing the entire Klamath River system with the intention of turning this high desert plateau into farmland. The area was opened to homesteaders who received access to an irrigation system paid for by the taxpayers. As populations grew, the government diverted more of the river, drained more wetlands, and promised more water than the river could deliver. Naturally, the ecosystem in the Klamath Basin could not handle these intrusions. As irrigation increased, the basin's lakes shrank and grew warm, and the rivers dried up. The native fish species that once thrived in them began to disappear. Much of the basin's wetlands, once the staging ground for one of the mightiest concentrations of migratory birds on the planet, was converted to farms and, as a result, bird numbers plummeted. (OH,it's all our farmers fault. That's a new one on me.) The government irrigation program may have been a great boon for the farmers living in the basin, but many other people have suffered immeasurably from this largesse. The Klamath River was once the third-greatest producer of salmon and steelhead in the United States, and supported a fishery that provided thousands of family-wage jobs. As irrigation drained much of the water out of the Klamath River in recent years, the fishing economy collapsed. An estimated 3,700 fishing-dependent jobs have been lost in nearby coastal communities alone. Today, a visitor to once-thriving towns along the coast will see few fish but plenty of FOR SALE signs on fishing boats. The government's irrigation program was even more devastating for the region's numerous Indian tribes. The Klamath Indians, for example, forced from their ancestral homelands, received solemn guarantees in a treaty with the government that their fishing rights would be protected for all time. The fish that once thrived in the region formed the backbone of the tribe's economy (??? What tribal economy did the suckers ever help?), culture and religion. The government ignored this promise when it replumbed the basin for irrigation, sending the river and lakes into an ecological tailspin and completely destroying the fisheries. Today, lake fish on which the tribe relies are hanging on the very precipice of extinction. So, too, are the once-abundant salmon in the Klamath River on which many different tribes rely. While the government's experiment with desert agriculture in the Klamath Basin has exacted immense costs, the benefits have been marginal at best. Farming represents only 6 percent of total employment in Klamath County and income from farming and agricultural services provides just 1 percent of the county's total personal income. Moreover, agriculture receives taxpayer subsidies at every stage of the process, from federal price supports for crops to heavily subsidized irrigation water. Even so, agriculture in the basin has struggled: Last year, part of the Klamath Basin potato crop was plowed back into the ground because there was no market for it. The Endangered Species Act didn't create the problem in the Klamath Basin. Rather, it is a warning, a "miner's canary," indicating that we have created an unsustainable ecological Frankenstein: The basin is on the edge of collapse.Politicians and others who have long disliked the ESA see this tragedy as an opportunity to attack the act. They are cynically using the farmers' plight as a tool for their own purposes. But "fixing" the basin's irrigation crisis by amending the ESA is like trying to put out a five-alarm fire by pulling the batteries out of the fire alarm. We must say no to this "quick fix" and work together to find a balanced, long-term solution to the water fight in the Klamath Basin, one that protects all of the people involved, farmers, fishermen and Indian tribes alike.

Elizabeth Furse is a former congresswoman from Oregon's 1st District (1993-1999). She is currently on the staff of the Mark O. Hatfield School of Government, Portland State University, Portland.

"The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government." ---Patrick Henry

Click to make comments or ask questions about anything on this website.

To contact the editor, click here: editor@rogueforum.com