Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt has declared an 11-mile stretch of southern Oregon’s Klamath River a National Scenic River. Babbitt’s decision deals a death blow to the city of Klamath Falls’ proposed Salt Caves hydroelectric project, reports The Oregonian. Oregon citizens voted six years ago to include the free-flowing portion of the river in the state’s […]
Water
Posted inOctober 17, 1994: As elections near, green hopes wilt
Nevada Water Forum
University of Nevada professor Jean Ford has published the findings of a series of Nevada Water Forums held around the state last spring. The forums asked: “How should we manage and allocate water to help create the Nevada we want over the next 20 years?” Participants considered maintaining the current system of water allocation under […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Water planning in the desert
Residents of the driest state in the nation use more water per person than almost anyone else in the country. But change may be forced on Nevada by sustained drought and record population growth. The State Division of Water Planning is drafting a new policy to guide water-planning decisions for the next 20 years. The […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Sole source
The EPA may grant special protection status to an aquifer that covers 14,000 square miles in eastern Washington and portions of western Idaho. A local environmental group, the Palouse-Clearwater Environmental Institute, petitioned the agency in 1992 to designate the Eastern Columbia Plateau aquifer as the “sole source” of drinking water for the area. The EPA […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
New look at a river basin
The market-oriented environmental group that helped McDonalds get rid of Styrofoam wants to save the Colorado River Basin. The Environmental Defense Fund recently launched its Colorado River Basin Initiative, a project that begins by re-evaluating the Colorado River compact. The compact has dictated water use in the basin for the past 70 years. EDF hopes […]
Posted inOctober 3, 1994: Subdividing the desert: Should there be a vote?
Leopold floats us to an understanding
A View of the River Luna B. Leopold. Harvard University Press, 1994. 298 pages. $39.95 plus $3.50 postage and shipping; Customer Service Dept., Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass. 02138 (800/448-2242). Review by C.L. Rawlins Anyone concerned with flowing water – river rats, lawyers, architects, irrigators, fly fishers and land managers – will learn to love […]
Posted inSeptember 19, 1994: Flame and blame in the Northwest
Save a river
Have you ever wanted to save a river from a dam or pollution but felt frustrated by not knowing how to begin? David M. Bolling effectively channels this passion in his book How to Save a River: A Handbook for Citizen Action. Full of case studies from successful fights to stop dams on rivers such […]
Posted inSeptember 5, 1994: Can planning rein in a stampede?
Undoing a dam is expensive
Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and the National Park Service want to tear down two dams on the Elwha River in Washington’s Olympic National Park. But White House budget director Leon Panetta says the federal government can’t afford it. A Park Service study found that removing the Elwha and Glines Canyon dams is the best way […]
Posted inAugust 8, 1994: Glitz and growth take a major hit in Santa Fe
Animas-La Plata a financial boondoggle
The Inspector General’s office of the Department of Interior says costs have soared so high on the $635 million Animas-La Plata water project that it is “economically infeasible.” That pronouncement was made in a draft report addressed March 14 to U.S. Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Dan Beard on the controversial dam-and-irrigation project proposed for southwestern […]
Posted inAugust 8, 1994: Glitz and growth take a major hit in Santa Fe
The list no Idaho stream wants to be on
Prodded by court order, the EPA has increased its official list of polluted streams and lakes in Idaho from 36 to 800. The agency had been relying on information compiled by the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, but the Idaho Conservation League and Idaho Sportsmen’s Coalition sued, claiming that hundreds of polluted waterways had been […]
Posted inAugust 8, 1994: Glitz and growth take a major hit in Santa Fe
Wetlands program wasn’t
Although designed to prevent the loss of Oregon’s wetlands, mitigation projects in the state destroyed more wetlands than they created, according to a state study. While Oregon has some of the strongest wetland protection laws in the nation, it still allows wetlands to be drained and developed if their destruction is offset by creating, restoring […]
Posted inAugust 8, 1994: Glitz and growth take a major hit in Santa Fe
Colorado water map
To help end the chronic battling over water in Colorado, a group has formed to provide impartial information on water issues. The nonprofit Colorado Water Education Forum is made up of 33 volunteers representing virtually every water interest in the state, ranging from farmers and dam builders to environmentalists and wildlife agency staffers. The group’s […]
Posted inAugust 8, 1994: Glitz and growth take a major hit in Santa Fe
Pesticides linger in Northwest
A report commissioned by the Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides found major groundwater contamination in five Northwest states. Neva Hasanein, the author of Uncovering the Legacy of Pesticide Use: What We Know About Ground Water Contamination in the Northwest, gathered information from researchers and government agencies in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and northern California. […]
Posted inJuly 25, 1994: 'Unranchers' reach for West's state lands
Fish benefit from trade
An eastern Oregon rancher recently swapped his water rights in a local stream for a year’s worth of hay. Rancher Rocky Webb will receive $6,600 worth of hay from the Oregon Water Trust in exchange for not irrigating 50 acres of pasture. The result: Steelhead trout will swim in more water, reports The Oregonian, and […]
Posted inJune 27, 1994: Home, home on the range ... where neo-Nazis and skinheads roam
Utah and the Ute Tribe are at war
It all began with Abraham Lincoln and a promise. In the midst of history’s greatest test of presidential mettle, Lincoln took time in 1861 to establish the Uintah Valley Reservation for the Ute Indians in Utah. Before he wrote the order, however, the federal government asked Mormon leader Brigham Young if the Uintah Valley was […]
Posted inJune 13, 1994: A doomed species?
Wyoming dam gets go-ahead
Acting on a recommendation from the state’s Water Development Commission, the Wyoming legislature recently approved a $30 million appropriation to build the Sandstone Dam (HCN, 12/27/93). The commission okayed the project despite conflicting evidence regarding the geologic suitability of the site. Mike West, a geologist hired by opponents of the dam, says he found irregularities […]
Posted inJune 13, 1994: A doomed species?
The Great River becomes a great sewer
FORT HANCOCK, Texas – Red-headed Jimmy Frank Rogers, a junior and an agile receiver on Fort Hancock High’s six-man football team (school enrollment: 102), straddled some spindly salt cedar on the steep banks of the Rio Grande and surveyed what was once the Great River. “I’d guess maybe 20 yards across,” offered Rogers, tugging at […]
Posted inMay 30, 1994: Can mining come clean?
A savage SLAPP suit
A “conspiracy” exists to destroy the Savage Rapids Dam in Oregon, say Oregon residents who are suing Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, the Oregon governor, 15 state and federal agencies and 10 environmental groups. “If the preservationists win here, they’ll want to go after all the dams in the state,” said John DeZell, attorney and founder […]
Posted inMay 30, 1994: Can mining come clean?
Changing the law of the river
The Bureau of Rec-lamation has released a draft plan to change the way the Colorado River is managed within Nevada, Arizona and California (HCN, 2/21/94). “The lower Colorado River needs to meet the water needs of more people,” says commissioner Dan Beard. “In the past, we have managed the river primarily to serve agricultural and […]
Posted inMay 30, 1994: Can mining come clean?
Endangered waters
The Clarks Fork of the Yellowstone is the most endangered river in North America, reports the environmental group American Rivers. The wild and scenic river, which runs through Montana and Wyoming, is threatened by a proposed gold mine two-and-a-half miles from Yellowstone National Park. The project includes a 90-foot dam designed to hold millions of […]