For Immediate Release 

Contact: Jane Wagner-Tyack

Phone: (209) 642-5105

Restore the Delta 

10100 Trinity Pkwy, Suite 120 

Stockton, CA 95219 

Email: janetyack@mac.com 

 

Interior Secretary Salazar Badly Mistaken About the Situation in the Delta

 

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar used remarks delivered at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco on September 19 to link building ill-conceived conveyance in the Delta to the American Jobs Act the administration has put before Congress.

“It doesn’t make sense to put people to work building infrastructure that will destroy jobs,” said Jane Wagner-Tyack, policy analyst for Restore the Delta.  “Close to 23,000 jobs in the Delta region are linked to Delta agriculture that is threatened by plans to move Sacramento River water under the Delta.”

Salazar praised as “open, collaborative, and transparent” the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) process driven by water contractors who are fighting to ensure continued high levels of exports from the Delta.

“Exports from the Delta are the primary cause of the destruction of habitat in this estuary,” said Bill Jennings of the California Sportfishing Protection Alliance and a Restore the Delta board member.  “The process the exporters are using to plan for the Delta’s future has been anything but collaborative.”

Restore the Delta Executive Director Barrigan-Parrilla noted that the state and federal water contractors have held required meetings soliciting public input but have continued for three years to move forward with the plan they have always intended to build, ignoring input from Delta locals.

Salazar threw the weight of the federal government firmly behind moving quickly on the BDCP, which aims for a draft environmental analysis by June 2012 and a final plan by early 2013.

“They’re pushing this habitat conservation plan through in one-third of the time that similar plans have required for much less complex natural systems elsewhere,” said Barrigan-Parrilla.  “If Interior is serious about respecting Delta science, they should be putting the brakes on the process instead of urging haste.”