Farmers, Fishermen and Delta Community Representatives Available for Comment on Gov. Brown’s Administration Delta Media Tour

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, September 23, 2013
Contact: Steve Hopcraft 916/457-5546; steve@hopcraft.com; Twitter: @shopcraft; @MrSandHillCrane; Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla 209/479-2053 barbara@restorethedelta.org; Twitter: @RestoretheDelta

Farmers, Fishermen and Delta Community Representatives Available for Comment on Gov. Brown’s Administration Delta Media Tour

Brown Administration Excluding the Delta Community

Sacramento, CA- Restore the Delta (RTD), opponents of Gov. Brown’s rush to build Peripheral Tunnels that would drain the Delta and doom salmon and other Pacific fisheries, today called out the Natural Resources Agency and the Department of Water Resources for choreographing a media tour of the Delta that does not include one Delta area representative.

Restore the Delta Executive Director, Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, said, “Directors and public relations officials are conducting a tour with officials from the Metropolitan Water District in the Delta at tax payer expense to sell the project to Southern California media, but they have managed to exclude all Delta community representatives from talking with these members of the media to learn the Delta perspective of the peripheral tunnel project.

While we do not fault the media for participating in the tour, as listening to multiple sources is part of their job, we note that the Department of Water Resources is expanding its tax-fueled media campaign to sell Californians on a $54 billion boondoggle project that Federal fisheries agencies have said will not save endangered fish species, will destroy wintering habitat for endangered Sandhill Cranes, and will destroy the Delta family farming community. All of this is being pushed forward by the Brown Administration to serve the special interests of a few big water districts like the Metropolitan Water District, Westlands, and the Kern County Water Agency which operate as the middlemen to control a limited, public resource for profit– California’s water supply.”

Delta residents including farmers, fishermen and recreation enthusiasts will be present roadside with signs throughout the tour to answer questions on the Delta reaction to the proposed tunnel project.

Barrigan-Parrilla added, “What DWR officials will not tell the media is the level of destruction that will be inflicted on the Delta with this project. They also won’t tell the media that there is a better solution for the Delta and California, including: upgrading levees, reducing water exports, fixing the existing pumps, retiring drainage impaired farmland, and investing in projects throughout the state that will make more water for Californians. This will save the Delta and ensure that southern Californians have the water that they need.”