Sierra Club
Redwood Chapter Newsletter
|
Lake Group Report Steve Devoto | |
|
Lake Group Joins in Yolo Water Rights Protest In 1912, a water company applied for and received the appropriative rights to all of the summer flow from Clear Lake and built a dam in 1914 at the Cache Creek outlet to control the release of the water. Control of the company passed through various hands until the mid 1960's when Yolo County bought the company which is now known as Yolo County Flood Control and Water Conservation District (Yolo Ditch). In actuality, their primary purpose is to store and then deliver irrigation water to farmers in Yolo County, it is not flood control or water conservation. Various court decisions have held that summer flow means the water stored at up to 7.56 feet on the Rumsey gauge, an artificial measure of the lake level which is maintained near Lakeport. Any excess water released during the winter is not appropriated (winter flow). In 1994 Yolo Ditch applied for 95,000 acre feet of the winter flow with the State Water Resources Board. They propose diverting the winter flow to off stream storage pits in the Capay area. To date there has been little action on their application, presumably because they have not attempted to implement the storage scheme. Although not mentioned in the application, an alternative storage could be behind a dam on Cache Creek. The Sierra Club Lake Group has joined with other conservation groups - Friends of the River, Cache |
Creek Wild, Yolo Audubon Society, Sierra Club Yolano Group and California Native Plants Society, Sacramento Valley Chapter - in filing a water rights protest on this application with the State Water Resources Board. Although the time limit for filing such protests has passed, our protest letter argues that the Water and Administrative Codes allow for a late filing provided there is a showing of a "good cause." We argue that numerous environmental discoveries and public policy decisions since 1994 demonstrate the need for additional studies of the impact of the proposed water appropriation. Some major environmental concerns covered in our application included the historic migration of threatened Central Valley Steelhead and spring and fall run Chinook Salmon in Cache Creek. Historically, Steelhead migrated all the way up Cache Creek, through Clear Lake, and into its major tributaries to spawn. Spawning fall run Chinook Salmon have recently been discovered in the portion of Cache Creek below the Capay Diversion Dam. The Putah-Cache Creek watershed has been designated as a key recovery area for the California Red-Legged Frog, designated as threatened under the ESA. Finally, the threatened Bald Eagle has recently been discovered nesting and remaining year round along the banks of Cache Creek. Look for updates in future issues of the Redwood Needles. |