Scott Valley
Protect Our Water organized in June 2010 as an ad-hoc group of
like-minded individuals, who have decided to stand-up against
governments, its agencies and officials, when those governments,
agencies and officials are invasive and threaten OUR Individual
and Property Rights.
General
meetings are open to like-minded individuals.
Those who do
not agree with the Scott Valley POW Mission Statement are not
welcome.
POW MISSION
STATEMENT
We say
“NO” to those regulations that are attempting to destroy our
Constitutional Rights.
We will
not submit,
nor sign
our rights away;
we will
stand on those
Constitutional Rights
with all
the resources at our command.
POW stands for–
Protect Our Water
We are a little
agricultural valley
in the mountains of
Siskiyou County –
at the very top of the
State of California.
Scott River
is located in Scott Valley over a range of hills
from
Interstate 5 near county seat Yreka.
Population
in the entire Siskiyou County is 45,000;
County
Supervisors Jim Cook and Michael Kobseff are packing their bags
and heading for Washington, D.C. Sunday morning. And they’re
upset.
Klamath County, Oregon Commissioner Bill Brown will accompany
the duo as they make the rounds Monday through Wednesday to
speak with U.S. Senators, members of the House of
Representatives and their staffs about a reported deal to remove
four hydroelectric dams on the Klamath River.
“It’s more than a rumor,” Cook said concerning a story being
e-mailed around the county about a possible agreement “only days
away” between Pacific Power and the federal government to remove
the dams. “And it’s clearly coming from the President’s office,”
he lamented.
The controversy surrounding the four hydroelectric dams on the
Klamath has been brewing for several years while PacifiCorp,
parent company of Pacific Power, is applying for license renewal
through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The first of
the dams was built in 1918.
Pressure to
remove the dams has come from Indian tribes, environmentalists,
some commercial and sports fishermen, as well as certain Klamath
Basin farmers. Efforts to restore the salmon runs have been
largely unsuccessful. Studies into the causes of salmon run
declines have been inconclusive, according to the Northwest
Fisheries Science Center.
If the dams were to be removed, it would be the largest project
of its type in world history, said the Washington Post in a Jan.
31, 2007 news story.
The Board of Supervisors has been firm in its opposition to dam
removal. Some of the problems cited by the supervisors and
others are downstream sedimentation, loss of irrigation for
agriculture, flooding risks, loss of private property and loss
of electrical power generating capacity.
“I’m not willing to see our entire economy crippled like with
the spotted owl,” Kobseff said, “I’m not willing to do that with
the dams. We need to explore other corrective measures in regard
to fisheries restoration.”
Cook, Kobseff and
Brown will meet with the staffs of Senators Diane Feinstein and
Barbara Boxer of California and Gordon Smith and Ron Wyden of
Oregon. Also on the agenda are staff meetings with Congressmen
Greg Walden of Oregon and Mike Thompson, Wally Herger and,
possibly, John Doolittle of California.
The two supervisors will be making their case for not removing
the Klamath River dams.
“I think it’s
a bad idea to remove the dams and the people of Siskiyou County
mostly agree,” said Cook. “In informal surveys, between 85 and
90 percent of the people in this county answer that they are
opposed to dam removal,” he pointed out. “It’s a little less in
southern Oregon, but not much.”
County
Natural Resource Policy Specialist Ric Costales said he didn’t
know if a deal is pending. However, he voiced dismay over the
prospect of losing the dams saying, “It’s clean renewable
energy. Pacific Power has to decide what to do. The effects are
huge, and they need to be involving the county in the process.”
The four dams produce electricity for about 70,000 customers.
The power is worth more than $30 million per year, according to
the California Energy Commission.
Throughout the controversy, agricultural irrigators in
California and Oregon have voiced major concerns about not
getting enough water for their crops, according to Costales.
Costs associated with dam removal have been estimated to be as
low as $100 million to as high as $1 billion by various groups.
“I can’t imagine how they could expedite a project of this
magnitude,” said Costales. “It could take as long as 20 years to
get the job done.”
Cook and Kobseff have scheduled a return flight to Medford on
Wednesday evening.
Removal of four
Klamath River dams as proposed in the Klamath Hydroelectric
Settlement Agreement and and the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement
likely will result in undesirable and unintended consequences that
collectively add up to negative cost-benefit outcomes using
scientific, engineering, economic, and Native American cultural
criteria. Surprisingly, the fishery faces the greatest risk of all,
and the agencies responsible for promoting dam removal do not appear
to care.
First and
foremost, the dams provide flood protection (minimum 9-hour
peak-flood delay) for small communities, residences, businesses,
agency offices, bridges and other structures along the Klamath River
downstream from Iron Gate Dam to the ocean. Additionally, the
reservoirs provide local water supplies to helicopters used in
fighting wildland fires. Reservoirs also provide sufficient water in
the mainstem Klamath to support the fall run of chinook salmon.
Property values adjacent to dam reservoirs have declined
precipitously, and property tax reductions will reduce funds for
Siskiyou County programs.
