No On 18 Chairs Are Optimistic After Water Bond Delayed

No On 18 Chairs Are Optimistic After Water Bond Delayed

by Dan Bacher

The lack of support by Californians for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's water bond spurred the Legislature last week to delay the vote for this measure from the November ballot to 2012. This is a great victory for all of those opposed to the construction of the peripheral canal around the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

The bond funded the infrastructure needed to build the peripheral canal and new dams. Due to overwhelming opposition to the bond by fishing groups, environmentalists, Indian Tribes, labor unions, family farmers and Delta residents, the Governor will leave office without setting in place the infrastructure for the canal that he has so relentlessly campaigned for over the past three years.

"With the Legislature's vote to delay the Water Bond until the 2012 ballot, it is clear that both the contents and price are unpopular with voters," according to a news release from the No on 18 Campaign. "Now members from both houses, across party lines, have seized the opportunity to start the discussions necessary to craft a proposal that will truly ensure California has a secure, safe and reliable water supply for all Californians and our fragile environment."

A bi-partisan coalition of legislators worked hard to prevent AB 1265 from passing, knowing that the water bond “would not get better with time,” according to the No on 18 Campaign. Assemblymember Jared Huffman, who led the charge in the Assembly to pass last year's water package, was a vocal opponent of now delaying the bond.

Legislators of both parties, including the entire Delta delegation of Democrats Mariko Yamada and Joan Buchanan and Republican Bill Berryhill, joined Huffman in the Assembly. Twenty-two assembly members stood firm with the many environmental, fishing, tribal, labor and consumer groups opposing AB 1265.

In the Senate, Senator Lois Wolk of Davis, another Delta legislator, rallied the Democrats who had opposed the bond last year. Senators Corbett, DeSaulnier, Hancock, Para, Leno and Yee joined with Republican George Runner in opposing AB 1265.

The No on Proposition 18 legislative co-chairs, Senator Lois Wolk (D) and Assemblymember Bill Berryhill (R), portrayed the delay as a victory and vowed to defeat the bond two years from now.

"While we may have (narrowly) lost the fight to keep the bond on this ballot, we must remember that they're moving it in the first place because of the hard work and dedication of everyone on this team," said Assemblymember Bill Berryhill (R - Ceres). "This is a victory for us. As long as we use the next two years to continue to work together and educate people on this bond, I know we can defeat it just as soundly two years from now."

"I want to thank everyone for their efforts and I am grateful for the friendships I have forged in this endeavor. We took on some giants and won. We must build on this momentum and keep fighting," he stated.

"I welcome the action taken to remove the bond from the 2010 ballot, although simply postponing it to 2012 has done nothing to address my concerns or the concerns of the voters," said Senator Lois Wolk (D - Davis). "It is still bloated with unnecessary pork and still fails to address the most important water issue in the state, the unsustainable over-reliance on the Delta for our water supply.

This bond is out of touch with our fiscal situation, including a structural deficit projected for years to come. This bond still funds water taxis in Tahoe while we cut public transportation. It still funds watershed education centers while we lay off teachers It still funds billions of projects unrelated to our true water needs.

Voters didn't like it this year and I'm confident that the more they learn about it they'll like it even less two years from now. So, I consider this bond all but dead.

That is why I intend to get to work with other legislators and water policy advocates on a smart water financing plan that focuses on reducing our reliance on the Delta. A plan that is in touch with our times and recognizes our fiscal realities, not a lobbyist driven wish-list that saddles our children and grandchildren with more and more debt.

I look forward to working with the next Governor and a new Legislature on a responsible water financing plan for California."

The work by the broad coalition that organized against the bond and peripheral canal kept the Water Bond from being passed this year but it isn't over yet. The Governor and his collaborators will continue to push his schemes to build the canal and new dams through his Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) process and the Delta Stewardship Council.

"It's clear voters do not want this poorly designed water bond, but they do want solutions," the No on Proposition 18 Campaign concluded. "We'll continue working to build support for cost effective water solutions that benefit all Californians. It's imperative that we keep up this momentum on this issue. Stay tuned for more information."

The peripheral canal, backed by Governor Schwarzenegger, corporate agribusiness, and southern California water agencies, is likely to lead to the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, green sturgeon and southern resident killer whale populations. The canal is designed to facilitate the export of Delta water to corporate growers on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley and water privateers including Stewart Resnick, owner of the giant Paramount Farms in Kern County. The canal/tunnel would cost an estimated $23 billion to $53.8 billion at a time that California is in its greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression.

I applaud all of those Legislators who opposed the bill to delay the bond. Still, the fact that the bond has been delayed shows that the Governor and his collaborators knew that the water bond was headed to certain defeat in November, just like the peripheral canal initiative was crushed by the voters in 1982.

The Governor's certainty that the water bond would have been defeated had it gone before the voters is not the only major defeat for Schwarzenegger's "environmental" legacy in the past two weeks. The Legislature, faced with massive opposition to the confirmation of Don Benninghoven to the Fish and Game Commission because of his strong support of the Governor's fast-track Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative, failed to confirm the Republican Governor's appointee by the deadline of August 4.

The MLPA Initiative under Schwarzenegger, in a bizarre parody of marine "protection," has taken oil drilling, water pollution, corporate aquaculture, wave energy projects and all other uses of the ocean other than fishing and gathering off the table. The Blue Ribbon Task Forces that design the so-called "marine protected areas" are dominated by oil industry, marina development, real estate and other corporate interests.

Opposition to the MLPA on the North Coast by Indian Tribes, environmentalists, fishermen, immigrant sea urchin industry workers and community leaders has spurred the creation of the largest political movement on the North Coast since the Redwood Summer of 1990.