Publish to Newswire
Add an EventFrom the Open-Publishing Calendar
From the Open-Publishing Newswire
Indybay Feature
Pacific Lumber Logging Restricted in Freshwater and Elk River
"Due to PALCO’s failure to submit a complete report of waste discharge, [Water Board] staff did not have the information necessary to prepare draft watershed-wide waste discharge requirements for timber operations in the Elk River and Freshwater Creek watersheds. Without a draft permit, staff have been unable to conduct the necessary environmental review or take the other steps necessary to provide coverage to PALCO for its operations in these watersheds beginning January 1, 2005."<br>
~from the Water Board's EXECUTIVE OFFICER’S SUMMARY REPORT
~from the Water Board's EXECUTIVE OFFICER’S SUMMARY REPORT
Humboldt County, CA - The North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board has taken action that will significantly reduce Pacific Lumber's (PL) rate of harvest in Freshwater and Elk River watersheds this winter. On Monday, representatives of the Humboldt Watershed Council, EPIC, the Sierra Club, and residents of Elk River traveled to Santa Rosa for the RWB's meeting. On the agenda was an item to consider permitting for PL's timber harvest plans in Freshwater and Elk River for 2005.
Last December, the Regional Water Board (RWB) had directed their staff to draft watershed-wide waste discharge requirements (WWWDRs) for PL's operations in Freshwater and Elk River, to go into effect in 2005. Throughout the year, RWB staff had been in communication with PL as to what information they would need from PL in order to draft the permits. In June, the RWB ordered PL to provide the neccessary data, but PL missed the deadline. Twice the deadline was extended, and twice more PL failed to comply. PL’s repeated delay made it impossible for the Board to process the WWWDRs in time for PL to start operations on January 1st. This means that they would not be able to operate in Freshwater and Elk River until Late February, or perhaps even March.
The Staff Report for the meeting explained the reason for PL's delay: “In ensuing discussions, PALCO made it clear to staff that it did not wish to provide the missing information concerning landslides and harvest history because PALCO did not want staff to use that information to develop and recommend a permit structure that could have the effect of limiting PALCO's rate of harvest.”
PL sent a letter to the RWB asking the Board to simply put all of their Timber Harvest Plans (THP) for the two watersheds under the General Waste Discharge Requirement (WDR) to provide "interim" coverage until the WWWDRs could be approved. The Board asked how many THPs they would need just to get by in the interim, and PL, no surprise, said "All of them." That would have included a total of 22 THPs (11 in Freshwater, 11 in Elk River.)
RWB staff presented the Board with 3 options. Option A would continue on the current path to develop WWWDRs, without granting any special interim coverage. Option B would enroll all of PL’s THPs into the General WDRs, as PL had requested. Option C would enroll some particular THPs into the General WDRs, provided they meet certain terms, while continuing to develop the WWWDRs. The Humboldt Watershed Council recommended Option A, for the reasons that the lack of permits was a problem of PL's own making, and that PL's THPs did not meet the necessary conditions of the WDR.
After presentations by staff, PL, and the public, the Board chose a modified version of option C. Under this plan, PL may be limited to as few as 3 THPs in the two watersheds, until such time as the WWWDRs are approved. The remainder of PL's THPs would not be eligible due to the fact that the Water Board had non-concurred on their approval by the California Dept. of Forestry (CDF). Those non-concurrences had been due to sediment discharge related to rate of harvest. This means that for PL to get permits for those THPs, they would first have to resolve the nonconcurrences, which means they would have to accept the Water Board's curtailment of their excessive rate of harvest.
This is a significant step in providing long-needed relief for these watersheds and their residents. Of course, there is always another hand to play, and we will see how this all plays out in the coming months. For now, though, this is a giant step in the right direction.
Last December, the Regional Water Board (RWB) had directed their staff to draft watershed-wide waste discharge requirements (WWWDRs) for PL's operations in Freshwater and Elk River, to go into effect in 2005. Throughout the year, RWB staff had been in communication with PL as to what information they would need from PL in order to draft the permits. In June, the RWB ordered PL to provide the neccessary data, but PL missed the deadline. Twice the deadline was extended, and twice more PL failed to comply. PL’s repeated delay made it impossible for the Board to process the WWWDRs in time for PL to start operations on January 1st. This means that they would not be able to operate in Freshwater and Elk River until Late February, or perhaps even March.
The Staff Report for the meeting explained the reason for PL's delay: “In ensuing discussions, PALCO made it clear to staff that it did not wish to provide the missing information concerning landslides and harvest history because PALCO did not want staff to use that information to develop and recommend a permit structure that could have the effect of limiting PALCO's rate of harvest.”
PL sent a letter to the RWB asking the Board to simply put all of their Timber Harvest Plans (THP) for the two watersheds under the General Waste Discharge Requirement (WDR) to provide "interim" coverage until the WWWDRs could be approved. The Board asked how many THPs they would need just to get by in the interim, and PL, no surprise, said "All of them." That would have included a total of 22 THPs (11 in Freshwater, 11 in Elk River.)
RWB staff presented the Board with 3 options. Option A would continue on the current path to develop WWWDRs, without granting any special interim coverage. Option B would enroll all of PL’s THPs into the General WDRs, as PL had requested. Option C would enroll some particular THPs into the General WDRs, provided they meet certain terms, while continuing to develop the WWWDRs. The Humboldt Watershed Council recommended Option A, for the reasons that the lack of permits was a problem of PL's own making, and that PL's THPs did not meet the necessary conditions of the WDR.
After presentations by staff, PL, and the public, the Board chose a modified version of option C. Under this plan, PL may be limited to as few as 3 THPs in the two watersheds, until such time as the WWWDRs are approved. The remainder of PL's THPs would not be eligible due to the fact that the Water Board had non-concurred on their approval by the California Dept. of Forestry (CDF). Those non-concurrences had been due to sediment discharge related to rate of harvest. This means that for PL to get permits for those THPs, they would first have to resolve the nonconcurrences, which means they would have to accept the Water Board's curtailment of their excessive rate of harvest.
This is a significant step in providing long-needed relief for these watersheds and their residents. Of course, there is always another hand to play, and we will see how this all plays out in the coming months. For now, though, this is a giant step in the right direction.
Add Your Comments
Comments
(Hide Comments)
State of California
Regional Water Quality Control Board
November 24, 2004
North Coast Region
Catherine Kuhlman
EXECUTIVE OFFICER’S SUMMARY REPORT
8:00 a.m., November 29, 2004
Regional Water Quality Control Board
Hearing Room
5550 Skylane Boulevard, Suite A
Santa Rosa, CA 95403
ITEM: 14
SUBJECT: Discussion of permitting for Scotia Pacific Company, LLC., Salmon Creek Corporation, Pacific Lumber Company (PALCO), and Green Diamond Resource Company, Elk and Freshwater Watersheds, Humboldt County
DISCUSSION
I. Summary
Due to PALCO’s failure to submit a complete report of waste discharge, staff did not have the information necessary to prepare draft watershed-wide waste discharge requirements (WWWDRs) for timber operations in the Elk River and Freshwater Creek watersheds. Without a draft permit, staff have been unable to conduct the necessary environmental review or take the other steps necessary to provide coverage to PALCO for its operations in these watersheds beginning January 1, 2005.
The purpose of this item is to discuss what can or should be done about the predicament facing PACLO on January 1, 2005. More specifically, PALCO has written a letter asking the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board (Board) to provide “interim” coverage for what appears to be all of its 2005 THPs in Elk and Freshwater.
The Executive Officer (EO) recommends that the Board decline PALCO’s request to grant another year of THP coverage. The EO recommends that the Board instead direct staff to continue developing the WWWDRs, to review individual PALCO THPs in the interim and to consider enrolling some portion of them into the General Timber WDRs (Order No. R1-2004-0030). Coverage would be extended only to the degree the record can support a finding that some portion of the proposed THPs would be eligible and not excluded under applicable provisions of the General Timber WDRs, including but not limited to provisions V.A.4, V.A.5 and V.A.7, and only after the WWWDRs are out for public review so that such an accommodation could be undertaken without unduly delaying or otherwise inhibiting the development of the WWWDRs.
II. Background
During the period between April 2000 and December 2003, an exhaustive series of staff reports, board meetings and workshops, petitions, State Board remands for further action, mediation efforts, independent scientific review panel reports, and various permit and enforcement orders dealt with the issue of water quality impacts resulting from PALCO’s intensified logging operations in Elk River, Freshwater, Bear, Stitz, and Jordan Creek watersheds. In June of 2002, Board-directed mediation efforts broke down when PALCO refused to agree to discuss the relationship between rate-of-harvest and water quality impacts. In response, the Board directed that mediation be abandoned so that all relevant issues could be analyzed, and directed staff to solicit the assistance of an independent scientific review panel to review the technical issues underlying the disputes over causation and available solutions to flooding and other water quality problems in the five watersheds.
The independent scientific review panel (ISRP) issued two reports, which were broadly circulated and discussed at numerous public Board meetings and workshops. The first ISRP report validated the use of the empirical sediment budget model as the best option currently available, recommended that additional data be gathered to make optimal use of that approach, and, among other things, to move quickly to reduce sediment and peak flows by decreasing the rate of harvest. In response to industry concerns over these recommendations, the ISRP was asked to again convene, leading to the “Phase II” report. In Phase II, the ISRP was directed by the Board to look more closely at the potential water quality benefits from the Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP), Sustained Yield Plan (SYP), and THP process. In its Phase II report, the ISRP found those mechanisms and procedures to be well-intentioned and important, but insufficient to meet Basin Plan water quality objectives. The ISRP took the opportunity to again confirm a scientific preference for the empirical sediment budget model in the near-term for water quality protection.
The final Board hearing discussing the ISRP reports was in December 2003. At this hearing, the Board passed a series of motions. The Board found that additional actions were “necessary to address the water quality impacts due to the rate and scale of land disturbing activities in the five watersheds.” Among the Board’s specific instructions was a motion directing staff to issue requests for Reports of Waste Discharge (ROWDs), leading to WWWDRs for sediment generating activities in the Elk River and Freshwater Creek watersheds.
As part of this discussion, in response to the Executive Officer’s presentation of options and in response to downstream residents’ requests, the Board considered various options, including a cease and desist order, and applying the empirical sediment budget model to PALCO’s 2004 THPs. However, recognizing the time necessary to draft applicable WWWDRs, and the potential for economic disruption in the meantime if THPs could not proceed until the new WWWDRs were in place, the Board decided to allow all of the THPs proposed to be cut in the year 2004 to proceed, while staff worked with PALCO to prepare the documents necessary to establish WWWDRs by the end of the year.
III. The ROWD for WWWDRs
After several months of discussion with PALCO representatives, which included a discussion of the types of information that would be necessary to draft the WWWDRs, on June 17, 2004, the EO issued an order requiring PALCO to submit ROWDs, with specified information requirements. In order to ensure that there would be no gap in permit coverage, a complete ROWD was due by July 16, 2004, and the WWWDRs were scheduled for consideration by the Board on October 6, 2004.
The EO's order requiring PALCO to submit the ROWD required PALCO to provide certain specified information regarding harvest history and landslide data, among other things. This information was deemed necessary by the EO in order for staff to draft a permit that would effectively protect water quality and comply with the Basin Plan’s standards. (Water Code section 13260(a) authorizes the Executive Officer to determine what type of information shall be included in a ROWD.) PALCO objected to providing this particular data, and failed to provide a complete ROWD by the deadline contained in the EO’s order. The EO extended PALCO's deadline, and a special Board meeting (this meeting, November 29, 2004) was set, to allow PALCO more time to submit a complete ROWD and allow the Regional Board sufficient time to issue Waste Discharge Requirements prior to the end of the year, as requested by PALCO. The deadline was extended to September 1 for this purpose, but PALCO missed that deadline as well. In ensuing discussions, PALCO made it clear to staff that it did not wish to provide the missing information concerning landslides and harvest history because PALCO did not want staff to use that information to develop and recommend a permit structure that could have the effect of limiting PALCO's rate of harvest.
Staff's response was that the staff’s draft Waste Discharge Requirements would not regulate PALCO’s rates of harvest per se, but would instead set effluent limits for sediment and peak flow increases related to canopy removal. As required by Water Code section 13360(a), PALCO would have discretion about how to conduct its activities in order to comply with the effluent limits. For example, PALCO may choose to employ more protective harvesting strategies, eg, by building fewer roads, selecting silvicultural methods that produce less ground disturbance, avoiding geologically sensitive areas, and/or altering its rate of harvest. In staff's view, this approach is no different than putting a mass-based effluent limit in a wastewater treatment plant permit, which properly only regulates the amount of pollutants that may be discharged, but often has the effect of requiring the wastewater treatment plant to choose between installing better treatment technology or limiting the amount of wastewater the treatment plant receives. The POTWs have often, but to no avail, argued that this approach improperly limits local land use decisions regarding growth.
In any event, in the absence of the required information, staff have not been able to draft the WDRs in such a way that it can recommend to the Board that they will result in compliance with Basin Plan standards and protect water quality. The ultimate question of the contents of the final WDRs, whatever staff's recommendations, will be the province of the Board.
In October, it was thought that perhaps all the data had finally been provided and that the ROWD was complete, pending staff review of the documents submitted. Upon review of the submittals, however, staff found that inconsistencies were contained in the data submitted by PALCO regarding harvest history. This was not a new issue, but one raised previously to PALCO by Board staff, as they worked to help PALCO complete their submittals. Staff specifically pointed out that the data was inconsistent and if used as presented would result in inaccurate and misleading scientific conclusions regarding water quality. Staff asked PALCO to have their licensed staff review the submittals, resolve the discrepancies and submit the final, accurate, complete data under the stamp of appropriately licensed professionals. The data were re-submitted, under stamp, but contain the same problems previously identified. Staff cannot use the data provided to develop the WWWDRs. Staff is working with PALCO and is beginning to make progress in resolving this longstanding problem, and the effort continues.
In summary, PALCO failed to submit the required documents in time to obtain uninterrupted permit coverage into 2005. PALCO has therefore placed itself in the position of not having permit coverage to conduct THP operations in Elk and Freshwater beginning January 1, 2005.
The ROWD remains incomplete at this time.
IV. Current Options
The Board’s simplified options are to:
A. Proceed on current path of WDR development, without granting additional
“interim coverage” for this discharger.
Proceed in processing the permit applications consistent with other permit applications, drafting the WDRs whenever the applications are complete, circulating the necessary CEQA documents thereon, and considering the WDRs at the next available Board meeting.
Given the possibility of a lack of a quorum to take action after November 29, 2004, however, it is unknown when the “next available Board meeting” would occur. Alternatively, the Board could ask the State Water Resources Control Board to take this matter up and issue the permits at the State level while the Regional Board lacks a quorum.
B. Accommodate PALCO’s request to enroll all of its 2005 THPs in the General Timber WDRs for “interim” coverage.
Option B is to do as PALCO requests and enroll all of its specified 2005 THPs in the General Timber WDRs for “interim” coverage. This presents two issues of concern to the EO.
The first issue of concern is finding a basis for enrolling the 2005 THPs in the General WDRs, given the extensive record to date regarding cumulative impacts of activities in these watersheds, and more specifically in light of provisions V.A.4, V.A.5 and V.A.7 in the General WDRs.
In provision V.A. the Board ordered that the EO shall deny or rescind coverage to any THP that the EO finds, among other things, any of the following:
4. Where conditions unique to the watershed (including, but not limited to,
cumulative impacts, large acreage ownership holdings or management plans,
affected domestic water supplies, or an increased risk of flooding) warrant
further regulation.
5. Where past land use activities unique to the watershed resulted the discharge of human generated sediment in amounts which warrant further regulation.
7. The project is the subject of an unresolved non-concurrence filed by the Regional Board with CDF.
Provisions V.A.4 and V.A.5 are problematic especially when viewed in light of the record regarding cumulative impacts, documented incidences of increased flooding, and the Board’s findings in December of last year regarding the need for further regulation (thus staff’s ongoing efforts to establish WWWDRs).
Additionally, Provision V.A.7 presents problems because, based on the factors cited in V.A.4 and 5, among other things, there are currently unresolved non-concurrences on the majority of the THPs PALCO has proposed for enrollment in the general WDRs.
C. Proceed on current path of WDR development while enrolling some portion of the 2005 THPs in the General Timber WDRs.
If the Board is inclined to allow harvesting prior to the issuance of WWWDRs, but wishes to keep the WWWDRs on track, the Board could consider a compromise option.
This compromise option should be viewed in light of the Board’s previous decision in December of 2003 to allow a full year of THPs to proceed in 2004 while the WWWDRs were being developed. Any additional THPs for 2005 would be on top of that previous compromise and in light of PALCO’s refusal to provide the information requested on June 17th.
The Board could direct the EO to consider a limited number of THPs for enrollment in the general WDRs, if and to the extent that she can establish a record and basis for finding eligibility. Developing such a record would require some staff time and effort, and must be consistent with record and the General Timber WDR provisions described above in Option B.
To ensure that the WWWDRs are not subject to continued delays in development, the Board could direct the EO to develop a record and a basis for granting limited coverage to a sub-set of the proposed THPs, but only after PALCO’s ROWD is complete, the inaccuracies and inconsistencies in the data provided to date are resolved, and only after the draft WWWDRs are out for public review. This would allow staff to finish developing the WWWDRs without further preventable delays.
PRELIMINARY STAFF
RECOMMENDATION:
Staff recommends Option A or C above. Staff does not recommend Option B.
Regional Water Quality Control Board
November 24, 2004
North Coast Region
Catherine Kuhlman
EXECUTIVE OFFICER’S SUMMARY REPORT
8:00 a.m., November 29, 2004
Regional Water Quality Control Board
Hearing Room
5550 Skylane Boulevard, Suite A
Santa Rosa, CA 95403
ITEM: 14
SUBJECT: Discussion of permitting for Scotia Pacific Company, LLC., Salmon Creek Corporation, Pacific Lumber Company (PALCO), and Green Diamond Resource Company, Elk and Freshwater Watersheds, Humboldt County
DISCUSSION
I. Summary
Due to PALCO’s failure to submit a complete report of waste discharge, staff did not have the information necessary to prepare draft watershed-wide waste discharge requirements (WWWDRs) for timber operations in the Elk River and Freshwater Creek watersheds. Without a draft permit, staff have been unable to conduct the necessary environmental review or take the other steps necessary to provide coverage to PALCO for its operations in these watersheds beginning January 1, 2005.
The purpose of this item is to discuss what can or should be done about the predicament facing PACLO on January 1, 2005. More specifically, PALCO has written a letter asking the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board (Board) to provide “interim” coverage for what appears to be all of its 2005 THPs in Elk and Freshwater.
The Executive Officer (EO) recommends that the Board decline PALCO’s request to grant another year of THP coverage. The EO recommends that the Board instead direct staff to continue developing the WWWDRs, to review individual PALCO THPs in the interim and to consider enrolling some portion of them into the General Timber WDRs (Order No. R1-2004-0030). Coverage would be extended only to the degree the record can support a finding that some portion of the proposed THPs would be eligible and not excluded under applicable provisions of the General Timber WDRs, including but not limited to provisions V.A.4, V.A.5 and V.A.7, and only after the WWWDRs are out for public review so that such an accommodation could be undertaken without unduly delaying or otherwise inhibiting the development of the WWWDRs.
II. Background
During the period between April 2000 and December 2003, an exhaustive series of staff reports, board meetings and workshops, petitions, State Board remands for further action, mediation efforts, independent scientific review panel reports, and various permit and enforcement orders dealt with the issue of water quality impacts resulting from PALCO’s intensified logging operations in Elk River, Freshwater, Bear, Stitz, and Jordan Creek watersheds. In June of 2002, Board-directed mediation efforts broke down when PALCO refused to agree to discuss the relationship between rate-of-harvest and water quality impacts. In response, the Board directed that mediation be abandoned so that all relevant issues could be analyzed, and directed staff to solicit the assistance of an independent scientific review panel to review the technical issues underlying the disputes over causation and available solutions to flooding and other water quality problems in the five watersheds.
The independent scientific review panel (ISRP) issued two reports, which were broadly circulated and discussed at numerous public Board meetings and workshops. The first ISRP report validated the use of the empirical sediment budget model as the best option currently available, recommended that additional data be gathered to make optimal use of that approach, and, among other things, to move quickly to reduce sediment and peak flows by decreasing the rate of harvest. In response to industry concerns over these recommendations, the ISRP was asked to again convene, leading to the “Phase II” report. In Phase II, the ISRP was directed by the Board to look more closely at the potential water quality benefits from the Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP), Sustained Yield Plan (SYP), and THP process. In its Phase II report, the ISRP found those mechanisms and procedures to be well-intentioned and important, but insufficient to meet Basin Plan water quality objectives. The ISRP took the opportunity to again confirm a scientific preference for the empirical sediment budget model in the near-term for water quality protection.
The final Board hearing discussing the ISRP reports was in December 2003. At this hearing, the Board passed a series of motions. The Board found that additional actions were “necessary to address the water quality impacts due to the rate and scale of land disturbing activities in the five watersheds.” Among the Board’s specific instructions was a motion directing staff to issue requests for Reports of Waste Discharge (ROWDs), leading to WWWDRs for sediment generating activities in the Elk River and Freshwater Creek watersheds.
As part of this discussion, in response to the Executive Officer’s presentation of options and in response to downstream residents’ requests, the Board considered various options, including a cease and desist order, and applying the empirical sediment budget model to PALCO’s 2004 THPs. However, recognizing the time necessary to draft applicable WWWDRs, and the potential for economic disruption in the meantime if THPs could not proceed until the new WWWDRs were in place, the Board decided to allow all of the THPs proposed to be cut in the year 2004 to proceed, while staff worked with PALCO to prepare the documents necessary to establish WWWDRs by the end of the year.
III. The ROWD for WWWDRs
After several months of discussion with PALCO representatives, which included a discussion of the types of information that would be necessary to draft the WWWDRs, on June 17, 2004, the EO issued an order requiring PALCO to submit ROWDs, with specified information requirements. In order to ensure that there would be no gap in permit coverage, a complete ROWD was due by July 16, 2004, and the WWWDRs were scheduled for consideration by the Board on October 6, 2004.
The EO's order requiring PALCO to submit the ROWD required PALCO to provide certain specified information regarding harvest history and landslide data, among other things. This information was deemed necessary by the EO in order for staff to draft a permit that would effectively protect water quality and comply with the Basin Plan’s standards. (Water Code section 13260(a) authorizes the Executive Officer to determine what type of information shall be included in a ROWD.) PALCO objected to providing this particular data, and failed to provide a complete ROWD by the deadline contained in the EO’s order. The EO extended PALCO's deadline, and a special Board meeting (this meeting, November 29, 2004) was set, to allow PALCO more time to submit a complete ROWD and allow the Regional Board sufficient time to issue Waste Discharge Requirements prior to the end of the year, as requested by PALCO. The deadline was extended to September 1 for this purpose, but PALCO missed that deadline as well. In ensuing discussions, PALCO made it clear to staff that it did not wish to provide the missing information concerning landslides and harvest history because PALCO did not want staff to use that information to develop and recommend a permit structure that could have the effect of limiting PALCO's rate of harvest.
Staff's response was that the staff’s draft Waste Discharge Requirements would not regulate PALCO’s rates of harvest per se, but would instead set effluent limits for sediment and peak flow increases related to canopy removal. As required by Water Code section 13360(a), PALCO would have discretion about how to conduct its activities in order to comply with the effluent limits. For example, PALCO may choose to employ more protective harvesting strategies, eg, by building fewer roads, selecting silvicultural methods that produce less ground disturbance, avoiding geologically sensitive areas, and/or altering its rate of harvest. In staff's view, this approach is no different than putting a mass-based effluent limit in a wastewater treatment plant permit, which properly only regulates the amount of pollutants that may be discharged, but often has the effect of requiring the wastewater treatment plant to choose between installing better treatment technology or limiting the amount of wastewater the treatment plant receives. The POTWs have often, but to no avail, argued that this approach improperly limits local land use decisions regarding growth.
In any event, in the absence of the required information, staff have not been able to draft the WDRs in such a way that it can recommend to the Board that they will result in compliance with Basin Plan standards and protect water quality. The ultimate question of the contents of the final WDRs, whatever staff's recommendations, will be the province of the Board.
In October, it was thought that perhaps all the data had finally been provided and that the ROWD was complete, pending staff review of the documents submitted. Upon review of the submittals, however, staff found that inconsistencies were contained in the data submitted by PALCO regarding harvest history. This was not a new issue, but one raised previously to PALCO by Board staff, as they worked to help PALCO complete their submittals. Staff specifically pointed out that the data was inconsistent and if used as presented would result in inaccurate and misleading scientific conclusions regarding water quality. Staff asked PALCO to have their licensed staff review the submittals, resolve the discrepancies and submit the final, accurate, complete data under the stamp of appropriately licensed professionals. The data were re-submitted, under stamp, but contain the same problems previously identified. Staff cannot use the data provided to develop the WWWDRs. Staff is working with PALCO and is beginning to make progress in resolving this longstanding problem, and the effort continues.
In summary, PALCO failed to submit the required documents in time to obtain uninterrupted permit coverage into 2005. PALCO has therefore placed itself in the position of not having permit coverage to conduct THP operations in Elk and Freshwater beginning January 1, 2005.
The ROWD remains incomplete at this time.
IV. Current Options
The Board’s simplified options are to:
A. Proceed on current path of WDR development, without granting additional
“interim coverage” for this discharger.
Proceed in processing the permit applications consistent with other permit applications, drafting the WDRs whenever the applications are complete, circulating the necessary CEQA documents thereon, and considering the WDRs at the next available Board meeting.
Given the possibility of a lack of a quorum to take action after November 29, 2004, however, it is unknown when the “next available Board meeting” would occur. Alternatively, the Board could ask the State Water Resources Control Board to take this matter up and issue the permits at the State level while the Regional Board lacks a quorum.
B. Accommodate PALCO’s request to enroll all of its 2005 THPs in the General Timber WDRs for “interim” coverage.
Option B is to do as PALCO requests and enroll all of its specified 2005 THPs in the General Timber WDRs for “interim” coverage. This presents two issues of concern to the EO.
The first issue of concern is finding a basis for enrolling the 2005 THPs in the General WDRs, given the extensive record to date regarding cumulative impacts of activities in these watersheds, and more specifically in light of provisions V.A.4, V.A.5 and V.A.7 in the General WDRs.
In provision V.A. the Board ordered that the EO shall deny or rescind coverage to any THP that the EO finds, among other things, any of the following:
4. Where conditions unique to the watershed (including, but not limited to,
cumulative impacts, large acreage ownership holdings or management plans,
affected domestic water supplies, or an increased risk of flooding) warrant
further regulation.
5. Where past land use activities unique to the watershed resulted the discharge of human generated sediment in amounts which warrant further regulation.
7. The project is the subject of an unresolved non-concurrence filed by the Regional Board with CDF.
Provisions V.A.4 and V.A.5 are problematic especially when viewed in light of the record regarding cumulative impacts, documented incidences of increased flooding, and the Board’s findings in December of last year regarding the need for further regulation (thus staff’s ongoing efforts to establish WWWDRs).
Additionally, Provision V.A.7 presents problems because, based on the factors cited in V.A.4 and 5, among other things, there are currently unresolved non-concurrences on the majority of the THPs PALCO has proposed for enrollment in the general WDRs.
C. Proceed on current path of WDR development while enrolling some portion of the 2005 THPs in the General Timber WDRs.
If the Board is inclined to allow harvesting prior to the issuance of WWWDRs, but wishes to keep the WWWDRs on track, the Board could consider a compromise option.
This compromise option should be viewed in light of the Board’s previous decision in December of 2003 to allow a full year of THPs to proceed in 2004 while the WWWDRs were being developed. Any additional THPs for 2005 would be on top of that previous compromise and in light of PALCO’s refusal to provide the information requested on June 17th.
The Board could direct the EO to consider a limited number of THPs for enrollment in the general WDRs, if and to the extent that she can establish a record and basis for finding eligibility. Developing such a record would require some staff time and effort, and must be consistent with record and the General Timber WDR provisions described above in Option B.
To ensure that the WWWDRs are not subject to continued delays in development, the Board could direct the EO to develop a record and a basis for granting limited coverage to a sub-set of the proposed THPs, but only after PALCO’s ROWD is complete, the inaccuracies and inconsistencies in the data provided to date are resolved, and only after the draft WWWDRs are out for public review. This would allow staff to finish developing the WWWDRs without further preventable delays.
PRELIMINARY STAFF
RECOMMENDATION:
Staff recommends Option A or C above. Staff does not recommend Option B.
We are 100% volunteer and depend on your participation to sustain our efforts!
Donate
$110.00 donated
in the past month
Get Involved
If you'd like to help with maintaining or developing the website, contact us.
Publish
Publish your stories and upcoming events on Indybay.
Topics
More
Search Indybay's Archives
Advanced Search
►
▼
IMC Network