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CSPA Action Alert: Clean Farms - Clean Water Campaign
The California Sportfishing Protection Alliance (CSPA) needs your help, according to Bill Jennings, CSPA executive director/chairman.
"Restoration of the Central Valley's degraded fisheries depends upon better flows, habitat and water quality," said Jennings. "And, the blunt fact is that water quality won't improve until we control the largest source of pollution to Valley waterways: discharges from irrigated agriculture."
Under enormous political pressure, the Regional Water Quality Control Board exempted farm runoff from reasonable pollution control requirements routinely demanded from everyone else, from municipalities to industry to mom-and-pop businesses. Until this exemption ends, fish will continue to live and reproduce in a toxic soup.
"The Regional Board is adopting new long-term regulations for irrigated agriculture. CSPA has launched a campaign to persuade them to meaningfully control farm pollution," noted Jennings.
I join Jennings in urging you to join the Clean Farms - Clean Water Campaign. We need your voice, presence and donations to help protect fisheries and clean up our degraded Central Valley waterways!
Photo: An alarming report released by then UC Davis Professor David Ostrach in 2008 documented the maternal transfer of pollutants to striped bass fry in Central Valley rivers and the California Delta, resulting in stunted and deformed fry. The top fish is a normal striped bass larva from a hatchery mother. The bottom fish is an abnormal striped bass larva from a river mother. The green arrows indicate areas of abnormal fluid accumulation, yellow areas indicate blistering and dead tissue, and red arrow indicates skeletal abnormality/curvature of the spinal cord. Photo courtesy of David Ostrach.
"Restoration of the Central Valley's degraded fisheries depends upon better flows, habitat and water quality," said Jennings. "And, the blunt fact is that water quality won't improve until we control the largest source of pollution to Valley waterways: discharges from irrigated agriculture."
Under enormous political pressure, the Regional Water Quality Control Board exempted farm runoff from reasonable pollution control requirements routinely demanded from everyone else, from municipalities to industry to mom-and-pop businesses. Until this exemption ends, fish will continue to live and reproduce in a toxic soup.
"The Regional Board is adopting new long-term regulations for irrigated agriculture. CSPA has launched a campaign to persuade them to meaningfully control farm pollution," noted Jennings.
I join Jennings in urging you to join the Clean Farms - Clean Water Campaign. We need your voice, presence and donations to help protect fisheries and clean up our degraded Central Valley waterways!
Photo: An alarming report released by then UC Davis Professor David Ostrach in 2008 documented the maternal transfer of pollutants to striped bass fry in Central Valley rivers and the California Delta, resulting in stunted and deformed fry. The top fish is a normal striped bass larva from a hatchery mother. The bottom fish is an abnormal striped bass larva from a river mother. The green arrows indicate areas of abnormal fluid accumulation, yellow areas indicate blistering and dead tissue, and red arrow indicates skeletal abnormality/curvature of the spinal cord. Photo courtesy of David Ostrach.
CSPA Needs Your Help to Improve Fisheries and Water Quality
The existing regulatory waiver covering discharges from irrigated lands expires in June 2011, and the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board will consider a new long-term program at a hearing on April 7.
The Clean Farms - Clean Water campaign is attempting to gather together fishermen, environmentalists, farmworkers, Tribal members, environmental justice communities and others who support abundant fisheries and clean water to urge the Regional Board to establish an effective program that will ensure that pollutant discharges from irrigated agriculture are reduced and minimized.
Runoff from irrigated agriculture is identified as the largest source of pollution to Central Valley waterways and the Delta. Monitoring downstream of agricultural areas reveals that virtually all sites exceed water quality standards and almost two thirds are toxic to aquatic life. Pollution is identified as one of the principle causes of the collapse of Central Valley fisheries.
Agricultural pollution also threatens drinking water supplies and public health and is a major source of groundwater impairment. Inexplicably, irrigated agriculture remains exempt from routine requirements to protect water quality that have long been applicable to virtually every other segment of society.
The Regional Board is proposing a Framework, which will be followed-up over the next year with specific orders. Unfortunately, they propose to continue the same basic approach to regulating agriculture that has proved to be a dismal failure: i.e., ceding implementation of the program to industry advocacy groups.
Under this scheme, the Board doesn't know who is discharging, what pollutants are being discharged, the localized impacts to receiving waters and whether dischargers are implementing measures to reduce or eliminate pollution or if those measures are working. Consequently, the Board cannot identify any improvement in water quality or any effort to stop pollution.
More information, including CSPA's formal comments on the proposed Framework and PEIR can be found at the Clean Farms - Clean Water button at http://calsport.org.
Continue Reading
We ask that you do three things:
1. Circulate this information to other interested individuals and organizations.
2. Submit comments to the Regional Board urging them to reject the proposed Irrigated Lands Regulatory Program Framework.
Comments on the recommended ILRP Framework can be sent electronically to Adam Laputz (AWLaputz [at] waterboards.ca.gov) or mailed to the Regional Water Quality Control Board, Central Valley Region, 11020 Sun Center Drive, #200, Rancho Cordova, CA 95670; ATTN: Adam Laputz. Phone: (916) 464-4848; Fax: (916) 464-4645
3. Plan to attend the public hearing.
Date: 7 April 2011
Time: 8:30 AM
Place: Central Valley Water Board office
11020 Sun Center Drive, Suite 200
Rancho Cordova, CA 95670
The Regional Board will hold 3 sequential hearings on the following:
· The Proposed Framework
· Adoption of the PEIR
· Continuation for the Ag Waiver for 3 Years
It is important that the Regional Board understand that agribusiness special interests do not represent the entire Central Valley community. Make your voice heard!
The existing regulatory waiver covering discharges from irrigated lands expires in June 2011, and the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board will consider a new long-term program at a hearing on April 7.
The Clean Farms - Clean Water campaign is attempting to gather together fishermen, environmentalists, farmworkers, Tribal members, environmental justice communities and others who support abundant fisheries and clean water to urge the Regional Board to establish an effective program that will ensure that pollutant discharges from irrigated agriculture are reduced and minimized.
Runoff from irrigated agriculture is identified as the largest source of pollution to Central Valley waterways and the Delta. Monitoring downstream of agricultural areas reveals that virtually all sites exceed water quality standards and almost two thirds are toxic to aquatic life. Pollution is identified as one of the principle causes of the collapse of Central Valley fisheries.
Agricultural pollution also threatens drinking water supplies and public health and is a major source of groundwater impairment. Inexplicably, irrigated agriculture remains exempt from routine requirements to protect water quality that have long been applicable to virtually every other segment of society.
The Regional Board is proposing a Framework, which will be followed-up over the next year with specific orders. Unfortunately, they propose to continue the same basic approach to regulating agriculture that has proved to be a dismal failure: i.e., ceding implementation of the program to industry advocacy groups.
Under this scheme, the Board doesn't know who is discharging, what pollutants are being discharged, the localized impacts to receiving waters and whether dischargers are implementing measures to reduce or eliminate pollution or if those measures are working. Consequently, the Board cannot identify any improvement in water quality or any effort to stop pollution.
More information, including CSPA's formal comments on the proposed Framework and PEIR can be found at the Clean Farms - Clean Water button at http://calsport.org.
Continue Reading
We ask that you do three things:
1. Circulate this information to other interested individuals and organizations.
2. Submit comments to the Regional Board urging them to reject the proposed Irrigated Lands Regulatory Program Framework.
Comments on the recommended ILRP Framework can be sent electronically to Adam Laputz (AWLaputz [at] waterboards.ca.gov) or mailed to the Regional Water Quality Control Board, Central Valley Region, 11020 Sun Center Drive, #200, Rancho Cordova, CA 95670; ATTN: Adam Laputz. Phone: (916) 464-4848; Fax: (916) 464-4645
3. Plan to attend the public hearing.
Date: 7 April 2011
Time: 8:30 AM
Place: Central Valley Water Board office
11020 Sun Center Drive, Suite 200
Rancho Cordova, CA 95670
The Regional Board will hold 3 sequential hearings on the following:
· The Proposed Framework
· Adoption of the PEIR
· Continuation for the Ag Waiver for 3 Years
It is important that the Regional Board understand that agribusiness special interests do not represent the entire Central Valley community. Make your voice heard!
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Re: CSPA Action Alert
Wed, Mar 23, 2011 10:24AM
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