Klamath Irrigation District July 22, 2022 UPDATE:  https://myemail.constantcontact.com/22-July-2022-Update-from-Klamath-Irrigation-District.html?soid=1137800206451&aid=aUivAuN6Q5I
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USFWS irrationally withholds from Klamath Irrigators 3-Feet of their stored water
Klamath Lake Water Supply Update, KID July 22, 2022 Update:
   "In March and April of 2022, the districts communicated with Reclamation staff proposals to manage Upper Klamath Lake to the 2019 Biological Opinion level for C'waam and Kaptu habitat recognizing the need to protect these species and to not take the lake to our stored water right of 4,136.0 (Reclamation datum)
   USFWS previously communicated the biological need for the C'waam and Kaptu as an elevation of 4,137.7' (Reclamation datum) allowing the endangered fish to have over 3 feet of water above a natural reef into Pelican Bay. Reclamation then updated this elevation with simply hydrology model outputs, without a biological foundation to maintain lake elevations in excess of 4,138.00' in 2019.

Outflows to Upper Klamath Lake over 100 percent of average --- Inflows around 25percent of average, KID Update 7/22/22. "...a great deal of water is being unnecessarily and unnaturally evacuated from the Klamath Basin into the Klamath River canyon below Keno..."

9th Circuit rejects arguments against farming in Klamath wildlife refuges, Capital Press 7/19/22. "A unanimous panel of three 9th Circuit judges has now upheld that decision, ruling that the Fish and Wildlife Service’s plan complies with all the laws governing the 200,000-acre refuge complex... The 9th Circuit has disagreed with that argument, ruling that the Fish and Wildlife Service’s plan struck the appropriate balance between agriculture and wildfowl management as required by refuge management statutes...FWS adequately explained that some amount of pesticide use was necessary on the Refuges to ensure sufficient crop production, on which Refuge waterfowl now depend..."

Rogue Wolf Pack kills more cattle near Fort Klamath, H&N 7/19/22. For more on Klamath Basin wolves killing livestock: www.klamathbasincrisis.org/wolvestoc.htm

Letter from FERC to US Congressmen Bentz and LaMalfa regarding Klamath hydroelectric dam destruction, FOLLOWED BY: letter from Congressmen Bentz and LaMalfa to FERC 7/14/22. "...I take very seriously our obligation to ensure that any action the Commission takes is in the public interest..."

Ag stakeholders reject White House draft reports on (Columbia/Snake) dam breaching, Capital Press 7/13/22. "...Only Congress has the authority to order the dams to be removed," said Sean Ellis, a spokesman for the Idaho Farm Bureau. "The president can have his own opinion on the matter, but Congress will be the one deciding..." KBC NOTE: In the case of Klamath River hydroelectric dams, Congress did not support dam destruction because the Klamath and Siskiyou counties overwhelmingly rejected the idea, so the states of California and Oregon bypassed our Congressional representatives and promised taxpayer money to support dam destruction, defying the will of the constituents. Their goal is hoped-for benefits to salmon and environment despite the economic and environmental devastation caused by 20 million cubic yards of sediment behind the dams decimating any fish or habitat.

Klamath Drainage District Press Release: Reclamation files surprise complaint against KDD, District disappointed in government's conduct July 11. 2022. "Scott White, General Manager for the district notes that this is not a contract issue at all and points to the district’s existing water rights of record. 'The Bureau has literally acknowledged and affirmed KDD’s water rights in the past and encouraged us to exercise them when there is no Project Supply available,' said White. 'It’s incredible that they claim we are in breach of contract for doing the very thing they asked of us for years.' '...The district is also bound by contract to deliver water to water users outside of the district, but the complaint makes no mention of the district currently facilitating the conveyance of water to the refuge under state law. 'The Bureau is out of its lane in picking and choosing which law to recognize,' states Bill Walker, President of the district. 'The Bureau supports state law when it means getting water to their land but does not when it means getting water to family farmers and ranchers...'"
UNITED STATES of America VS Klamath Drainage District, COMPLAINT with Department of Justice attorneys against the small Klamath Drainage District 7/5/22.

OSU, Yurok Tribe partner to study Klamath River after dam removal, Capital Press 7/9/2022. "the project was recently awarded $870,000 from Oregon Sea Grant to conduct the research, including outreach among five key stakeholder groups — tribes, irrigators, commercial fishing, recreation and conservation organizations."

Managing Water,  Reclamation Commissioner Camille Touton visits Klamath Basin, Capital Press 7/5/22. "...Asked whether she sees the Klamath Project as sustainable with its current model and scale, Touton said, “I don’t want to speculate on that...”

< Headgates of A Canal at Klamath Irrigation District
Irrigators, tribes object to extending Klamath Project interim operations plan, Capital Press 6/30/22.FOLLOWED BY full letter from Klamath Water Users Association to BOR "In a letter sent June 17 to Ernest Conant, Reclamation’s regional director, the Klamath Water Users Association outlined deficiencies in the interim operations plan, claiming “it is based on erroneous data, flawed hydrologic assumptions and a proposed action that does not comport with current operations...The three years of attempted operation under the (plan) has been a period of chaotic, ad hoc decision-making,” the letter states. “KWUA has, for well over a year, emphasized the lack of any coherent regulatory construct for the IOP. That point is further underscored by the fact that the IOP has required Reclamation to do things that literally are impossible.”

< Lucky Ackley. Costs spike, fields go fallow in Klamath, CFBF AgAlert, 6/22/22. " 'That (Upper Klamath) Lake did not exist other than wet years before they built the Link River Dam," he said. "It was built to store water for dry years to irrigate and farm with, and now it's totally being misused, mismanaged, and all the water is getting flushed down the river for salmon or being held in the lake at unhistoric levels for suckerfish.' He said many beef producers have had to sell their cattle at a loss because they can't feed them. If Ackley were eventually forced to sell off his herd, he said, he would lose about 80 years of genetic selection for the best cattle for this rangeland. 'You can't just go buy that back,' he said."

Letter from Congressman Doug LaMalfa and Congressman Cliff Bentz regarding Klamath hydroelectric dam destruction: unknown and undisclosed local, state and federal and ratepayer costs and liabilities, legal authority, Keno Dam authority and plans, additional burdens for agriculture  ... , letter to FERC, PacifiCorp, KRRC, Oregon governor Kate Brown, California governor Gavin Newsom, Secretary of Interior Deb Haaland, June 16, 2022.

Farm groups troubled by court's bumblebee ruling (bumble bee is a fish), CFBF Ag Alert 6/10/22. "The move triggered full protection for the bumblebees under state law, which prohibits actions that would kill, or "take," candidate species without a permit or other authorization."

Dams are critical for reliable energy grid in Pacific Northwest, Capital Press commentary by Rep. DAN NEWHOUSE 6/9/22.