go back home CLICK "REFRESH" TO ENSURE VIEWING THE MOST RECENT INFO.
I actually went fishing in Alameda Creek today and got skunked and then received the following email. The Sunol Wilderness Area has a beautiful portion of the creek, but the places I saw were only a few inches deep. If more water could flow to it, I'm sure it would be a great place for fishing. Jay Capachi 6/22/5
6/23/5 Went back and caught some trout in Alameda Creek. All released.. Here's a picture. I don't intend to catch anymore until they are coming back in numbers after the creek restoration.
To the Alameda Creek Alliance e-mail list:
1) Two recent articles on Alameda
Creek
Livermore Independent - June 15,
2005
http://www.independentnews.com/
Groups Ask SFPUC
To Modify Approach On Creek
Sixty-eight environmental groups, including a few in the
Valley, are calling on San Francisco to make changes to its plan for rebuilding
its water supply system in the Sunol Valley. They say the changes are needed so
that steelhead trout and other aquatic life will prosper.
The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) is
planning a $3.4 billion upgrade of its water facilities, including those in
Sunol.
The Alameda Creek Alliance (ACA) is the lead organization
among the 68 groups calling for the changes. Local groups in the coalition are
Friends of the Arroyos, Friends of Sycamore Grove Park, Save Our Sunol and Stop
the Dump in Sunol.
The coalition calls for three things.
It wants San Francisco to remove the uppermost dam on the
creek, known as the Alameda Creek Diversion Dam (ACDD). The dam diverts up to
seven-eighths of the stream water into Calaveras and San Antonio reservoirs,
said Jeff Miller, spokesman for ACA. That water is needed to provide better
upstream habitat for the fish and other wildlife, said Miller.
The environmentalists also want SFPUC to refrain from
building a $17 million project that would install a two-foot rubber inflatable
dam in the Sunol Valley portion of Alameda Creek. The dam would catch water and
store it for use in the San Francisco water system. The coalition says that the
rubber dam would adversely affect stream levels at certain times of the year
that are critical to some fish species.
The group also calls on San Francisco to have an interim
plan in place about stream flow before work is undertaken on rebuilding
Calaveras Dam.
Michael Carlin, assistant general manager for water for
the SFPUC, spoke to the Independent about all three requests. He emphasized that
the SFPUC has the same goal as the environmentalists, namely the best habitat
for steelhead and other species.
The SFPUC is willing to eliminate the diversion dam, said
Carlin. However, the desirability of taking out the dam should be evaluated
scientifically, he said. Keeping the dam in place might provide San Francisco
more flexibility in managing the stream
waters.
“It’s important that we have flexibility in meeting the
challenge. We can ladder the stream, screen it, have pulse flows, do things that
supply the balance we’d like to see. But we can’t do it, if there is no
diversion dam,” he said.
As to the request to eliminate the rubber-dam
construction project, Carlin said that the dam will help capture more water for
San Francisco’s water system. Not installing it would not have any big impact on
the stream, since the water doesn’t go to the bay, but percolates into the
underground water table in Niles Canyon, said Carlin.
Further, it’s important to have a variety of habitat, to
meet needs of both warm-water and cold-water fish. The stream can’t be managed
for the benefit of just one species, said Carlin. There has to be a balancing
act, he said.
The steelhead trout have been proposed for listing in
this section of California. However, the whole listing has been put on hold,
said Carlin. More is expected to be known in August. SFPUC will deal with the
steelhead regulations when they come out, just as Zone 7 Water Agency, Alameda
County Water District, and other agencies that deal with streams, said
Carlin.
In calling for having an interim plan in place before
work starts on Calaveras Dam construction, Miller said that SFPUC hasn’t lived
up to its agreement signed in 1997 with state fish and game about providing more
water for steelhead. Something should be done now, he said. The SFPUC shouldn’t
wait until the rebuilding of Calaveras Dam is completed in 2011.
Carlin said it’s true SFPUC hasn’t lived up to the
agreement. He said that the Calaveras Dam was red-tagged as a danger in an
earthquake, so only about one-third of its water capacity can be held in the
dam, said Carlin. “If we do a release, we would harm the fish in the reservoir,”
said Carlin.
SFPUC is definitely working on an interim plan for
Calaveras Dam reconstruction. In an update since the environmentalists sent out
their press release, Carlin said Tuesday that the ACA and affected water
agencies met last Friday as part of the process to create that interim
plan.
Further, SFPUC stays in touch with state Fish & Game
and the federal fisheries agency about stream management, added
Carlin.
Contra Costa Times - June 22,
2005
http://www.independentnews.com/
Activist
coalition in Sunol seeks time to plan future
Members of four activist groups will join forces in
seeking a moratorium in Sunol on everything from quarries to compost facilities
while they put together a proposed plan outlining a different vision for the
Sunol Valley.
"We hope to figure out some sort of plan to protect and
preserve the quality of life in our valley," said Pat Stillman of Save Our
Sunol.
"Sunol Valley is a beautiful, historic little valley, and
we think it's totally unfair that everything should be dumped on us. We want a
little reprieve on some of these
things."
Save Our Sunol for 15 years has been fighting plans for a
quarry near town on land owned by the San Francisco Water Department. With its
legal options dwindling, the group met Monday night with three other groups in
an effort to bring a more unified voice to concerns facing
Sunol.
One group, the Alameda Creek Alliance, among other things
has been fighting plans for another quarry, on privately owned Apperson Ridge
land southeast of Sunol.
Another group, called Stop the Dump in Sunol, has been
fighting the Alameda County Waste Management Authority's proposed compost
facility on Andrade Road property that would be leased or purchased from San
Francisco. The fourth group is the Tri-Valley's Preserve Area Ridgelands
Committee.
At Monday's meeting, attended by about 60 people, the new
coalition decided to ask Alameda County and San Francisco to hold off for now on
quarries and compost facilities.
"We'll put together a resolution asking them for a
cease-fire, to not move forward on any of these industrial projects until our
(proposed) specific plan for Sunol is prepared," said Jeff Miller of the creek
alliance. "Sunol residents are as tired as we are in fighting every little
project that comes along and wants to get Alameda County and San Francisco to do
some long-term planning."
In 2003, Save Our Sunol's lawsuit against planned
expansion of Mission Valley Rock Co.'s quarry to the northwest side of
Interstate 680 was denied, and earlier this year the state Supreme Court
declined to review the case. The quarry was recently bought by Hanson
Aggregates.
Stillman and Miller said there may be remaining legal
avenues to pursue and believe the separate Apperson Ridge quarry lacks all
necessary permits. What's more, they said they hope joining forces will give
them stronger political clout.
Alameda County Supervisor Gail Steele, who represents the
populated portion of Sunol, said she supports a moratorium but is unsure if it
will fly politically.
"I think it's a practical solution, but think it's uphill
all the way," Steele said.
Supervisor Scott Haggerty, who represents
the undeveloped parts of Sunol, was unavailable Tuesday for
comment.
2) Save Coyote Hills, at the mouth of
Alameda Creek
Help stop the proposed Patterson Ranch
development, a high density 1,300-1,500 home development on the open space
bordering Coyote Hills Regional Park. Visit the Friends of Coyote Hills
and Fremont web site at www.fchf.org to send a letter or sign their
petition. Click on What you can do at the bottom of the
homepage.
3)
Estuary Imperiled by the South Delta
“Improvement” Project
California Sportfishing Protection Alliance
Action
Advisory:
The Bay-Delta Estuary that once sustained multiple runs
of salmon and abundant runs striped bass, American shad, sturgeon and steelhead,
is on the verge of collapse. According to agency scientists, the estuary’s
productivity is so low that it may be signaling the collapse of the ecosystem.
Delta populations of key plankton and tiny shrimp that fuel the foodweb and
drive the system’s ecology have virtually disappeared, as have some of estuary’s
important species of fish including Delta smelt, longfin smelt, shad and
young-of-the-year striped bass.
While fishery agencies have reacted with an increased
effort to further study the reasons for this declining productivity, the state
Department of Water Resources (DWR) has decided to move forward with their
“South Delta Improvement Project” (SDIP) that would increase water exports out
of the Delta by up to 25%! The SDIP draft Environmental Impact Report will be
circulated for public review this
month.
The decision to move the SDIP forward in the face of a
collapsing estuary can only make the estuary’s problems worse and do irreparable
harm to its fishery resources. Our organization has been working to
restore the estuary for twenty years, so its declining productivity is not new.
Declines in salmon, steelhead and striper bass have become common place as has
that of the foodweb. The decline in productivity has been clearly linked to the
impacts that result from exporting huge amounts of water out of the Delta. What
is new is the near total collapse in ecosystem productivity.
The SDIP may well be the straw that breaks the estuary’s
back. If the foodweb is lost it will result in the estuary’s fisheries not being
able to find food where and when they need it for survival. The foodweb is
irreplaceable! Scientists have long maintained that water export affects the
productivity of the estuary by changing the once natural flow regime and the
amount of water that used to flow through it into the San Francisco Bay. Instead
of the high spring runoff through the entire estuary, the water projects have
greatly reduced these flows and the timing of when that water would normally be
available to the estuary. The dramatic changes in this natural flow pattern and
its timing is at the very hart of the
problem.
State and federal water project facilities in the Delta
export, on average, some 60% of the fresh water that flows into the system.
Their storage of what was once natural runoff behind dams on nearly every
tributary to the Delta has significantly reduced the spring flows which the
phytoplankton and zooplankton had adapted to over millennia. The projects have
increased Delta exports primarily in the late spring and summer to meet the
needs of Central Valley agricultural interests.
While we understand that other factors such as toxic
pesticides and unintentionally introduced non-native species may be involved in
this collapse, this is not the time to be increasing exports! In order for the
waters of the estuary to produce food, the water must stay in the system
long enough to do so. When 60% of the estuary’s fresh water is exported
annually, that leaves only 40% of the water to do what 100% used to do.
Increasing exports beyond the current level can only make the situation
worse.
If we are to completely understand and address the
reasons for the collapse, increasing exports must be stopped until the solutions
are found and our fisheries are recovered. CSPA is urging a cease fire on
additional exports until the ecology of the estuary and the recovery of its
fishery resources is achieved.
Given the push to export more water by water contractors,
the best way to stop the SDIP is to contact Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger. We urge you to ask
the Governor to stop the SDIP and any additional Delta export projects until the
ecology and fisheries of the estuary are restored.
You can email the Governor by going to http://www.govmail.ca.gov where you can fill out the email form and send it to the
Governor’s office. Or you can send a letter or card to him at:
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
State Capitol
Building
Sacramento, CA 95814
You can also call or fax his office:
Phone:
916-445-2841
Fax: 916-445-4633
The
message is simple, stop the SDIP and any additional water export out of Delta
until our estuary and fisheries are restored.
Here are two recent editorials in the Sacramento Bee and
L. A. Times about the proposed increased Bay Delta Estuary pumping, focusing on
the collapse of Calfed and the Delta fisheries crash. The editorials point
out that the State should focus on these problems rather than on increasing
pumping from the degraded Bay Delta Estuary.
Sacramento Bee Editorial – June 14,
2005
http://www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/story/13062712p-13908333c.html
Top staff leaving CalFed water program -
why?
As the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta faces perhaps its
greatest environmental problems in modern history, two of the most important
leaders needed to help solve the problem have suddenly left. CalFed, the grand
state and federal effort to coordinate the work of more than 14 agencies and to
forge a consensus among the many conflicting water interests, is without a
permanent executive director or science director. Patrick Wright, CalFed's
former leader, has taken a job with the state resources agency. Lead scientist
Johnnie Moore, meanwhile, has announced his departure as well.
CalFed
these days has few (if any) staunch defenders among water districts, farmers and
environmentalists. But this isn't a popularity contest. Back when the official
CalFed water strategy was unveiled in 2000, there was widespread support largely
because of expectations that CalFed was the key to billions in funds from the
state and federal governments. CalFed, an authority run by an array of state and
federal officials, legislators and appointees, was to mull how best to spend the
money on behalf of every interest - ecosystem restoration, reservoirs, Delta
levee maintenance, groundwater management programs, you name it.
Because
both the state and federal budgets have gone deep into deficits since 2000,
however, CalFed has brought a message that a different financial strategy, one
based more on self-funding, is necessary. When the news isn't welcome, everyone
knows what can happen to messengers.
Meanwhile, the Delta suddenly has
some of the lowest overall populations of smelt, shad and other native fish ever
recorded. That's unwelcome news. So is the notion that scientists such as Moore
don't know precisely why this is happening. Or that they may not have nearly the
research money to get to the bottom of it. No wonder he's leaving.
As
the Delta ecosystem is crashing, Southern California and San Joaquin farming
interests are hoping to boost supplies by increasing the maximum rate of pumping
from the Delta into the state's aqueduct. Too much political energy is going
into this fight. For CalFed and all of California water policy, this is a moment
to step back, regroup and get the house in order, starting with the family
budget. This house desperately needs some parents - and participants from all
interests with realistic expectations and a sincere desire to find common
ground.
L. A. Times EDITORIAL - June 15, 2005
Having enough water has been a California obsession for
nearly a century, pushing the state to build dams, reservoirs and canal systems.
Massive quantities of water were shifted from one part of the state to another —
primarily from north to south.
But you can't keep building dams forever;
eventually you run out of good places to put them, which happened some time ago
in California. Built-from-scratch reservoirs that can hold surplus water in wet
years for use during dry years are costly and hard to site.
The state's
chief water agency is now looking elsewhere for answers, and happily predicts
that it can provide for the future with less dependence on new reservoirs,
canals and dams.
The proposed California Water Plan, the subject of
extensive hearings throughout the state, calls for renewed emphasis on urban and
farm conservation, more storage in groundwater basins, recycling of urban water
and desalination of runoff from farms (which is a lot easier than desalinating
saltier seawater).
The plan sees a fundamental shift away from grand
statewide plans toward more efficient regional management of water supplies,
more water trading and restoration of depleted groundwater basins.
That
doesn't mean coasting along with the state's current supply and usage. The plan
notes, "By wringing every bit of utility from every drop of water, Californians
can stretch water supplies and help ensure continued economic, social and
environmental health." Translation: It's not cheap, and it won't come without
sacrifice.
The plan emphasizes maintenance of the aging water delivery
system, including the canals and pumps of the State Water Project and the
federal Central Valley Project, both of which pump supplies from the
Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to cities and farms to the south. This includes
strengthening hundreds of miles of aging earthen levees that corral the delta
water and prevent it from spreading across miles of farmland. A massive delta
levee collapse, possibly from an earthquake, could cut off a major source of
Southern California's water supply.
The newfound ability to stretch
existing supplies stems in part from sophisticated farm water systems, such as
drip irrigation, that reduce loss through evaporation and runoff. Some farm
regions also are lining dirt canals to cut seepage. Other savings come from
underground storage, which also prevents evaporation loss. In the San Joaquin
Valley, suburban sprawl is converting crops to housing tracts that consume far
less water.
Water district managers are still seeking more surface
reservoirs, but the emphasis now is on making sure that the beneficiaries,
whether urban districts or farm regions, pay the cost.
A proposal to
increase the capacity of delta pumps by about 25% so more water can be exported
to the south remains part of a "delta improvements package." But there has been
a sudden plunge in fish life in the delta, possibly linked to heavy pumping over
the last three years. Pumping should not be expanded until more is known about
the reasons for this crisis.
It would be too much to expect a
problem-free future when it comes to water in this thirsty state. But for a
change, most of the news is
encouraging.
********************
If you would like to be removed from this
list, please notify me by return
e-mail.
The Alameda Creek Alliance is a non-profit
watershed restoration group. Please support our efforts by becoming a
member.
Jeff Miller,
Director
Alameda
Creek
(510)
845-2233
http://www.alamedacreek.org
“Protecting and restoring the natural ecosystems of the Alameda Creek watershed”