BLM Recommends Wild & Scenic River Protection For The San Joaquin River Gorge!
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is recommending protection of the magnificent San Joaquin River Gorge as a National Wild & Scenic River. The agency’s recommendation is in the Bakersfield BLM Draft Resource Management Plan (DRMP), which is providing management direction for more than 408,000 acres of public land in central California. The Wild & Scenic recommendation for the San Joaquin River Gorge is gutsy given that it defies the intent of several members of Congress and other government agencies to build the proposed Temperance Flat Dam, which would flood the Gorge and destroy its outstanding attributes.
Dam proponents will be mobilizing to oppose the agency’s recommendation for Wild & Scenic protection and its many other conservation-oriented proposals – including protecting all Wilderness Study Areas and other lands with wilderness qualities. Conservationists need to speak out in favor of protecting the Gorge and other sensitive areas in written comments to the BLM. The deadline for public comments in Dec. 9, 2011.
Background
The Bakersfield BLM DRMP not only recommends protection for the San Joaquin River Gorge, it also recommends protection for a segment of the North Fork Kaweah River and identifies several other streams as eligible for protection. Federal law requires the BLM to identify, study, and recommend rivers for potential Wild & Scenic status as part of its planning process. The DRMP also determines the future of more than 39,000 acres of Wilderness Study Areas and other lands with wilderness qualities.
The San Joaquin River Gorge is located upstream of the existing Friant Dam and Millerton Reservoir in the Sierra Nevada foothills northeast of Fresno. The BLM manages about 4,000 acres of public land in and surrounding the Gorge for public recreation, open space, and wildlife habitat. A network of trails in the Gorge provide opportunities to hike, mountain bike, ride horses, view wildflowers, hunt, fish, and camp in some of the most spectacular scenery in the central Sierra foothills. The Gorge is also rich in Native American cultural values.
In the Bakersfield DRMP, the BLM found 5.4 miles of the San Joaquin River Gorge between PG&E’s Kerkhoff Dam and Kerkhoff Powerhouse to be eligible and suitable for Wild & Scenic protection because of the river’s outstandingly remarkable scenic, wildlife, and Native American cultural values. Another five miles of the river downstream of Kerkhoff Powerhouse was also found eligible, but BLM was unable to recommend protection for this lower segment because the Bureau of Reclamation has a legal claim on this segment to allow for possible enlargement of Millerton Reservoir (as an alternative to building Temperance Flat).
The BLM’s Wild & Scenic recommendation for the San Joaquin River Gorge directly defies the intent of several members of Congress from the southern Central Valley and the Bureau of Reclamation to build the Temperance Flat Dam, which in its largest configuration could flood the Gorge all the way up to Kerkhoff Dam. Ironically, the proposed Temperance Flat would not contribute significantly to the state’s water supply since existing storage reservoirs already capture about 98% of the San Joaquin’s annual run-off. Based on 80 years of flow records, the Temperance Flat Dam would only store some water one year out of three. But this hasn’t stopped dam proponents, who hope to convince the taxpayers to pay for this outrageously expensive $3 billion dam.
Whether a river should remain free flowing and undammed is exactly the question the National Wild & Scenic Rivers Act was intended to answer. When it approved the nation’s foremost river conservation law in 1968, Congress explicitly stated its intent of balancing the nation’s existing policy of developing many rivers for their water supply and hydropower potential by adopting a new policy stating that some free flowing rivers with outstanding natural and cultural values should remain undammed and free flowing. In addition to prohibiting dams, the federal lands through which Wild & Scenic Rivers flow are to be managed specifically to protect the free flowing character of the river and its outstanding values.
In addition to recommending protection for the San Joaquin River Gorge, the BLM proposes to protect 2.5 miles of the North Fork Kaweah, as it flows out of Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Park into BLM lands. Unfortunately, the BLM is not recommending protection for eligible segments of the East and Middle Forks of the Kaweah River, even though the National Park Service proposes Wild & Scenic status for upstream segments. Similarly, the BLM is not recommending a 3.2-mile segment of the lower Kern River below Isabella Dam, even though the Forest Service considers another 26 miles of the river on downstream National Forest lands to be eligible. In addition, the draft RMP does not recommend protection for segments of Chimney Creek, South Fork Kern River and the Salinas River.
The Bakersfield RMP considers five different alternatives to manage public lands. Conservationists should support a modified Alternative C, which emphasizes conserving natural and cultural resources, and restoring and maintaining functioning natural ecosystems. In addition to protecting all 31 miles of eligible streams as Wild & Scenic, Alternative C fully protects all 21,140 acres of existing Wilderness Study Areas as well as 17,890 acres of additional land with wilderness characteristics, and more than 108,000 acres as Areas of Critical Environmental Concern. Alternative C also closes to grazing riparian corridors in the San Joaquin River Gorge, along the North Fork Kaweah, South Fork Kern and in other areas of ecological importance. Alternative C should be modified to remove or severely limit grazing on all allotments where livestock grazing has contributed significantly to violation of range health standards.
You can review a the three volume RMP by visiting: http://www.blm.gov/ca/st/en/fo/bakersfield.html
For more information, contact Steve Evans, Wild Rivers Project Consultant for Friends of the River and the California Wilderness Coalition, phone: (916) 708-3155, email: sevans@friendsoftheriver.org.
Take Action!
Send an email today thanking Bakersfield BLM Field Manager Tim Smith supporting the BLM’s recommendation to protect the San Joaquin River Gorge as a National Wild & Scenic River. Urge the BLM to adopt a modified Alternative C, which recommends Wild & Scenic protection for other eligible streams, including the San Joaquin River Gorge, the North, Middle, and East Forks of the Kaweah River, lower Kern River, South Fork Kern River, and Chimney Creek, and fully protects Wilderness Study Areas and other lands with wilderness characteristics. Be sure to email your comments by Dec. 9 deadline.
SAMPLE EMAIL
Mr. Tim Smith
Bakersfield BLM Field Manager
3801 Pegasus Drive
Bakersfield, CA 93308
Dear Mr. Smith:
Thank you for recommending Wild & Scenic River protection for the San Joaquin River Gorge in the BLM’s Bakersfield Resource Management Plan (RMP). As you know, the Gorge is threatened by the proposed Temperance Flat Dam. Protecting our few remaining free flowing rivers with outstanding values is exactly why Congress passed the National Wild & Scenic Rivers Act and the San Joaquin River Gorge very much deserves federal protection. It simply makes sense to protect the Gorge as a Wild & Scenic River, particularly since the Temperance Flat Dam will cost taxpayers billions of dollars and produce very little additional water supply.
Please adopt a modified Alternative C, which proposes Wild & Scenic protection for all eligible streams, fully protects all Wilderness Study Areas and other lands with wilderness characteristics, and establishes more than 108,000 acres of Areas of Critical Environmental Concern.
Please inform me when a final plan and decision is available. Again, thank you for your courageous stand to protect the San Joaquin River Gorge, the North Fork Kaweah River, and other eligible streams, as well as all wilderness quality lands in the Bakersfield area.
Sincerely,
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