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On Paper
BDOC WRAPS UP TECHNICAL WORK
The Bay Delta Oversight Council's technical experts got their shopping list of ideas for making the Bay-Delta more habitable for salmon, smelt, rails, mice and pickleweed on paper this November, when the last two of five advisory committees reported in.
"The reports define a wide range of actions that could be implemented in terms of both what's feasible and what's beneficial," says BDOC's John Amodio.
For the Aquatic Resources Committee techies, the development of an options list began with some wrangling over what should be the thrust of restoration. "The issue was when you're trying to determine what to do for a fix, do you focus on continued human intervention or on making the system more self-sustaining?" says Cal Fish & Game's Wernette. Should you build more salmon hatcheries or make Delta waterways more fish-friendly, he explained by way of example. The committee decided to emphasize the latter, and suggested 37 options, some as broad as restoring shaded riverine habitat, some as controversial as building a peripheral canal, some as specific as installing a fish screen at the Clifton Court Forebay and prohibiting discharge of ship ballast water in the Estuary.
The Plant and Wildlife Committee, meanwhile, worked to bring a hodgepodge of disjointed ideas together under a single, strategic plan, says Wernette. Its 27 action options ranged from protecting riverine flood plains to controlling urban growth to establishing habitat corridors between inner Delta marshes and upland communities of the Delta rim. Wernette says many of the options borrow from or build on the recommendations of the S.F. Estuary Project's CCMP.
Wernette thinks both reports can serve as "useful stepping stones" for the next phase. What that next phase will be for BDOC, given state-federal plans to launch a new public-private advisory committee that may supersede the council this spring, isn't clear. But BDOC's John Amodio says the goal of his council's technical reports and last few months of work isn't to prejudice the new process but to give it a jumpstart on the tough task for finding long-term solutions to the problems facing the Estuary. Contact: Frank Wernette (209)948-7800 2/94 & 6/94
TECH REPORTS IN ON STATE NONPOINT THRUST
Though the toxic barnacle-battling boat paint additive TBT is now banned in America, Mexico still allows its use and pleasure boats continue to ply the waters between the two countries. To reduce this transport of toxic materials to California waters and marinas, a new technical report suggests the state should ask the EPA to flex its international muscles.
The report, which recommends measures to stem nonpoint source pollution from state marinas, is one of 10 draft reports the State Water Board will present to the public at a Sacramento workshop this January (see calendar). The reports, prepared by expert committees of agency officials and stakeholders, examine what the state should do to improve its plans and policies on nonpoint source pollution and to comply with a 1990 amendment to the Coastal Zone Management Act.
Each report targets a specific pollution source - such as marinas, urban runoff, abandoned mines, on-site disposal systems, irrigated agriculture and grazing - reviews the EPA's recommended measures for their control, and develops its own recommendations list. The list for tackling the state's abandoned mines, for example, recognizes the "embryonic" stage of control programs and aims at providing: a method for prioritizing clean up efforts; stable funding sources for clean up; a mechanism for limiting liability exposure for those private and public entities that chose to clean up abandoned mines voluntarily; clean up objectives that realistically reflect the technical and financial difficulties of mine clean up; and scientific documentation of the regional effects of metal loading from mines.
The urban runoff report, meanwhile, had much more to build on in terms of existing programs and recommends that local governments continue to take the lead responsibility for curbing runoff from cities, suburbs and small. The report recommends, among other things, that state and regional boards promote a watershed approach, provide technical advice to local governments, and create a model program that small municipalities can make their own. For a copy of any or all of these draft reports, contact: Sid Taylor (916)657-0432 4/93 & 10/94
MINE PLAGUES STATE
State water officials entered Calaveras County's Penn Mine as regulators in 1978 and walked out as dischargers in late 1993, thanks to an environmentalist-sponsored lawsuit. The court found that under the Clean Water Act efforts to channel and contain the mine's acid water runoff by the Central Valley Regional Board and the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD), which operates a dam and reservoir on the property, made them responsible for decades-old acid discharge from the mine.
The Regional Board and EBMUD must now apply to the State Board for a NPDES discharge permit, even though neither owns the principal stake in the property nor are the cause of the mine pollution. This outcome sets an expensive precedent for California's 15,000 abandoned mines - 160 of which have been tagged as potentially significant polluters. NPDES permits can require expensive treatment before discharge. "We can't just do basic mine clean up anymore," says the State Board's Rick Humphreys. "The way it's set up now, it's all or nothing. If the state's going to end up having to meet these kinds of permit requirements, we've no incentive to go out and spend what little funds we have on mine abatement." A draft Penn Mine discharge permit is now making its unprecedented way through the State Board approval process. Contact: Rick Humphreys (916)657-0759 4/93
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