MEETING SUMMARY - KLAMATH BASIN ALTERNATIVE DISPUTE RESOLUTION

Welcome

Mike Golden welcomed everyone. The September 12, 2000, meeting summary was reviewed and approved.

Klamath County Commissioners Steve West and Al Switzer reported on their meeting with Governor Kitzhaber and Paul Cleary on October 4 regarding issues in the Klamath Basin.

Commissioners West and Switzer expressed their concerns to the Governor regarding water issues in the Basin. The Governor was invited to visit the Basin to tour the area and listen to the people involved. West asked the Governor to establish a task force with the OWRD taking the lead, for the purpose of developing additional water resources. West and Switzer told the Governor that there is a lot going on in the Basin and that a lot of the answers that are needed are going to be on the supply side of the equation. The task force needs to look at how capacity is going to need to increase in the Basin.

The Governor was also asked to work with Oregon's congressional delegation to push for the creation of an agricultural safety net for the Basin's producers. This safety net would be comparable to the county's for timber revenue sharing. The Governor was asked to work with the delegation to provide the same amount of federal support for the solutions in the Basin that have been provided in other areas. The problem is a lot bigger than county or state government. It is going to take support from the federal government. West and Switzer asked the Governor to look at all possible opportunities for development of additional storage. All the problems of the basin cannot be solved with the Project and on the back of agriculture. They expressed to the Governor that his help and leadership is needed to accomplish these things. The local people are committed to local solutions. Everyone needs to be at the same level.

Switzer said that in talking to the Governor, he understands that he needs to visit the area and help get all parties engaged in developing solutions. Switzer said the meeting was very productive and that the Governor was interested in the storage ideas and ground water potential.

West thanked Paul for arranging this meeting with the Governor.

Paul Cleary said that he also thought the meeting went very well and he appreciated the approach that Steve West and Al Switzer took. Governor Kitzhaber has always been an advocate of collaborative community based solutions. He believes that solutions that are developed locally will have the roots that are necessary to last through the long haul. He is interested in making sure that people stay engaged and that the Federal Government is as well. Paul said that the Department has a task force that the Legislature developed called Stewardship and Supply (SB 93) that is looking at water supply augmentation, water conservation, and efficiency measures. One of the things that will be looked at will be to do some pilot studies with the Klamath Basin as one study area. Everyone is trying to look for opportunities for win/win solutions.

Steve West expressed to the Governor that his help, input and commitment to the process is needed. He believes that the Governor was concerned about what is happening in the Basin.

Someone asked what interests were presented to the Governor other than agriculture.

Steve West said what they wanted the Governor to understand was there needs to be a win/win solution and all groups need to be represented. The issues of tribal trust, endangered species, agriculture and refuges, in all aspects of the watershed, were discussed.

Al Switzer said they tried to explain to the Governor that there is a solution and the solution could possibly solve the problems across the broad spectrum.

Someone asked Steve if he could get word to the media regarding the meeting that they had with the Governor, then people in the basin might feel more secure about what has happened over the past 30 days. Steve West said that he and Al Switzer didn't have this meeting to politicize the issue. Their intent was to meet with the Governor and discuss solutions for the Klamath Basin. They hoped that they did a good job for the people of the Basin.

Hydrology Subcommittee Report

Bob Main noted that at the last meeting, Jonathan said he would complete the report on the synoptic measurements of the Sycan River. He has completed the report. Because of the size of the report, it is located on the Department's web page. Using your web browser, go to:

ftp://www.wrd.state.or.us/pub/studies/klamath-adr/

click on: "hydrology_model_output/

If you have any problems, contact Bob Main and he will E-mail it directly to you. The report was created in Microsoft Word.

The measurements taken last August, during the lowest flow period of the year, show that at the mouth, 95% of the water flowing came from two spring areas in the canyon of the Sycan River. There was no overland outflow out of the marsh. There was no appreciable flow in the river until about 10 miles down river from Sycan Marsh, in the Torrent Springs areas, where approximately 10 cfs joined the river from springs in the canyon. There were no more appreciable gains from Torrent Springs to the Sycan Valley. The Sycan Valley is a significant discharge area, where approximately 10 cfs joined the river. An analysis of the record at the Sycan River stream gauge, located near the mouth, shows that about 84% of the water that falls in the basin fails to show up in the river at its mouth. That is remarkably low. It appears that there is a lot of water that falls in the Sycan sub-basin that is leaving by some path other than the river.

Bob Main noted that the other purpose for doing this report was to see if this would give an opportunity for a check on the consumptive use numbers in the distribution model. It was determined that it was not a good setting. Jonathan thinks that there is a reach of the Sprague River that will be a better laboratory for testing his consumptive use numbers.

Bob Main noted that in Jonathan's report, the photographs show how poorly developed the tributary channels are, suggesting that these tributaries seldom flow much water.

Klamath Project Operation and Clear Lake Releases

Jim Bryant said that the Upper Klamath Lake (Lake) is stabilized at 4139.50 (feet above sea level). It may start to increase depending on the weather over the next couple of months. Approximately 2100 acre-feet of water was purchased from wells in the area. Reclamation released about 23,000 acre-feet of water out of Clear Lake. The situation is stable now. The Refuges are getting about 140 cubic feet per second out of the Tule Lake area which about 50 is turned down to the Tule Lake area. About 120 cfs out of the Ady Canal, which is pretty close to the capacity. Things have stabilized in the Basin.

Don Hagglund asked what Jim's thoughts were regarding fall irrigation for agriculture use on the Running Y property adjacent to Upper Klamath Lake. Jim Bryant said there should not be a problem. He hadn't had a chance to evaluate things as of that day, but asked the Don to call him later.

Karl Wirkus discussed the Klamath Project NEPA and ESA Time line. Invitations were given to agencies to participate in this process. Those agencies consisted of county, state (California and Oregon), federal and irrigation districts. He said that they are near a report on final alternatives to be in preparation of the draft EIS. A long term operation plan has been in preparation for 5 five years and a draft is scheduled to available in February 2001. They are undergoing a multi-year type consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service. The draft Biological Assessment's are scheduled to be available in March 2001. The Bureau's plan is to have the final EIS to the public in October 2001.

Williamson River Restoration

Mark Stern of the Nature Conservancy (TNC), introduced Paul McCormick who would be making the presentation on TNC's Williamson River Restoration. Paul McCormick gave the group an overhead presentation. He presented the goals and history of the project and an update on the restoration activity to date. Paul noted that even though TND is the lead organization in the restoration project, there are several other partners that have contributed, the Tribes, Fish & Wildlife, and Bureau of Reclamation, Natural Resource Conservation Service, along with some private organizations.

The restoration project is located near the mouth of the Williamson River. The project consists of approximately 7000 acres. Historically, it was an extensive wetland and flood plain habitat. The land was drained and developed for irrigated agriculture late in the last century. The goal of the project is to restore the historical ecological functions of the lower Williamson River and the delta area by recreating wetlands and reconnecting the wetlands to the river and to the Upper Klamath Lake. Some functions that they are trying to restore include increasing habitat for endangered species, provide water quality improvements in the lower Williamson River and to improve the overall habitat conditions for other native fish and wildlife species.

To date, the $800,000 project will continue through the summer. The Nature Conservancy received a grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, through the Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, recommended by the Hatfield Upper Basin Working Group, to pay for the project.

Klamath Refuge

Steve Lewis gave a Fall update on the Klamath Refuge. He said that on August 31, 2000, the Bureau of Reclamation notified the Refuge's to not take any water from the Ady Y Canal and pass all water that was coming to the refuge from the D Pumping plant via the V canal that eventually goes out through the Straits Drain. Water that comes the Ady Y and the P canal were not available to the refuge starting August 31, 2001. The water restriction on water intake to the refuge continued through September 15, 2000. The refuge received no water during this time from these sources.

As a result of the cut-off, the wetlands began to recede. Beginning on September 15, and running through September 21, the refuge was allowed to take 50.0 cfs from the Ady Y Canal and 50.0 cfs from the P Canal. This water was used to replace water lost from the existing wetlands. On September 21, the refuge was allowed to increase water from the P Canal to 140.0 cfs. On September 27, flows increased in the Ady Canal to 150.0 cfs and remained at 140.0 cfs from the P Canal.

The information Fish & Wildlife has received from the Bureau of Reclamation is that they believe these levels of delivery can be continued through the end of October. Normally the refuge would be taking 300.0 cfs starting in September. The refuge did shutoff deliveries as requested. There will be approximately a month late in flood-up. Benefits that would have occurred in September will be delayed approximately one month. Those benefits lost cannot be replaced. The peak of the fall migration normally occurs the first week of November, but they will be short this year due to the loss of water.

Settlement Framework Follow-Up Report of the Administrative Subcommittee

Paul Simmons said that the subcommittee has been working on the ADR Settlement Framework Proposal. That has been done with an eye toward having a large facilitated settlement discussion over a period of several days hosted by Dividing the Waters. Question have been asked regarding concerns in the federal administration, who has to be at the discussion, and what issues are on the table. It was agreed by the subcommittee that there should be some initial scoping effort to address those questions and try to frame the discussion for the large facilitated settlement meeting. They would also try to decide when this meeting should occur. A subcommittee of the Administrative Subcommittee was created to do the initial scoping. The regular Administrative Subcommittee plans on meeting prior to the next ADR meeting to reach some kind of agreement or recommendations for the larger ADR group.

The Dividing the Waters workshop/negotiation session scheduled for December has been canceled. We hope to have the large negotiating session on track for February or March.

Contest Hearing Report

Reed Marbut gave a brief report on the contest hearings. He reported that the Adjudicator had met with the administrator of the central hearings panel to discuss the mechanics of getting the contests referred to the hearings panel. The Adjudicator and panel are in the process of working out a schedule. Reed said he hoped to be able to come back to the next ADR meeting with specific ideas about the schedule and at some point, come back with a recommendation from the hearings panel as to how they want to manage the cases.

Earl Miller asked if there is a possibility of getting an early resolution on the cases where people are contesting their own preliminary evaluation. Reed said yes. The Adjudicator has indicated that he would like to reach settlements with those individuals who contested their own preliminary evaluation. He will be notifying people that he wants to settle those evaluations.

Legislative/Legal Subcommittee Report

Barbara Scott-Brier gave an update on the Legislative/Legal Subcommittee. She said that they are waiting for some analysis from the Oregon Attorney General's Office regarding legislation. This would be regarding the hearing officer panel statute (HB 2525) and model rules as they relate to the adjudication statutes (ORS Chapter 539). They should have the Attorney General's analysis next month. Some opinions have been done on certain issues and they will be reviewed next month. She reported that Water for Life has some legislative ideas that they will be providing to the Water Resources Department.

Other Business

Paul Cleary noted that Senator Gordon Smith was possibly going to be the Klamath Area on October 17. Tessa Stuedli, Klamath Water Users Association, clarified that Senator Gordon Smith was going to be in town on October 17 from 3:00 - 5:00 at OIT in the Student Union Building. The public meeting will be a round table forum. Congressman Wally Herger of California, Congressman Greg Walden of Oregon and Senator Gordon Smith will be at the meeting. There is a possibility that the meeting may not occur if other commitments should arise for the Congressional delegation. Everyone is encouraged to attend from the Klamath Basin area to show how serious the issues are. A lot of jobs and the livelihood of the people depend on it.

Paul Cleary said that it is also important to heighten the awareness of the Klamath Basin and the water issues in the Basin. Federal resources and funding commitments are needed as well. Someone asked if the tax measures pass that are on the November ballot, how will they affect the Water Resources Department. Paul Cleary said that the state natural resource agency budgets only total 3% of the General Fund. There are core responsibilities that the Department has, but how the Department proceeds will be determined by Legislature and the Governor.

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned.