This deep green fish, with its armored back, shovel-shaped snout, vacuum-like suction device (beneath its chin), and two sets of feelers that help it find food, is in serious trouble. Dams, diversion structures, and sediment pollution have altered the habitat and hydrology of the freshwater rivers in which the fish once spawned, leaving only a few fish in the Klamath, Trinity and Sacramento Rivers. They once spawned in the Eel and San Joaquin Rivers, too, but no longer. A recent study by the American Fisheries Society concluded that the sturgeon has declined by more than 88 percent in most of its historical range, which once stretched along the West Coast from Mexico to Alaska.
But some experts are not yet convinced the fish needs to be listed. Green sturgeon have always been more scarce than the commercially preferred white sturgeon (tagging studies result in an average catch of one green to every 100 white sturgeon), but it is not obvious that the population in the Estuary is declining, says Cal Fish & Game biologist Dave Kolhorst. "They may even be doing better than in the past because of the raising of the Red Bluff diversion dam gates from the winter months through May 15, which leaves more water in the river for fish," he says.
If green sturgeon are anything like white sturgeon, he adds, they have benefited from the recent wet winters. Kolhorst says that in sampling for young salmon, he also finds young sturgeon.
But environmentalists say that finding young sturgeon does not lessen the need for immediate action on the species' behalf. "We've seen the decline of large adults in our rivers," says Jeff Miller with the Center for Biological Diversity. According to Miller, the size of the fish being caught has decreased, which may mean that the prime breeding fish have been lost. The sturgeon is long-lived (up to 70 years) but doesn't spawn until it is sometimes as old as 20, and even then not always very successfully. Delayed reproduction, combined with habitat destruction and pressure from fishing, makes it difficult for the sturgeon to replenish their populations quickly. "Fish-catch numbers have plummeted," says Miller. "And more spawning populations have been lost than still exist."
One thing that enviros and agency folks agree on is that this odd
primeval fish needs to be better studied. To that end, the U.S. Fish
& Wildlife will soon launch a study. National Marine Fisheries
Service has until early September to make a preliminary
recommendation on the petition for listing, and a year to make a
final determination.
Contact: Jeff Miller: (510) 841-0812, ext.3;
Dave Kolhorst: (209) 948-7080 LOV
The area nearby is covered by industrial and commercial buildings in varying degrees of disrepair, not the life-giving wetlands of yore. But Save the Bay and the Friends of Sausal Creek have just begun a monitoring project to see if the channel is home to a remnant population of Ostrea lurida, native California oysters. Dangling inconspicuously from the substructure of the drawbridge are what look like strands of clothesline trailing into the water. Just below the surface, and threaded like beads along each one, are about a dozen oyster shell halves. Save the Bay's Marilyn Latta pulls one of the strings from the water, and examines the underside of each shell for spat, or immature oysters, which may have drifted by and managed to attach themselves to this artificial "reef."
It's only been a week since they were hung, so she's not surprised that the shells are still quite clean. But for the next few months, volunteers from the creek group will regularly check in at the Fruitvale Bridge, noting the presence of any new oysters, measuring the temperature, salinity and dissolved oxygen, and checking for nitrates and phosphates as well.
If conditions prove favorable, volunteers may later try seeding the dangling shells with larval oysters. Ultimately, says Latta, such efforts could help to rebuild decimated oyster colonies throughout the Bay. She stresses, however, that this is not an attempt to revive a commercial oyster industry. Instead, it's aimed at restoring a formerly abundant species that also helps keep the Bay clean by filter feeding.
Save the Bay wants to work with creek and wetland groups throughout the Bay Area in similar projects. The project is being funded by a NOAA Community Based Restoration Grant. Other partners include San Francisco State, U.C. Davis and Cal Fish & Game.
The benefits extend beyond the collection of scientific data, says Stuart Richardson of the Friends of Sausal Creek. His volunteers have focused on restoring an area three miles upstream of the creek mouth, and he acknowledges that it can be difficult for them to see that their work also affects conditions at the mouth of the creek. "We need to help make the creek to Bay connection," he says.
Latta says her groups focus has been just the opposite - "We're always down in the Bay" - and encouraging upstream restoration work will have a long term positive effect on water quality in wetland areas and beyond.
Besides, asks Richardson, "How many times in your life do you get to
climb out onto a bridge?"
Contact: Marilyn Latta (510)452-9261 O'B
RESEARCHERS UNVEILED A SALT-TOLERANT TOMATO this July, a genetically engineered tomato endowed with some of the sodium management skills of the thale cress gardenweed. The gene borrowed from the weed enables the tomato to sequester the salt in its leaves, rather than its fruit, and to be irrigated with water 50 times saltier than normal.
U.C. Davis researchers are saying what they did with the tomato could
be done with other fruits or even nuts, offering California farmers
plagued with salty fields (due to a combination of soils and
irrigation) new hope for a productive future.
Contact:
eblumwald@ucdavis.edu
A PHALANX OF WATER DISTRICTS SUED EBMUD this summer, opposing the
East Bay Municipal Utility District's Freeport Project to enhance its
water supply reliability in dry years by tapping the Sacramento
River. The project, endorsed by the city and county of Sacramento and
enviros, replaces EBMUD's prior efforts to tap American River water -
efforts that spawned decades of
litigation. EBMUD and BurRec signed a contract to begin the Freeport
project this July. EBMUD'S Charles Hardy says that though the
contract allows them to divert up to 133,000 feet of water in dry
years, the district only plans to draw about 21,000 acre feet of this
per year. He says that all the issues raised in the suit - among them
water quality, supply and use fee impacts on others drawing water
from the Delta and federal Central Valley Project - will be carefully
addressed in the
environmental impact review process.
Contact: (510)835-3000
THE WATER WARS CROSSED THE
CONTINENT THIS SUMMER, as three different CALFED authorization bills
(Feinstein S976, Calvert HR1984 & Miller HR2404) and two
appropriations bills (HR2311& S1171) made their way through
Washington DC's hallowed halls. CALFED is the cooperative state and
federal program that has spent seven years working with farming,
urban and environmental interests trying to balance competing demands
for California's scarce water supply. Some of the bills are supported
by farmers and water districts and others by environmentalists. Two
'lightning rod' issues, according to CALFED's Daniel McCarroll, are
first,
provisions for surface water storage (such as offstream reservoirs)
in the Feinstein and Calvert bills that enviros are concerned
predispose decisionmaking in favor of such facilities, and second,
provisions echoing language in the CALFED 2000 record of decision
concerning water deliveries to CVP contractors in the South Delta.
Water users and enviros are both "fretting about where the water for
these deliveries will come from," says McCarroll, and think the
duplication of the language in the bill gives it a weight that may
result in further conflicts. The bills will be taken up again after
the August recess.
Contact: Feinstein (202)224-3841; Calvert
(202)225-1986 or Miller (202)225-2095.
AN EXPERIMENT IN COMMERCIAL FISHING FOR BAY SALMON has been put on hold by state officials for another year. This August, the California Fish & Game Commission voted not to approve a proposed one month Chinook season in San Francisco Bay and San Pablo Bays this year, in which five boats would be permitted to catch a total of no more than 4,000 fish between August 15 and September 15. The proposed fall-centered season targets the healthiest of the Estuary's four annual Sacramento River salmon runs - the fall run, whose population has recently surpassed target management levels.
While commercial fishers support the new season, especially as a
payback for ocean limits imposed on them to protect other more
endangered runs, recreational anglers want to keep the Bay salmon to
themselves. These and other concerns will be explored in further
public meetings this year, say officials.
Contact: (415)561-5080
The S.F. Regional Water Quality Control Board is in the process of bringing the gist of SUSMP to the Bay Area, as part of the reissuance of Santa Clara County's five year stormwater discharge permit (NPDES). Enhanced permit requirements will mean cities throughout the county will have to follow the same rules for managing runoff flows.
Previous requirements were more generic, "do what you can where you can," according to Geoff Brosseau of the Bay Area Stormwater Management Agencies Association. The new requirements get more specific about how much runoff must be captured, filtered (through soils, vegetation or actual fabric filters) or treated on a project site - the "start at the source approach" - before it can flow into creeks, bays and ultimately the ocean. This way, says the S.F. Board's Dale Bowyer, "You get the benefits for the life of the project."
The new requirements also define for the first time what kinds of projects must comply. They don't, however, mandate specific technology, leaving that to a developer's architects and engineers. Some designers incorporate more permeable surface area, such as grassy swales, into their projects: at other times catch basin filters are more appropriate.
Bowyer says this isn't a "shocking new evolution" in regulation, but it does provide more backbone to existing 1990s regulatory guidance. "Rather than use that guidance, some Bay Area cities have pretty much let developers do things that were easy and inexpensive, just enough so they say could say 'we checked off that box'," he says. "This raises the bar for performance and compliance with stormwater permits," says Brosseau. "It forces municipalities to get more serious about stormwater, and to integrate stormwater management more fully into city infrastructure and procedures."
The new Santa Clara requirements build on previous performance standards established in the city's1997 permit, but also embrace some lessons from Los Angeles County - where the L.A. Regional Board adopted the state's first SUSMP in March 2000. Though 30 of 85 L.A. county cities appealed the new SUSMP regs, the State Board recently upheld most of the L.A. rules.
As a result, some Southland developers are now going all out on stormwater control, according to Jeff Okamoto with the Orange County office of RBF Consulting, a regional engineering firm laying out major subdivisions. Before the local SUSMP came along, everyone just let all the runoff head straight down the storm drain, he says. Now, RBF's projects include dozens of runoff pollution reduction measures, among them streetsweeping; catch basins equipped with special "trash baskets" and filters to clean up the first flush of urban runoff and something Okamoto calls "summer slobber" - soaps, brake dust and fertilizer from car washing, driving and lawn watering; and other stormwater collection units with holding tanks cleaned out by trucks similar to the "honey wagons" serving portable toilets.
Okamoto says several of his firm's clients have directed him to go beyond the minimum requirements and do better on recent projects. "In the current political atmosphere, some of our builders wanted to show the city and interest groups they're willing to do what's right," he says. (Full disclosure: Jeff Okamoto is the editor's brother in law). Of course doing all these things can cost more. Adding bioswales or detention basins can take up significant amounts of land, which can be a precious commodity, and some treatment measures are expensive to build and maintain, say developers. City officials worry that the new requirements will make it more difficult to do infill projects and build low income housing. They also argue that the proposed performance standards, which call for catching 85% of peak storm runoff, are too confusing, even for engineers, and they want the board to delay implementation, particularly for smaller projects. Board chief Loretta Barsamian says she "got an earful" from city managers when she met with them earlier this summer, and over thirty speakers lined up at a July public hearing, objecting to various aspects of the permit changes.
BayKeeper's Jonathan Kaplan says he's disappointed with the city officials lobbying. "What's being proposed is in a lot of respects weaker than what was approved in Los Angeles and San Diego." He wants to see a strong regional approach.
Amy Glad of the Home Builders Association of Northern California says that a one size fits all approach won't work because of localized variations in terrain and rainfall. "Some standardization is useful, but you need to recognize regional differences." That issue will loom large in the near future. The NPDES permits of several other Bay Area counties, including Alameda, will likely be amended to include similar new stormwater provisions soon, says Bowyer.
At press time, the staff was putting the final touches on a revised
version of the requirements, aiming for an August 15 release. That
will begin a five week comment period, during which the Board will
hold multiple meetings with stakeholders and tweak the permit details
one more time. The full Board is scheduled to vote on the issue at
its October meeting (see calendar). "I'm sure we'll be going through
a painful and protracted process of denial about SUSMP," says
Brosseau, "But the reward is getting credit for good front end site
design, and then not having to treat so much
stormwater."
Contact: Jan O'Hara (510)622-5681 OB & ARO
An alternative approach is to use plants to suck the selenium from the soil into their aboveground parts, which can then be harvested and removed. "You need to have really good site management," says Lin, referring to the necessity of preventing mice or other animals from consuming or making their homes in the treatment pickleweed. "It's not something you can just create and walk away from."
Terry is also looking for ways to enhance selenium uptake in a
variety of plants, including pickleweed, through genetic
manipulation. Though he's succeeded in increasing rates of selenium
uptake in Indian mustard by three-fold, for example, he's still not
satisfied. "In phytoremediation, we're striving for 10-fold or
100-fold increases," he explains, placing plants firmly on the front
lines of humanity's battle with contaminants.
Contact: nterry@nature.berkeley.edu; zlin@nature.berkeley.edu. LOV
Earlier this summer the last of the 27 Joint Venture members - public agencies, environmental groups, private companies, and agricultural interests - signed off on the 111 page document, which is based on the 1999 S.F. Baylands Ecosystem Habitat Goals report. It outlines a 20-year implementation strategy, and sets specific acreage goals for each subregion around the Bay as well as for the entire Estuary. "This creates a framework for restoration of wetlands and creeks in the middle of a burgeoning urban area," says executive director John Steere. Restoring the Estuary gives planners, developers and environmentalists alike a "blueprint" for future restoration. "They can point to this and say, we have agreed to restore this amount of acreage," says Steere.
With publication completed, the Joint Venture is now seeking support for its goals from municipalities and special districts throughout the Bay Area. San Francisco supervisors have given the document their endorsement, and Steere expects Sonoma County to consider the issue soon. The group has also reached another important milestone: recognition by U.S. Fish & Wildlife as the eleventh member of the U.S. Habitat Joint Ventures. "This means we've become a federally sanctioned program," says Steere.
It's more than just a formality he adds - recognition makes the Joint
Venture eligible for $300,000 worth of operating funds from the feds
for the next fiscal year, and gives the Bay Area a better chance in
sharing some of the $41 million in grants under the North American
Wetlands Conservation Act.
Contact: John Steere (510) 286-6767 O'B
At the urging Marin Audubon, the Coastal Conservancy and others, U.S. Fish & Wildlife has identified a 17,600-acre study area stretching from the Petaluma River to Corte Madera and encompassing tidal marsh, diked baylands and some uplands. In May, the Service held a second series of public meetings to familiarize local landowners and other stakeholders with the idea and with the process for establishing a refuge.
Of all the baylands on the North Bay shore, Marin's are the most at risk from development, say environmentalists. Novato recently built a new golf course in the Marin baylands, and residential and transportation projects are proposed all along the Highway 101 corridor, which parallels the bayshore. Rather than hosting new homes, putting greens, highways and marinas, the proposed refuge would offer protected habitat to several federally listed endangered species, including the salt marsh harvest mouse, as well to curlews, dunlins, sandpipers, mallard, teal, pintail and scaup.
Although environmentalists are clearly enthusiastic about the notion of a new refuge, the proposal is encountering predictable resistance from developers with an interest in bayside property, as well as anxiety on the part of local landowners. With regard to the latter, Ellen Johnck of the Bay Planning Coalition - on record as supporting the concept of a new refuge - says the Service made a fundamental error by presenting the study area boundary as a fait accompli. "Fish & Wildlife goes in and draws a line around the parcels it thinks should be included without telling anyone, then notifies property owners that their property is within the line," says Johnck. "Most owners are very upset that didn't they know this was under consideration."
"Some folks have interpreted the study area as meaning that 'this is going to be the refuge,'" says the Service's Cathy Osugi. "We really want to make it clear - it's just a study area." She notes that the Service initially used incomplete mailing lists when it notified property owners about the first series of public meetings last November. "We should have done a better job with that," she admits, adding that the problem has since been corrected.
Osugi says the next step will be for the Service to develop several preliminary refuge boundary alternatives within the study area. These will be presented to the public for comment before being incorporated into federally required environmental documents. The Service will then select a preferred alternative.
Marin Audubon's Barbara Salzman says she expects the preferred alternative to include wetlands at the former Hamilton Air Force Base and Bel Marin Keys, which the Coastal Conservancy already owns. "Then we can add to it north and south," she says.
Osugi emphasizes that property for the refuge will be acquired from
willing sellers only, and adds that the Service is required by law to
pay fair market value based on an independent appraisal. She adds
that until the boundary is established, estimating cost is impossible.
And she cautions that the new refuge is by no means a done deal. "The
alternatives always include a 'no action' alternative, she says. "For
now we are just working our way through the process and we'll see
where that takes us. I'm hopeful, but I can't predict what will
happen."
Contact Cathy Osugi
(503) 231-6838 CH
Over the past year, the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board has renewed the wastewater discharge permits for a couple of dozen cities up and down the Valley, including Sacramento, Vacaville, Stockton, Modesto, Merced, Tracy and Turlock. Many of the new permits include stringent new limits on the pollutants that the cities can discharge to the regions waterways - limits that may require the cities to spend tens of millions of dollars upgrading their sewage plants with newer, more advanced treatment technologies. The upgrade costs could double the price residents pay for water and perhaps triple the cost of sewage connections, say those involved. "It would cost us about $117 million to go to tertiary treatment," says David Tompkins of Vacaville, where the new permit includes strict limits on the levels of trihalomethanes in effluent. Like many of the affected cities, Vacaville has appealed, with a hearing before the State Board scheduled for September. "We have a question about the attainability of these standards," says Tompkins. "We have not found a wastewater plant in the state that can meet them." Tompkins also questions the need to make wastewater as clean as tap water. "This permit would require us to meet the standards for drinking water at the end of the pipe, which doesn't make any sense," he says. The Board's Ken Landau explains that the tightened pollutant limits are the result of the confluence of several factors. "The U.S. issued the California Toxics Rule in May 2000, which set receiving water standards for a long list of pollutants and greatly increased the number of constituents we are looking at. During the same period , the State Board adopted an implementation plan for handling toxics in wastewater, which includes directives on how to set effluent limits and establish timelines for compliance." The Board has also begun enforcing its Basin Plan for the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers more vigorously and looking more closely at how permits for impaired waters on the "303d list" are written. The upshot, says Landau, is "more stringent limits, and limits on many more components of effluent."
The new permit requirements are not only pinching cities, they're also putting a strain on the already understaffed Central Valley Board. "There are 128 priority pollutants and we have to develop levels for each one," says the Board's Greg Vaughn. "Each staffer used to be able to do four or five a year, but now can only handle about one."
Enviros say the costs of meeting stricter pollution limits should simply be considered part of the price of growth in an environmentally compromised system. "The Central Valley is looking at doubling its population over the next two decades, we haven't invested in infrastructure for many years, and most of the region's water bodies are already impaired," says Deltakeeper's Bill Jennings. "These costs simply reflect costs that are usually externalized from the ledger sheets."
Ironically, many pollutants in the rivers have sources other than municipal and industrial wastewater plants, such as agricultural runoff. "There is very little capacity left in these waters," says Landau. "So as the population grows, and creates ever more wastewater, the concentrations of pollutants in that wastewater are going to have to decline."
Many of those involved say they expect most of the permit disputes to
wind up in the courts. "This continuing appeals process delays the
implementation of what's required by the permits and allows cities to
put off building new facilities," says Vaughn. "But at some point
you've just got to ask, do you hire engineers or lawyers? At some
point you just need to build instead of continuing to appeal."
Contact: Ken Landau
landauk@rb5s.swrcb.ca.gov CH
On June 19, the San Jose City Council unanimously adopted a series of Green Building policies, including a goal that all new construction and major retrofit projects of city facilities and buildings over 10,000 gross square feet of occupied space meet specific Green Building Guidelines within the next two years.
"We have a lot of building planned for the next 20 years," says San Jose's Darren Bouton, "so from the standpoint of potential impact, we really have an opportunity to make a huge difference in a lot of structures." Bouton points to the city's plans to build 20 new libraries and 10-12 new community centers by 2010.
San Jose's green building goals focus on five major categories: site selection, energy and atmosphere, water use efficiency, materials and resources, and indoor environmental quality. The water use efficiency goal calls for water use reduction within buildings and water efficient landscaping, as well as for innovative wastewater technologies that reduce the generation of wastewater and potable water demand while increasing local aquifer recharge. The site selection goal includes a stormwater management component. The goals are based on the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEEDTM) rating system, a voluntary, consensus-based, market-driven green building rating system developed by the U.S. Green Building Council.
Although the building guidelines apply only to city structures,
Bouton says a key part of the city's strategy is to encourage private
developers to adhere to the guidelines. He notes that a number of
commercial developers are already receptive to green building
principles. "It will benefit the private sector to be ahead of the
curve on this," he says, "we want to help them get there."
Although the new policies do not include any financial incentives for
sustainable building, Bouton says the city is exploring other ways to
promote it. "We might develop ways to expedite the permitting process
for buildings that meet these guidelines, for example," he says.
Contact: Darren Bouton (408) 277-4670 CH
Over stonesbr>
smoothed
by the centuries
The ripples
seem to be
everlasting
A buckeye leaf
floats down
the creek
While the wren tit sings
and the sword fern
stands guard
Five-finger ferns
peek
over the edge
The love of this place
is like
a child's heart.
Tobi Earnheart-Gold, Age 10
Bolinas, California
1997 Shasta Bioregion Winner
Teacher: Cathy Nichelini
"Watershed" was not the commonly used environmental management and restoration concept it is today when Michael woke up that morning with the magical phrase in her head. At the time, six years ago, she was working for International Rivers Network in Berkeley. It was then Poet Laureate Robert Hass, whom she met soon afterwards, who suggested a watershed theme for the new "River of Words" contest and program because it "got at the idea of place in a unique and specific way," says Michael.
In creating an arts-oriented contest, Michael tried to break away from the strict water quality focus of many existing outreach efforts. "I felt environmental ed was stuck in the sciences," she explains.
"I believe that education is our best bet for saving the planet, and that if you help children fall in love with the Earth, they will protect it-we protect what we love. Our current educational system, however, compartmentalizes knowledge in a way that prevents children from recognizing the wonder and beauty of how everything fits together."
River of Words does exactly the opposite. Children learn what a watershed is and the basics of the water cycle, but they also learn about the wildlife native to the area (even in urban areas), the cultural history of the area, and how people have transformed the landscape. The program and contest also allow children to understand their watershed on their own terms, first by making careful observations of their neighborhood and their local creek or river and where it flows, then writing about and illustrating their impressions, and describing their own relationship to the landscape. "The essential design of River of Words is brilliant in its clarity, " says Zenobia Barlow with the Center for Ecoliteracy, a frequent partner in the program. "Rather than focusing children's attention on distant ecosystems, it encourages each child to stand in her own ecological address using her own unique imagination to make meaning." Michael, Hass and International Rivers Network held the first River of Words contest in April 1996 at The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., in conjunction with the first National Poetry Month. Since then, the annual contest and its companion environmental education curriculum and program have been so successful that River of Words spun off from the International Rivers Network in January 2001, becoming its own non-profit with coordinators in 24 states.
River of Words' success, according to Barlow, comes from Michael's indefatigable nature, quiet enthusiasm, and calm, focused attention to each poem, each piece of art. "Pam is one of those rare individuals who seems to have found her true calling," she says. Michael, who grew up moving from place to place (which made her more determined than ever to teach children to learn to appreciate "place"), says she has a unique position in the nonprofit environmental world. "Burnout is a constant threat to people doing this kind of work," says Michael, referring to the daily challenge of dealing with humanity's lack of concern for our air, water and natural world. "But I have the advantage of being comforted and inspired by the endless stream of children's art and poetry that comes into the office."
Michael's river of words - the phrase, the poetry, the art - has
helped change public understanding of where and how rivers flow, and
where and how we live within their divides. "It used to be that you
couldn't address a group about River of Words without first defining
a watershed," says Michael. "But that's not true anymore. Now it's a
given."
Contact: River of Words:
(510) 548-POEM; www.riverofwords.org LOV