From News Line, a daily compilation of farm water news distributed to CFWC members and others upon request. To receive News Line, click here.

Letter: Gov. Brown’s tunnels project would destroy the Delta

Coalition response…Cindy Manduffie is concerned about the health of the Delta’s aquatic ecosystems and rightfully so. The Delta is broken. It doesn’t provide the habitat for native fish to thrive anymore. Poor water quality has fundamentally changed the chemistry of the Delta, reducing the food supply that starts at the base of the food chain. Baby salmon don’t stand a chance because of non-native predators that consume them by the millions as they try to make it to the ocean. Unnatural river flows take fish to a dead end at the south end of the Delta where predators lurk.

The Bay Delta Conservation Plan is designed to reverse the trend that Ms. Manduffie has identified while continuing to meet the water supply needs of thousands of farmers and 25 million Californians. We can’t sit still and we can’t go back to 1850 before the Delta was drained. The right protections coupled with sound science and engineering can bring back the native fishery and continue to meet the water supply needs of a state that is the 9th largest economy in the world.