Posted on 09/24/2002 11:58:55 AM PDT by CedarDave
Tuesday, September 24, 2002
Public Enlisted in Fish Fight
By Leslie Linthicum
Journal Staff Writer
Formal appeals were in the works Monday, but Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chávez spent the weekend arguing the case of the silvery minnow vs. city water in the court of public opinion.
Chávez paid for a half-page advertisement in the Sunday Albuquerque Journal headlined "Someone's Stealing Our Water!"
Elsewhere in the newspaper the mayor wrote a column accusing U.S. District Court Chief Judge James A. Parker of ignoring "common sense and human need."
Parker's decision to force the release of stored Albuquerque water to keep the river wet for the endangered minnows was "a thoughtless and insensitive act," the mayor said.
Chávez, in an interview Monday, called the water issue the city's greatest crisis. "This is the most serious challenge to the future of the city of Albuquerque, that I'm aware of," he said.
And he said Albuquerque citizens were weighing in on his side. "The call volume is very high," he said. "And they are furious."
In a 28-page opinion filed late Monday, Parker wrote that in order to comply with the Endangered Species Act and protect the minnow, water in the drought-slowed Rio Grande must continue to flow through Albuquerque.
The judge said his hands were tied by Congress.
"In enacting the Endangered Species Act," Parker wrote, "Congress required the federal courts to give greater protection to endangered species over human interests."
To do that, he tapped the only remaining upstream water available — so called San Juan-Chama Project water from the Colorado River Basin that is channeled to New Mexico and held by the federal government in drought reserve for Albuquerque, Santa Fe and Rio Grande Valley farmers.
Albuquerque currently pumps city customers' water from wells, but it plans eventually to replace 70 percent of its well water with the San Juan-Chama water from its reserves at Heron Reservoir.
Chávez worries that if the drought continues and the city's wells continue to fall, it will need its water from Heron. If that water has been sent downstream for the fish, he argues, city taps could go dry.
"Any decision that deprives the city of 70 percent of our water needs our serious attention," Chávez said.
Any reversal of Parker's decision would have to occur in federal court, not in Congress or the Albuquerque City Council.
But in the newspaper ad, Chávez urged citizens to call their city councilors and congressional representatives to "join the effort to reverse Judge Parker's decision and assure a sustainable future for our children's children."
Chávez said judges respond to public opinion when they interpret laws.
Chávez said New Mexico Attorney General Patricia Madrid is organizing her counterparts in other Western states to file briefs in support of the appeals.
"For any water-challenged state in the union," Chávez said, "this is a serious issue."
Lawyers for the city, the state and the Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District were poised Monday to file notices with the court that they intend to appeal Parker's ruling. They also were ready to ask the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals to step in and stop the release of water while their appeals are considered.
A number of environmental groups sued the federal government in 1999 to force the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, which controls water flow in the Rio Grande, to free up enough water to allow the tiny fish to spawn.
In his ruling, Parker blamed the Bureau of Reclamation, which controls the water, for not doing a better job of responding to the worsening drought and meting out water properly.
He also blamed the federal agency for failing to seek a remedy from the "Endangered Species Committee," a six-member committee of executive branch appointees authorized to step in when public interests and the well-being of an endangered species conflict.
Copyright 2002 Albuquerque Journal
This part of the ESA must be changed to at least give humans an equal chance with the endangered species. < /sarcasm>
Although he is probably correct in interpreting the bogus EPA regs.
(I think these environmentalists are scared to be tarred and feathered and run out of town.)
Beyond that race, these controversies show that there are instances where the public can easily see through the green lies. With the right type of marketing* (which would stress a balance of man and nature), these examples can be used to demolish other green lies -- such as that oil/gas drilling destroys the environment and cattle grazing destroys rangeland. Due to the plethora of environmental laws and policies, more damage is being done to humans these days than they are doing to the environment.
*The US Chamber of Commerce is currently running two wonderfully written ads in NM showing the impact that lawsuit abuse and trial lawyers are having on us all. The lawsuit abuse ad shows how much more we pay in taxes (the "lawsuit abuse tax") due to frivolous lawsuits. The second ad shows victims standing in line waiting for their turn at justice from the court system when lawyers filing unnecessary lawsuits "cut in line" forcing them to wait longer.
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