Valuable farmland under flood water along River Road between Salinas and Gonzales in 2011. Sen. Anthony Cannell's new bill would streamline the regulatory process to clear the Salinas River of brush and debris. / The Salinas Californian/File
A bill introduced into the California Legislature on Monday by a state senator would streamline the regulatory process for Salinas River channel-clearing projects.
Senate Bill 1398, the Salinas River Environmental Stability Act, introduced by Sen. Anthony Cannella, R-Ceres, would follow a similar legal logic of bills that have been passed by the Senate to streamline the regulatory process of major construction projects in California, including the National Football League’s stadium in Los Angeles in 2009 and a new Sacramento Kings arena last year. It would, in effect, grease the wheels of the state regulatory process for a public benefit. Cannella represents much of the Salinas Valley.
Farmers wanting to clear their sections of the river to prevent flooding would still have to be permitted by state and federal regulators, but once an environmental impact report for a specific project plan was approved, this bill would allow growers to get into the river channel and start clearing more quickly. Environmental-impact reports must follow rules outlined in the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA.
The bill raised questions from one Monterey County environmental group that questioned whether the bill would grease the regulatory process or circumvent it. Steve Shimek, executive director of the Otter Project and CoastKeeper, said the part of the bill that would limit court injunctions against clearing would create a situation where once damage was done, it couldn’t be repaired.
“Once the bulldozers fire up and head down the river channel, the damage has already been done,” Shimek said.
At issue for the past several years has been the effect on endangered-species habitat caused by clearing brush and removing sandbars for flood protection of agricultural land. The endangered Pacific steelhead trout, for example, rely on the Salinas River to navigate from Monterey Bay to spawn in several upstream tributaries and depend on naturally forming pools in which to rest.
The proposed law would work by limiting a state court’s ability to prevent “the maintenance activities” unless either of two exceptions could be proven. One is if the practice becomes a threat to public health or safety. The other would throw up a challenge to some regulators and environmental groups.
The state court could hand down an injunction only if the site where the clearing was being done contained “unforeseen Native American artifacts or unforeseen important historical, archaeological, or ecological values that would be materially, permanently, and adversely affected by the maintenance activities,” the proposed bill reads.
The language in the bill tends to point to environmental damage caused by flooding — sewer spillage from damage to facilities, for example — rather than the environmental damage caused by clearing.
“Clearing the Salinas River will result in cleaner water and greater flood protection, ensuring a healthy, thriving ecosystem, environment and economy,” Cannella said in a news release Monday. “The Salinas River Environmental Stability Act provides a streamlined process that will allow for work to begin while ensuring environmental goals are met.”
The bill states that channel-clearing “activities are in compliance with all federal, state, and local laws and regulations, including water quality and species protection.” Some plans, including one contained in an environmental-impact report conducted for the Monterey County Water Resources Agency, were clearly out of compliance with both CEQA regulations and rules contained in both the Environmental Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act, according to comment letters from federal and state agencies.
The bill’s language also refers to the horrendous 1995 Salinas River flood that destroyed many millions of dollars in crops and topsoil, caused untreated sewage to spill into the river and severely damaged structures, including bridges. It implies that without channel maintenance the Salinas Valley would expose itself to another similar catastrophe. At a Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board meeting in Salinas two weeks ago, at least two environmental groups challenged that claim.
The Nature Conservancy hired a hydrological engineer to measure the river with a new technology that models a three-dimensional view of the river during flood stage. One of the results of that study is that even if all the vegetation were cleared the entire length of the river, it still would not prevent certain flood conditions.
The data show that if every tree, bush and piece of debris was cleared from the river, it would not prevent 5- or 10-year floods. The “years” refer to the severity of the flood and the average time between events. The 1995 flood estimates range from it being a 100- to a 500-year event, far greater in magnitude than what the Conservancy study addressed.
Shimek said the flow of that flood was equal to 92,000 cubic feet of water per second, 10 times the flow of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon.
“No project proposed or even imagined in any way could have controlled that event,” Shimek said.
Dennis L. Taylor covers water issues for The Salinas Californian. Follow him on Twitter @taylor_salnews.