Coastal Restoration

First came the urgent e-mail to two Cabinet secretaries from San Joaquin Valley farm interests, demanding that officials allow "maximum pumping" of water from recent storms for agriculture and cities and minimize flows for endangered fish making their river migrations amid the worst drought in years. By April 2, state and federal water officials said they had temporarily "adjusted" environmental rules to divert water from the season's last rains to reservoirs and away from rivers where endangered chinook salmon, steelhead trout and other fish are migrating. Feinstein's letter to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell and Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, whose agencies are responsible for protecting fish, was joined by the Republican House members backing drought legislation that would override the Endangered Species Act. The agencies responsible for water management, including enforcing Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act protections, say the water diversions will not harm wildlife. Asked whether the Feinstein letter had any effect on agency decisions, Mark Cowin, director of the state Department of Water Resources, said lawmakers were "keenly interested" in pumping levels during the drought. Maria Rea, assistant regional administrator for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries, which oversees salmon protections, acknowledged that there are "adverse effects that are happening to fish throughout the Central Valley region due to drought, and it's very hard to fully minimize all those effects." More than 40 groups warned of potential extinctions, with the water diversions coming at a time when migrating salmon, steelhead, green sturgeon, longfin smelt and delta smelt are already in dire straits from the drought.