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<br />c-J <br />tt:t' <br />C'~ <br />N <br />C"} <br />i;;.-' <br /> <br />1993] <br /> <br />CENTRAL UTAH PROJECT COMPLETION ACT <br /> <br />167 <br /> <br />agency has asked for new money to study non structural water <br />development and management alternatives," <br />Unfortunately, several years after announcing these new priorities, <br />it appears that the Bureau still clings to its old mission of dam building <br />rather than water management. The Bureau's water transfer policy, <br />critics complain, is too cautious," merely letting transfers happen <br />rather than initiating them." In fact, in most areas the Bureau has <br />not even attempted to change its policies. For example, the Bureau is <br />trying to find ways to finance new dams using the .cash register" of <br />public power.- The Bureau has also tried to preserve large irrigation <br />subsidies-the glue of the reclamation iron triangle. It has refused to <br />enforce the intent of the Reclamation Reform Act of 1982'" to limit the <br />size of farms receiving federally subsidized water." In 1989 the <br />Bureau announced it would renew its forty-year irrigation contracts to <br />California's Central Valley farmers with no changes in terms." These <br />renewals have created a subsidy that totaled $6.4 billion through <br />1987.43 Generally, absent specific legislative directives from Congress, <br />like the water conservation plan in the CUP," the Bureau has not <br /> <br />, : <br />\~ i <br /> <br />.f <br /> <br />.. It!.. at 60. <br />.., Brian E. Gray et aI., TraTUfen of Federal Reclamation Water: A C~e Study of Ca.lifornia'. <br />San Joachin Volky, 21 ENvTL. L. 911, 934 (1991). It appeared that an early draft policy was <br />much more forceful, but western members of Congreu preuured the Bureau to weaken the <br />policy statement. REIsNER" BATES, .upro note 10, at 49. <br />.. The new policy recognizes that -[PJrimacy in water allocation and management rests <br />principally with the States,- Gray et aI., .upro note 37, at 930-31. Transfers that adversely <br />atrect third parties will not be allowed. The policy does allow transfers from irrigation to <br />municipal and industrial suppliea, but would require a change in the repayment costs required <br />with the new water UN. Id. <br />In addition to overly cautious reform efforts, the Bureau has proven to be unable to take <br />care or environmental disasters like the selenium poisoning at California's Kesterson National <br />Wildlife Refop. Selenium leached into the refop from surrounding farms and killed and <br />deformed thousands or waterfowl. Lawrence Mosher, The Corps Ad4pts, the Bureau Founders, <br />in WESTERN WATER MADE sIMPLE 15, 24-25 (Ed Marston ed., 1987). Selenium has also become <br />a new problem for the completion of the CUP. See infra note 194. <br />II Public power agencies throughout the West support most reclamation projects through the <br />revenue they generate from the sale of federal public power. The Bureau has built more <br />hydroelectric projects, which have subsidized new reclamation projects. Mosher, supra note 38, <br />at 28. <br />.. 43 U.S.C. ~~ 390aa to 39000-1 (1988). <br />41 Representative George Miller, Foreword: Water and California's Future, 11 STAN. ENVTL. <br />L.J, vii, viii (1992). <br />.. The Bureau promiaed. to deliver the same amount of water for the next 40 years at an <br />infIation-alljusted price even lower than the original one. REISNER & BATES, supra note 10, at <br />51. <br />.. Elliot Diringer, Probloms Abound on Volley Weur, S.F, CBRON" Feb. 22, 1992, at A12. <br />"Tbe water conservation plan i. described infra notes 197-222 and accompanying text. The <br /> <br />~. <br />