Yearly in Sonoma County, steelhead trout and coho salmon return to spawn in creeks alongside the Russian River which can be fed by groundwater.
Environmental advocates have lengthy urged the county to undertake measures that will stop groundwater pumping and properly drilling from drying up these streams and damaging very important fish habitat.
Now, a Sonoma County Superior Courtroom decide has sided with environmental teams, ruling that the county violated state legislation and failed to fulfill its obligations to guard so-called public belief sources when officers adopted guidelines for wells below an amended native ordinance.
“We have long known that excessive well pumping can harm our public trust resources, such as salmon and steelhead,” says Don McEnhill, govt director of the nonprofit group Russian Riverkeeper. “We’re seeing major degradation in habitat.”
Coho salmon are listed as an endangered species, whereas steelhead are listed as threatened. Each spawn in Russian River tributaries together with Mill, Mark West and Inexperienced Valley creeks.
The court docket’s determination underlines a authorized requirement that California counties be sure that unchecked groundwater pumping isn’t drying up streams and threatening the survival of species, stated Sean Bothwell, govt director of California Coastkeeper Alliance.
“Groundwater and surface water are connected, essentially the same thing, and they need to be managed the same way,” Bothwell stated. “We really hope this ruling leads counties to be proactive, to manage the system as a whole.”
Bothwell stated the environmental teams filed the lawsuit as a result of Sonoma County “was just handing out groundwater permits without any review or analysis of the impact to the river.”
An uncovered gravel bar stretches alongside the Russian River in Healdsburg, Calif., in June 2021.
(Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Occasions)
Coastkeeper Alliance initially sued the county in 2021 below the general public belief doctrine — the precept that sure pure sources have to be preserved for the general public. That case was settled in 2022, when county supervisors quickly paused the issuing of properly permits and started work amending the county’s properly ordinance.
Final yr, Sonoma County supervisors permitted amendments that, in line with the county’s web site, “create a new regulatory process that considers potential adverse impacts on public trust resources, such as habitat for coho salmon, when approving well permits.”
Nevertheless, leaders of the environmental teams argued the measures fell brief and lacked adequate evaluation.
One other downside, McEnhill stated, was that the county nonetheless wasn’t requiring properly homeowners to put in meters to measure and report how a lot water they pump.
“It was kind of like posting a speed limit on the highway and having no cops enforcing it,” he stated. “When it comes to water, when it’s a ‘trust me’ situation, that’s never been proven to work in California — or anywhere else in the country.”
A small quantity of water flowed in Mill Creek, a tributary of the Russian River, throughout the drought in June 2021.
(Don McEnhill)
Plaintiffs argued the county failed to satisfy its obligations below the general public belief doctrine in addition to the California Environmental High quality Act (CEQA).
Superior Courtroom Decide Bradford DeMeo agreed in his Aug. 21 ruling, writing that based mostly on earlier instances, the state has “an affirmative duty to take the public trust into account when making decisions affecting the waters.”
Bothwell stated this was the primary time a California court docket has required a county to contemplate public belief sources when issuing permits for brand spanking new wells.
Sonoma County officers had been upset with the court docket’s ruling, stated Paul Gullixson, a county spokesperson. He stated the ruling adopted “a robust public policy making process with considerable public, scientific, and technical input, that took the public trust doctrine and CEQA compliance seriously.”
Gullixson stated in an e mail that county officers are awaiting the ultimate judgment within the case, which can begin a 60-day interval for submitting an enchantment.
Till that remaining determination is issued, the county is constant its regular technique of reviewing purposes and issuing permits for wells, Gullixson stated. If Sonoma County decides to enchantment, any keep of the choice would enable the county to proceed issuing permits below the amended ordinance pending the end result of that case.
The environmental teams stated the ruling means the county might want to analyze the “cumulative impacts” of permitting the drilling of extra wells, and undertake measures to make sure safety of creeks when new wells are licensed.
The choice ought to result in science-based limitations on well-drilling and pumping the place crucial to guard the circulation of streams that fish rely on, McEnhill stated.
“We see a pathway to resolving this issue,” he stated. “Our goal is to provide enough water so that salmon can persist.”
California’s groundwater legislation contains provisions supposed to guard groundwater-dependent ecosystems. However many of those weak pure areas are positioned outdoors regulated groundwater basins. Scientists have discovered that only one% of the state’s groundwater-dependent ecosystems are sufficiently protected below measures adopted thus far.
McEnhill stated that’s the case in Sonoma County, the place creeks that present priceless fish habitat and are in danger lie outdoors areas focused for measures to deal with overpumping below the Sustainable Groundwater Administration Act.
Bothwell stated the objective in Sonoma and elsewhere ought to be to stability the calls for of these diverting floor water and people pumping groundwater with the wants of fish and ecosystems, notably throughout extreme droughts, that are more and more being intensified by local weather change.
“Our biggest goal is to bring the watershed into balance,” Bothwell stated.
How the county responds is very necessary, he stated, as a result of the state’s groundwater legislation — which requires addressing overpumping by 2040 in lots of areas — is shifting “too slow, quite frankly, to address the issues that the Russian River watershed is dealing with now.”
