Re: Conservation, Fishing and Tribal Comments on Bureau of Reclamation Mid-Pacific Region December 2019 Central Valley Project Final Cost Allocation Study (CAS)

CLICK HERE to view full Comments document.

January 2, 2020

Brenda Burman, Commissioner
Bureau of Reclamation
1849 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20240-0001

There are four over-arching and fundamental flaws with the Bureau of Reclamation’s CVP Final Cost Allocation Study:

1. Reclamation’s proposal makes a mockery of a Supreme Court determination about Reclamation’s program.1 The Supreme Court, in 1958, in a well-known case involving the Reclamation program in California described the purpose of the Reclamation Act as providing, “the greatest good to the greatest number of people.” The Bureau of Reclamation, in the pending Cost Allocation Study, inverted that principle and instead is providing the greatest financial good to a few people.
2. Reclamation overturns the “user pays” principle pledged by water users. Reclamation ignores the public pledge by water users that “beneficiaries pay.” Instead, they design a cost allocation system that relieves water contractors (recipients of subsidized water from Reclamation’s dams, reservoirs, pumping stations and canals) of substantial portions of the very costs they previously agreed to pay.
3. Reclamation’s proposal uses regulatory reform as a platform to impose hidden tax responsibilities on taxpayers in California and throughout the Nation. The Bureau of Reclamation’s pending Cost Allocation Study methodology is, in effect, a secret, undisclosed and unauthorized tax on everyone, but select California water users. The precise size of the “water tax” is unknown, but suffice to say, it involves potentially millions of dollars.
4. Reclamation requests comments on a proposal, yet key portions are knowingly withheld during the comment period. The Reclamation proposal is an administrative act of public deception. During the comment period, the Bureau of Reclamation has been withholding key documents, attachments, and supporting documentation essential to Study analysis. This undermines the integrity of this comment process. We are left with no choice, but to believe that your Agency is knowingly and willfully withholding – hiding – critical documentation, information and analysis.

We request that you order the withdrawal of this CVP Final Cost Allocation Study. Attached to this letter is a summary of previous and some additional detailed comments, including links to previous comment letters submitted by the signatory groups. Thank you for the opportunity to comment.

1 Ivanhoe Irrigation Dist. v. McCracken, 357 U.S. 275 (1958)