Other water districts for the Restoration Projects that they have accomplished to reduce the predator pressure and they found that they failed to reduce the predator pressure, and finally a testimony that i can send to you electronic form, from dr. Peter moyle who is often a consultant and finding that predator control, and in the form that is being discussed for these rivers. And it is an unknown quantity and as likely to have negative effects as positive effects. So, you know, there are things that we can do for sure. And that is why frankly, our coalition and Bay Institute is only asking for 50 percent of the water in the river, and no one is asking for 100 percent of the water. I should also just add based on the comments that i heard about this great fear that San Francisco will run out of water or Something Like that, and i understand the city does not, and the puc ee desire to plan for an 8 year drought such as we have never seen before and that makes sense to me, but realize that the state water boards tolerance for risk is not what the city is tolerance for risk is and so in the previous drought years, they have waived their Water Quality regulations three of the five brought years because in order to increase and so the notion that anybody in San Francisco is going to turn on their faucet and not have water as a result of regulations to protect the fish is far fetched. Could it take the plays of the flows from february to june. No, and of course it depends on how you define the functional flows, what that means is how much do the fish need in this time period and lets turn on and open up the reservoir and let that exact amount of water flow and when we get to the end of that period we shut it off and so we get a very blocky hydrgraph, the amount of water flowing at any given time and it is you know, a flat level of flow and then it drops to a flat level of flow and increases based on what we think that the fish need. The problem with that approach, where we are using that approach solely, is that what the fish are really adapted to is variability and river flow, if you look at, you know, the storm comes through and the river flow goes up, and the storm passes and the river flow goes down, and the snow melt goes down, and they are actually adapted to that kind of variability, whereas the nonnative predators that the bass that the people want to eliminate are not adapted to that and do poorly in those kinds of conditions. And so with the mix of intell gept management of the water that we have, we are not going to have the entire river, with he know that, and tieing the flows that are in the river to natural conditions, that is the functional flow, and the variability that you get from tieing your flows to what is out there in the environment and what will be melting and you know, if it is raining there are storm clouds, right . It is a little cooler and those conditions combined, with run off from below the dam to make the better conditions, whereas just opening up the reservoir is not going to do that. So as i said, the state board proposal took all sorts of testimony on functional flows, and actually rolled that into a much more functional proposal that included natural variability. Okay, and then one last question, so the scientists, and the science says you need, 60 percent of unimpaired flows, you are saying, 50 percent. You are asking for 50 percent. So, is 40 percent then unimpaired flows, useless in i would not say that it is useless, i mean that we are talking about salmon populations here, salmon are among the easiery resources to restore. So, when we say that we have tried as hard as we can and looked at all of the various science and think that we can squeak by with 50 percent that means that 50 percent to get the legally required populations of salmon restored to these. 40 percent will not accomplish that legal requirement. That is not to say that it will not have benefits there are water qualities in the delta and the bacteria and the desolved oxygen that i mentioned that may be partially addressed by this and the salmon populations may be seem to understand what the stay us quo is rapid decline, okay . And so increasing the conditions for improving the conditions for the fish, and making them decline to extinction a little more slowly is not really a benefit. But it is not that there is no benefit at all to 40 percent, it is just not really going to address this problem. I mean that we are talking about a river that has far less than half of its water in it. Its really in miserable shape. Thank you. Sure. Thank you. I just have one question, is your organization participating in the settlement discussions . My organization is participating in the settlement conversations, those conversations have actually been going on, for approximately two years now and maybe a little longer. They have sort of rebooted when the state brought in former secretary babbot to lead the conversations but these are ongoing conversations. And i just, i should add that if we made it very clear to the state water board that if the Comment Period is extended again, it has already been extended twice, this plan is already about ten years overdue. Then we dont see any sign related to that continued conversations are going to get us anywhere. So we are trying to do our best and participate in good faith, but you know the river and the bay delta ecosystem will not wait forever. Thank you. Thanks. Okay, next speaker . John . I think that it is still morning, the executive director of the golden gate salmon association. We represent the short and commercial salmon fisherman. We are hoping that the board of supervisors will lead here in policy, we need to get more water back in the bay to restore our salmon runs and i just want to point out that i think that everybody here knows that salmon lives part of the life in fresh water and part in the so shen, i am here to tell you that the ocean is doing its part. There is bet aout there to eat and, they are fine to get there, their problem is when they are two or three or four inches long and they are trying to get out of these fresh Water Systems that are starved of waur. I can report to you, that i mean, what is Fishermans Wharf without the fisherman . Part of what we are asking here today is to help us revitalize a part of the economy that is not just commercial, and sport, but also the seafood processors, the restaurants who are all demanding real honest to god, wild caught california salmon. I think that people in San Francisco know the difference between foreign fish and i am here to tell you that with restaurant demand, a lot of the businesses being lost to alaska. It does not have to be that way. We can rebuild our salmon runs here to a healthy level, it would not take a whole lot. I think that you probably know that in 2008 and 2009, we were completely shut down from fishing salmon out on the ocean. The reason why is because deversions from the delta shot up in the year, 2000 by about, 16 peshs and it took a bunch of litigation to get those deversions back almost in a reasonable limit. We saw our salmon run slightly rebuild along came the drought and commercial fisherman are looking at a very poor season this year. We are still suffering the hang over from the drought and next year we are more hopeful, 2019. Should be a good one. And due to this flood that we are getting. But we are looking to you for leadership. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Cindy charles . Hello, high mame is Cindy Charles and i am the conservation person for the last 16 years and a former chair for the California Federation of fly fishers. I am here today to share my observations on why now the proposal by the state water board to increase the flows on the rivers is really our last best chance to attempt to restore these rivers. To lets see, it is really our last best chance. There should be no more delays in this process. The concept of a more balanced use of water in these three water sheds should not be considered a radical step, but a long overdue rebalancing of a public resource to a broader beneficial use. I grew up in San Francisco, drinking the water and learned to fish on salmon with on fishing trips with my father, my now adult sons fish fishing trip was near camp maeser, healthy salmon are a part of my familys life and history. I fear a feature without salmon to share with my grandchildren. I have fished the lower sections for 25 years, i have been a witness of the diminish quality of the resources and seen the habitat degraded over many seasons and water year types. Three years after higher, flow years, salmon returned numbers show a large increase. These differences can be dramatic as in 1985, when 40,000 salmon returned. And in the fall, of 2015, the returns were sadly less than 1,000. The numbers of people seeking recreation and natural areas is increasing annually. As the economic importance of those visitors. Recreational fishing does have value as fisherman spend their dollars on guides, lodging food, and gas and often in are you rural communities, which depend upon the source of this income. We need the state water board to move forward now, on this proposal to increase the flow to support the restoration of the bay delta system. Thank you. Next speaker, darcy loose . Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to address you today. My name is darcy loose and i am here representing the friends, and a nonprofit organization, bay area residents, clearly believe that the health of our environment should be a priority, in passed surveys 92 percent of the bay area voters have agreed that it is important for the reagains economy to have a healthy and a clean vibrant San Francisco bay, we passed measure aa by over twothirds vote, passing in all nine counties to fund the wet land Restoration Projects about you those projects will need vast quantities of settlement that come from large amounts, when we allow the fresh water flows to carry them from the river to the bay. Our Regional Government and elected officials around the bay have echoed support for the bay and the state boards efforts multiple times and i can provide the supporting materials, electronically. In 2012, the association of the governments passed a resolution, urging that the protext of the restoration of the healthy echo system includes, the adequate Water Quality, and the water supply to support the water supplies. Since then, similar resolutions have passed in 7 of the nine bay area counties, including the city and county of San Francisco, in 2014. More recently abag received it from the trust on phase one updates to the bay delta, control plan and voted to send a letter of supporting the state boards efforts. We cant afford to delay the completing of the water control plan up dates any longer, Governor Brown said in the letter to the state board last year, saying that the need to improve the eco systems is urgent, over 100 environmental organizations and 11 members of the bay area, agreed in their letters to the state board last year, urging expedited completing of the p dates, they do not preinclude the possibility of agreements to implement the plan, in fact, they have suppressed or expressed support to negotiated settlements among the shaek holders. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next, speaker ben ikenburg . Good afternoon, supervisors my name is stan and i am here on behalf of the San Francisco bay keeper and more than 5,000 members of supporters in the bay area. The state board revisions to the bay delta Water Quality plan are necessary and should not be delayed. The bay delta is in crisis, and we get 50 percent of the natural flow as it is, and . Years less than 35 percent, and reduced the flows from the bay are harmful to the birds and the fish and the marine animals and the smells are nearing extinction if not already there. The impact for the fishing tree, from these reduced flows of manifest and the industry for 267. 8 million in 20153, and 215 in 20 is 4, and 2008 and 2009 the commercial fishing season was cancelled. And now the three under consideration by the state board have in the past accounted for 400,000 salmon. Right now, there is zero salmon that is fishable in becoming out of those. And the state board has a legal right and an obligation to issue the Water Quality standards that protect the state trust. So this is a negotiate and this is already a compromise that we are looking at. That is revisions to the Water Quality plan are necessary and should not longer be delayed. The bay area should be a leader, and the sfpuc should be a leader, the last up date was only 20 years ago, a plan from 1995, and the latest review from 2009 and there have no reviews even though they are required and standards are lord over the last two or three years by the urge change petitions and this process has dragged on too long and it is mentioned that the letters from the eleven legislators of eleven organizations expedited process, and voluntariary can fit, and we need the state board standards to provide those standards, and the comment deadline should not be extended and we need no more delays and we have the science. I have one question. So essential valley agriculture interest, one or need more water diversions . How does that effect the agriculture and communities in the delta itself . The more water that is taken out by the state Water Project and the Central Valley project and that impacts the local communities because they have and they are related to the salt water intrusion and that is the Water Quality and so it is additional withdraw and so that is a function that the state water board has to analyze during its when it evaluated whether peoples rights will be impacted by additional withdraws, but i know that those communities are very concerned about additional withdraws. And additional flows help insure that those communities can stay healthy and have healthy high Water Quality. Thank you. Next speaker, bill marlin . Thank you very much. I would like to step back for just a moment look think about the plan itself. You go to the web page you supply mental environmental document. 24 chapters. 14 appendixes over 3,000 pages. These pages contain hundreds of graphs and tables as well as references to scientific studies and reports supporting the written comments. It has taken the board the state water board years to produce this. This is one example. Chapter 19. Analysis of the benefits to native fish from increased flows from february first to june 30th. This chapter alone is 120 pages. Eleven of those pages is a list of references used in just that one chapter. A second example appendix c. Which is a Technical Report that provides the data for the writing of chapter 19. That appendix is 289 pages long. And it provides detailed information regarding what the background and the scientific back up for the plan as drafted. One example from appendix c, one of many, on page 321. There was a graph. And it shows the salmon escapement from these three tributaries from 1952 to 2010, when there is a period of high water flows, such as the late 1990s, you have a huge spike in salmon escapement. Folks, those are unimpaired flows. Just like what we have flowing down that river right now today. Is unimpaired flow. That is what the state board wants to produce. Thank you very much. Next speaker peter drucmeyer. Good day, i am peter with the river trust. And i am going to go through these slides really quickly. First one it shows the direct correlation between unimpaired flow and hel yth salmon populations. Second one shows just how much the tualami suffers in the drought of the dry year, critically dry for the fish and wild life down stream. Page 2 top slide shows what 40 percent between february and june would look like. An improvement and not the 60 percent, but that the science tell us is necessary. The bottom one focuses again on the idea of adapted management that we establish the biological goals and objectives and we can accomplish them with lower flows and it can go as long as the 30 percent, and you believe that it is strongly and Habitat Restoration would like that component and page 3, a lot of misinformation out there and this is an op ed signed by the general managers. And talking about jobs lost, and 49 billion in decreased sales. The slide right below that tells you about water use and how it is declined, we have done a great job at conservation. Page 4 at the top, shows that we have reduced the water use, 30 percent in the last ten years. The next slide explains the flaws in the study. And then on page 5, it shows what the two studies projected would be losses. And you would see 49 billion at the bottom under 2009. There are 2014 report did not have the loss and we had 30 percent and we did not get the 6. 5 billion, and below that we did not get the job loss, on page 6, at the top. The jobs actually grew. And at the bottom, we each see that at the height of the drought we still are enough water in storage to last for three years. Page 7, the last page, shows that in december, after a normal year last year, we had enough water in the last five years, and then in this bottom one, if you would like to ask me a question about it, i would like to explain to you. Wow. Could you explain this last slide. Okay. So we created a little model that assumes that water demand rebounces to where it was before the drought. And that there is the 40 percent unimpaired flow from february to june and the San Francisco puc is responsible for half of the unimpaired flow. Which is an established but that would be the very highest end. And we would survive the 6 year drought of record, 87 to 9 2, and where you get into the trouble is that you get into these year seven and eight, which is never occurred and we should plan for them, but there is a lot to we can do to plan for them. So the bottom line is that we cannot allow the bay delta, and the rivers to die because we are worried about a 7 or 8 year drought that has never happened, we need to Work Together to make sure that we have the insurance but we need to take action on the bay delta now. I have another question for you, one of what i think is a compelling and what worries me argument of the sfpuc is that even if we increased water flow, then it might be diverted by other interests in the area. Could you respond to that . Well, we share that concern, and we are we want to make sure that the flow makes it all the way out into the bay. So that is going to be in the next phase of the bay delta plan. And i assure you the Environmental Community is united that we do not want noo he additional water pumped. And that is a big argument in the Central Valley and it is based on conjecture but that the governor wants to steal their water and send it down to la. I dont think that is the case. We are going to you know fight alongside with them to make sure that it makes it to the bay. Okay. I will say that it is something that we worries me quite a bit. It makes it. Yeah i have one question. Yeah, so the sfpuc is working to establish a voluntariary settlement with other interested parties, should we just wait for that agreement to be concluded . Well, you know, we have been in negotiations on it for about two and a half years. And you know it is a great opportunity to get to know each other and to hear each others concerns or visions but we hit a stalemate when it comes to flow, and i cant go into details because there is a confidentiality agreement. But what it really inspired more discussion is the release of the sed, on september 15th. And the original comment deadline was november, 15th and it was extended to january, 17th and extended again to march 17th, and so six months of comment. And that is not going to be end of settlement discussions. Because a decision is not even going to be made until september, so if everyone comes together, and says, hey, we have a compromise, and its you know, we dont all love it, but we can live with it. It will make the state water board decision a lot easier. And so the comment deadline is important to maintain as it is and it does not stop any Settlement Agreements but it gives us one more deadline to start working towards. And i will tell you we did have an official Settlement Agreement with the sfpuc, and i never described it that way, before. But in 2008, with the water system improvement program, we supported the seismic up grades to the system but there was a plan there to divert up to 25 million gallons more. And we will cap the sales until 2018 and we will Work Together on our concerns. We felt that the potential for Water Conservation was under estimate and that the demand projections future demand were exaggerate and we all started working together and we were all on the same boat and we have been amazing work and 30 percent reduction in ten years, so you can see those figures, maybe i didnt include them. I guess that i didnt include those. So any way, i think that discussions are always a great idea. This settlement, this voluntariary agreement process is not moving quickly at all. Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker, dave warner . I am honored to be speaking, i am here representing myself. I am here to ask you to start the process of creating a water imports reduction goal. And i think that you might find this some what interesting. First of all though the benefits of reducing imports are huge in addition to the environmental benefits think of what it would mean to water reliability if we reduce by 20 percent, we would all of a sudden have saved a full year of water reserves which say huge amount. A full year, but the thing that i really want to point out are two amazing Southern California cities, and your question, we in the los angeles water and power 2013, water plan, i was for it, i grew up in Southern California, they were the big bad guy. They have set a goal to reduce their water imports from 85 percent today to 50 percent by 2040. Now that is a long time. But what a radical concept. And when you look at the numbers, i am off track here, but it works out to be reduce the use, and it is a huge thing. And the state Water Project, but arent they going the right direction and shouldnt we be doing the same. The one other city is santa monica i am in shock. They said by 2020, we are going to reduce our water imports to zero. And that is just unbelievable and i think that they are right now, water imports are 45 percent down to 86. And the last thing that i will mention is Orange County which you heard about this, this he have a wonderful water recycling water, 100 million going to 130 million, where that can represent that project alone and, 20 percent of the annual water use will come from recycled water. There are so many things that we can do that by starting out and set to reach a goal is sort of make a whole discussion about the state Water Project moved. Thank you very much. Chris gilbert . Hello, i am a volunteer with the sierra club and i think that i reflect the general population, and i dont have the expertise that the scientists and the activists have. I see the voluntariary agreement pushed as a way of delaying it. On the other hand, the sfpuc them schls have said that pursuing voluntariary agreements is not a stall tactic. Exists previous settlement discussions have not had a driver at the state water board proposal is a new driver, that is a true value of the straight water board proposal and it is compelling the parties to come to the negotiating table. So the sfpuc themselves said that the state water boards proposal is a moving force, and it should not be it should be supported. And another point is all of the valley water should share the load in protecting. And the third is evidence that increased water flows will improve conditions on the tributaries, in the lower san jose, valley and in the delta, and so the science is strong and we have shown that. And one person here cited from the actual document. Finally, the bay area needs to lead on this issue to counter balance Central Valley interest. And the Central Valley, agriculture has been a poor ste ward and they have over used ground water and planted what urt kro pz and used fake science to assert that water flows dont matter. And argue that they dont have enough water while at the same time planting new orchards. The bay area needs to be a leader with a weeks notice we turned out 40 people at the sfpuc on meeting. We have 300 letters. Thank you. Thank you very much. Last speaker, adrian covert . Thank you. I am with the Bay Area Council and i just want to mention that i think that the plan is good intentions. But there are significant details that are lacking that caused us to have some significant concerns about the plan. Without any
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