[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 62 (Tuesday, May 8, 2001)]
[House]
[Page H1957]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                UPDATE ON CRISIS AFFECTING KLAMATH BASIN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. WALDEN of Oregon. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to update my 
colleagues in the House on the crisis affecting the people of the 
Klamath Basin in Oregon and California.
  Yesterday I attended what was called a ``bucket brigade.'' We had 
buckets like these representing each of the 50 States where we took 
water out of the lake and symbolically handed it down a chain of people 
1.2 miles long to dump it in the A-Canal that this year will have no 
water in it.
  These are the people that were at the rally. In all my years in 
public office, here and in Oregon, I have never seen close to 16,000 
people turn out to protest a government action, but that occurred in 
Klamath Falls yesterday; peaceful, civil disobedience, making the case 
for reforming the Endangered Species Act.
  Let me tell you what people are saying. Let me share with you some of 
the letters and comments. This from a Vietnam veteran who earned a 
medal for heroism, who flies in the Klamath Basin in a crop duster: 
``When the season starts up, we have just about used all our savings 
from the previous season. Taxes take a huge chunk out of my check. 
Since I have no retirement plan from work, I have to put what little I 
can into that. We have house payments due, food to put on the table, 
heating bills. I have no money left. I am going to have to start 
drawing from our IRA; and with penalties and interest, that is a poor 
option, but all I have. We are going to lose our house. We can't sell 
it, because everyone here is in the same boat. It is worth nothing. 
Help us.''
  And this from a woman from Malin: ``The decision of no water for 
irrigation comes as a major disaster to our small communities of Malin 
and Merrill, Tooley Lake. The government can offer low interest loans, 
but who will be able to ever pay them back. Our spirit is broken. How 
can the government ever be trusted again? Contracts for water in the 
Klamath project, where, by the way, there are 1,000 farmers that will 
not get water this year for the first time since this project was 
created nearly 100 years ago, contracts for this water have been broken 
and our water stolen. Why would we build more storage, to have it taken 
away by another group? There are school football fields and city parks 
that will get no water this summer.''
  Mr. Speaker, there have already been traffic accidents on the major 
highway because this area is turning into a dust bowl, and it will this 
summer, because the government has said it needs all the water for the 
suckers in Klamath Lake and for the salmon in Klamath River.
  So the ``reasonable'' and ``prudent'' decision of the government, and 
I put those two words in quotes, is to say the ranchers and the farmers 
can have no water; the schools that rely on the water for their fields 
and the cities for their parks will have no water; the people will have 
no income; the people will have no livelihood.
  They have no way to survive if they have no water to put on their 
crops, because nothing will be raised, nothing will be grown, nothing 
will be harvested, because the Endangered Species Act as written today 
makes no provision for people, for communities like Klamath Falls or 
Malin or Merrill or Tooley Lake.

                              {time}  1945

  No, these people are left off the plate. They have no seat at the 
table of public policy. They are being wiped out by this decision. It 
is wrong. The time has come to change and amend the Endangered Species 
Act so that we do not make these unilateral decisions that wipe people 
out.
  Mr. Speaker, 16,000 people in the Klamath Basin turned out yesterday 
to try to get the attention of the country, to get the attention of 
this Congress that change is needed. We can work together to have a 
cleaner environment, but we do not have to wipe agriculture off the map 
to do it. We can work together to provide for habitat for fish, but we 
do not have to create a dust bowl to do it. We do not have to rely on 
science that is now being questioned by those who have finally had an 
opportunity to look at it who say, maybe that science is not right.
  But let me tell my colleagues, on April 6, the decision was made: the 
headgates will be closed and they will be closed all year. The water 
will not flow. It is too late to plant. The contracts will be lost. 
Farmers have nothing to put in the ground, and if they did, no water to 
make it grow.
  So, we will approach this Congress for disaster relief. It is an 
option we wish we did not have to take; but we will, because we have no 
other option for this year. We will approach this Congress and 
vigorously fight for changes in the Endangered Species Act. This can 
happen to you, because it has happened to these people who fight for 
our country and provided for our people and farmed the land.

                          ____________________