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County loses place on flood board Governor replaces entire Reclamation Board

Published in the Stockton Record on 09/29/05

County loses place on flood board - Governor replaces entire Reclamation Board

Hank Shaw - Capitol Bureau Chief
Published Thursday, Sep 29, 2005

SACRAMENTO -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday sacked the entire state Reclamation Board, replacing the academics and local government officials serving on the Central Valley's flood-control panel with engineers and farmers.

San Joaquin County lost its representation on the panel in the process.

Schwarzenegger's switch marks an ideological shift in the board: It is now comprised of builders, people eager to strengthen and widen the Valley's 1,600-mile levee system so it can protect the millions of Californians who rely on it.

The old board, appointed by former Gov. Gray Davis, recognized the need to maintain the levees but encouraged several alternatives bitterly opposed by the building trades and the agriculture industry.

Debate in the flood-fighting community centers on whether the existing system of reservoirs, dams and levees can contain the frequent floods that soak the Central Valley in winter and spring.

Engineers such as new board member Cheryl Bly-Chester of Roseville say it can and point to structural solutions, such as bigger levees and flood-friendly building codes that force homes in risky areas to be built on high foundations. Weatherbee Lake near Lathrop already does this.

"There are lots of different approaches to doing things," Bly-Chester said. "But I'm such an engineer, I think there's an engineering solution to everything."

Outgoing board member Jeffrey Mount, a geologist from the University of California, Davis, rejects that approach.

"Most of the pressure these days is to put Band-Aids on the levees," Mount said. "The existing design is inadequate to support urbanization."

Mount views even a proposed $1 billion fix for the Valley's levees as little more than a very big Band-Aid. Fixing them could prevent fiascoes such as that at Jones Tract last year, but floods are becoming so fierce that even a shipshape system cannot contain them.

Development is a prime reason: As the Valley grows, concrete and asphalt replaces dirt. Then, water flows over -- not into -- the earth. That means more runoff and fiercer floods.

And even big levees fail. The walls protecting New Orleans were considerably stronger than anything surrounding even Stockton and Sacramento, which have the strongest protection in the Valley.

The damage could be severe. In San Joaquin County alone, a Record investigation last spring found that at least 30,000 houses in flood-prone areas have been built or approved by local governments since the last major flood, in 1997.

Mount says any engineering solution must include a pressure valve like a floodway -- such as Paradise Cut in the Delta or the giant Yolo Bypass west of Sacramento -- or a setback levee, which allows a river to expand by flooding the man-made flood plain between the levee wall and the riverbed.

Bly-Chester says setting back levees from the river channel is simply "not the first, best use of the land."

Bly-Chester's view is echoed by the agriculture, real estate and construction industries, which have provided Schwarzenegger with more than 25 cents of every dollar he's raised, according to state records.

Schwarzenegger said in an interview with The Record last week that one of his top priorities is finding cash to make the estimated $1 billion in levee repairs needed for the Valley. He said he's considering supporting a massive bond that would include that money sponsored by Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata. Perata says it could appear as early as the June ballot.

But bond money is temporary, so Schwarzenegger's Department of Water Resources devised a "flood fee" earlier this year as a stable source of funding for levee repair.

Farmers have fought the proposed flood fee, and legislation that originally included the fee has stalled.

Bly-Chester said she supports the fee idea and wants it assessed based on risk. The theory is that if a developer builds a subdivision within Frisbee distance of a levee, he is free to do so -- but he would have to pay a higher fee to help maintain that levee.

She says such a policy's effect would be similar to what the old board wanted, which was to use its bully pulpit to limit development in risky areas. The old board made such an announcement last month in Fresno.

Speculation was that Schwarzenegger sacked the old board in retaliation. But both new and old board members said the shift had been in the works for months.

Stockton's Floyd Weaver was one of those replaced. He did not know of the governor's move until a reporter told him Wednesday.

"I guess that's that," Weaver said. "The new board members have a lot to learn awful fast. I just hope they won't be too lenient with the developers."

Contact Capitol Bureau Chief Hank Shaw at 916 441-4078 or sacto@recordnet.com

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