By Herbert A. Sample — Bee San Francisco Bureau
Published 2:15 am PST Thursday, December 2, 2004

OAKLAND – A Bay Area business group has begun marshaling forces to fight the idea of restoring Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park by dismantling an 80-year-old dam.

Concerned by public relations successes by advocates of the valley’s restoration, the Bay Area Council has begun asking members to communicate with political leaders on the issue.

“The Bay Area Council is building a coalition to oppose the removal of Hetch Hetchy,” the group’s e-mail to members stated. “To protect Hetch Hetchy is not to be hostile to environmental quality; it is to be honest and rational about the importance of water to the Bay Area.”

The group, representing 275 of the region’s largest employers, established a page on its Web site (www.bayareacouncil.org) that can generate e-mail, faxes or letters to state lawmakers.

In late September, the conservation group Environmental Defense proposed replacing Hetch Hetchy by enlarging other reservoirs, increasing use of groundwater exchanges and purchasing water from irrigation districts.

Six weeks later, the Schwarzenegger administration announced it would prepare an assessment of previous studies on the feasibility of demolishing O’Shaughnessy Dam, replacing the water and power now provided by Hetch Hetchy to Bay Area and Central Valley consumers, and restoring the valley.

Schwarzenegger aides said the state is not planning to conduct a full-blown analysis and is not taking a position on the concept.

But even before that announcement, Bay Area Council officers were taking note of the increased chatter about Hetch Hetchy and decided to launch their organizing effort.

“It’s essential,” said Andrew Michael, the council’s vice president for resources. “Basically, the Bay Area depends on this water; 2.4 million residents use the water in four different counties.”

Dozens of businesses rely on the water’s unique purity, he added. Decreasing water quality by altering the Hetch Hetchy system will “shoot another hole in the economic competitiveness of the region,” Michael said. “Our chief executive officers that we work with are saying it’s tough already, and you’re going to make it worse.”

The council also contends that demolishing the dam would lessen San Francisco’s rights to Tuolumne River water, which flows through Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, and would upset the ongoing CalFed process – a state-federal program aimed at boosting water supplies and restoring the health of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

Groups advocating Hetch Hetchy’s restoration took issue with those predictions.

Ron Good, executive director of Restore Hetch Hetchy, said the council’s assertions are “really scaring people, and there’s no need to be scaring anybody.”

Good added that San Francisco’s Tuolumne River rights currently are junior to those held by the Modesto and Turlock irrigation districts.

Jerry Meral, a member of Restore Hetch Hetchy’s board and co-chairman of CalFed’s water supply committee, said restoring Hetch Hetchy would not damage CalFed. “That is the ultimate of ironies,” Meral said, noting that the Hetch Hetchy system is not part of CalFed and makes no releases to the San Joaquin Delta. “They don’t do anything to protect the Delta today.”

About the writer:

The Bee’s Herbert A. Sample can be reached at (510) 382-1978 or hsample@sacbee.com.