By Dan Bacher

Tribal leaders, Delta farmers, conservationists and environmental justice advocates rallied for the imperiled Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta on the west steps of the Capitol last Friday. As they held signs proclaiming “Pro Delta Means No Tunnel” and “Stop the $100 Billion Delta Tunnel,” they called on lawmakers to defend the state’s water rights, environmental protections and public due process from Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative leaders’ attempts to bypass all of those via new trailer bills benefiting Big Ag and water agencies in Southern California.

Newsom continues to argue that approving the controversial Delta Tunnel before he leaves office is vital to California’s ability capture, store and move water, as well as safeguard the state’s utilities against natural disaster.

The gathering followed a day of advocacy where dozens of Delta supporters held more than 100 meetings in Sacramento to express their collective opposition to the Delta Conveyance Project and Water Quality Plan CEQA Exemption trailer bills, according to the nonprofit Restore the Delta.

Advocates expect the reintroduction of Delta Tunnel trailer bills to be imminent as the deadlines to introduce bill language on Sept. 8 and the end of session September 12 draw near. Groups remain committed to opposing what Restore the Delta characterizes as an ”alarming push to override public participation in order to prioritize special water and agricultural interests.”

Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta, moderated the Capitol’s protest.

She was joined by Malissa Tayaba, the Vice-Chair of the Shingle Springs Band of Miwok Indians and the tribe’s Director of Traditional Ecological Knowledge. Tayaba provided the opening comments, exposing how the proponents of the Delta Tunnel were trying to coopt the language of a bill her tribe sponsored.

“My tribe was displaced from our ancestral villages along the Sacramento River and Delta waterways, but we have not and will not abandon our role as guardians of the water,” said Tayaba. “For the past two years, we have sponsored legislation to give tribal water uses the same legal protections as other water uses in the state. Each year our bill was held due to unreasonable fiscal estimates.” 

Tayaba added, “However, a few days ago, we learned that proponents of the Delta Conveyance Project were trying to co-opt our bill language to gain support for the trailer bills the Governor has been pushing since May.”

Then, the tribal leader set the record straight: “We are vehemently opposed to the trailer bills and categorically reject any attempt to use our bill language in any deal. Anyone claiming that we would support either trailer bill, if our bill advances, is lying. Passage of either trailer bill would undermine our ability to maintain our cultural traditions and sovereignty. The CEQA trailer bill would eliminate the opportunity for analysis and review of tribal cultural impacts in water quality control plans – it is an erasure of the commitments the Governor and the legislature have made to repair relationships with California tribes … Our people and our region are not a sacrifice zone. We will continue to speak out to protect and maintain our culture.”

Gary Mulcahy, Government Liaison with the Winnemem Wintu Tribe – one of the most-historically harmed indigenous groups by state and federal water policy – pointed out how the Delta Tunnel would benefit only corporate agribusiness interests and big water agencies.

“There is nothing about the Delta Tunnel project that significantly benefits anyone except Big Ag and south of the Delta water agencies, while putting endangered species, tribal cultural resources, and disadvantaged communities and the viability of the S.F Bay-Delta itself at risk,” Mulcahy stressed. “CEQA exemptions continue to attempt to erase tribes from water governance.”

Mulcahy, who refers to Governor Newsom as “Donald Newsom” for pushing Trump-like water policies, summed his thoughts up on the west steps by saying, “California water policy sucks: It’s not just about the Delta Tunnel. It’s all about taking water from the north and sending it south.” 

Keiko Merz, Policy Director of Friends of the River, also spoke. Merz discussed the long history of the attempts by politicians to build a tunnel that would divert even more water from Delta.

“For half a century, politicians have tried to repackage the Delta Tunnel as the solution to our water challenges,” Merz pointed out. “From the peripheral canal, to WaterFix, and now this tunnel, every version has been defeated not by accident, but because Californians know a bad deal when they see it. Now instead of listening, the Governor is trying to take away our tools to say no by gutting CEQA and cutting the public out of the process. Californians deserve better than political shortcuts and backroom deals. These trailer bills are an attempt to silence the public, sideline science and push and push through bad ideas that the people of California have rejected time and time again.”

The tribes, environmental groups and fishing communities continue to warn that the Delta Tunnel would devastate the region’s ecosystem, displace communities and undermine both economic and cultural livelihoods in the estuary, and do so at the time when its waters are in their biggest ever ecological crisis.

Commercial salmon fishing has been closed for the past three years, due to the collapse of the Sacramento River and Klamath River fall-run Chinook salmon populations. The Delta Smelt, once the most abundant fish on the Delta, is functionally extinct in the wild, due to massive water exports from the estuary, pollution and other factors.

Participants of the rally noted that the Delta is home to 4 million people and supports a $7 billion annual economy, including $5 billion in agriculture, $1.5 billion in commercial salmon fishing, and $780 million in recreation. At the Capitol, speakers highlighted the urgent need to revitalize the ecosystem and protect Delta communities and tribes as the path forward for true climate resilience and prosperity. 

“California cannot afford to backslide, and to see the Newsom Administration propose to do so through profoundly disappointing budget trailer bills sets the course for disaster in the Bay-Delta Estuary,” said Defenders of Wildlife Water Policy Advisor Ashley Overhouse. “If these legislative proposals become law, environmental reviews are off the table in an already overallocated water system with decades of outdated quality standards. We ask the Legislature to reject these unlawful proposals and stand up for our state’s natural heritage, our wildlife and our communities.”

Bob Wright, lawyer for Sierra Club California and other groups, and Jason Foster, a Delta advocate, also spoke at the event. Additionally, Delta farmers were in force.

“Members of our farm community with us today are the grown children of Delta farm leaders who beat back the peripheral canal in 1981,” observed Barrigan-Parrilla. “Yes, Californians voted down this idea 40 years ago, but that state does not believe that it has to listen to the will of the people. We have had enough. Our collective anger is righteous and historical. And because of what has been done this summer through the repeated bullying, manipulation, and outright lies put forward by those leading the water system – well, let’s just say they have ignited the beginning of a water revolution in California.”