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The Nugget Newspaper
Sisters, Oregon
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The contents of the on-line edition of The Nugget represent a selection among the stories that appear in the weekly print edition.

Canyon residents wary of irrigation piping
By Jim Cornelius

Property owners in the McKenzie Canyon area east of Sisters are casting a wary eye on plans to pipe irrigation water in local canals.

Squaw Creek Irrigation District (SCID) is planning a five-phase, multimillion dollar project to pipe the Black Butte and Association canals, starting in fall 2003. The project is designed to conserve water for farmers and would ultimately return 6 cubic feet per second (CFS) of flow to Squaw Creek, according to SCID manager Marc Thalacker.

Jan Daggett, who owns property with an irrigation canal across it, worries about the impact on the environment.

"I think that most people have concerns that removing that water completely from that area will have a bigger impact than canals across farmland in general," she said.

Daggett noted that wildlife and plant life in the scenic canyon have become dependent on the water. She noted that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department designates the canyon as an intermittent stream bed, which she believes should have water in it from springs and storm run-off.

Both SCID and the Deschutes Resources Conservancy, which will help fund the project, are willing to address property owners' concerns.

Thalacker disputes the designation of the canal area as a stream bed, but he said it can be left alone for run-off if that's what residents want.

"If they feel the need that (the canal) be left there, then we can probably leave it," Thalacker said.

SCID has a long-standing easement with the Bureau of Land Management that runs 50 feet on each side of a designated center line in the watercourse. Thalacker said that a pipe could be laid in another part of the easement.

DRC executive director Gail Achterman was adamant that the organization will not disburse the $150,000 it is contributing to the $1 million Phase 1 of the project until all affected property owners have their concerns addressed.

That has become the organization's policy in the wake of its involvement with the local Cloverdale piping project, which has become a focus of controversy over ownership of conserved water.

SCID stopped putting 3 CFS of water in the creek this summer after being threatened with legal action by Matt Cyrus. A conserved water permit has yet to be issued and is being contested by Cyrus and several farm advocacy groups.

"We're an organization that operates on consensus," Achterman said. "Subsequent to the Cloverdale ditch project, we don't fund the project until the individual landowners/water rights holders on the ditch agree to have conserved water dedicated in-stream."

Achterman believes there are ways to mitigate any impact from removing water in the ditch.

Achterman said DRC is committed to restoring water flows in Squaw Creek. She noted that it will take a restoration of some 20 CFS to make the creek viable for the return of anadromous fish such as steelhead.

Thalacker and the SCID board fear that the entire watershed could soon be declared critical habitat for bull trout. That could force irrigation districts to conserve large amounts of water -- without providing funding for conservation projects.

As it is, SCID must seek substantial grant funding for piping projects. The district needs some $600,000 more to fund the first phase of the McKenzie Canyon project. The district would then match the funds with donated labor and equipment use.

DRC will not disburse any funds until the entire project is funded.

In the atmosphere of controversy and suspicion that has grown up around SCID actions, some area residents were upset when the district sent an excavator into the canyon last spring.

Some believed that the district was already excavating in preparation for the project.

Thalacker adamantly denies this. He said the excavation was to clean and straighten the canal where it has meandered. Such activity is appropriate under the district's easement.

Thalacker acknowledged that the work will make it easier to pipe the area once the project begins.

Controversy is likely to continue. Some question the environmental value of piping for conservation (see related story, page 21).

The question of who owns the conserved water -- the district as a whole or individual water rights holders -- also remains unresolved.

An Oregon Water Resources Department preliminary decision on the conserved water permit for the Cloverdale Ditch project is not expected until late this year and the battle over the permit could drag on for a long time.

Both the Oregon Water Trust, the organization that filed for the permit, and DRC would like to see the issue of ownership resolved -- whichever way the decision goes -- because it will affect the way they do business.

"It remains unresolved in Oregon," Achterman said.

She noted that in many Western states, courts have ruled that districts and individuals both have an ownership role, analogous to that of an individual homeowner and a bank holding a mortgage.

Any resolution is unlikely to be very clear or complete, Achterman said. Ownership could vary across the state and even within districts, depending on how irrigation districts were originally set up.

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