If the designations were to take place, it would further the cause of those who want to reintroduce and sustain steelhead trout to local waterways.
By The Malibu Times staff
When Jim Edmondson, a longtime advocate of reintroducing steelhead trout to local waterways, entered “Malibu” in a word search in the revised steelhead federal critical habitat proposals, he was in for a surprise.
In the Nov. 30 document, the government floats the idea of expanding the Malibu Creek critical habitat designation to include the streambed above Rindge Dam. The former proposed rules of the year 2000, which were thrown out in a court challenge, confined the critical habitat designation to two-and-a-half miles of the creek from the Pacific Ocean to the Rindge Dam.
“Unless I missed something in my scanning of the 249 pages,” said Edmondson of California Trout, Inc., an organization that serves trout fishing enthusiasts, “the government, instead of taking the narrow view, included below and above the dam in the proposed rule.
“We like this.”
Some do not like it.
Critics of current studies to determine whether removal of the dam-at cost estimates upward to $40 million-to reintroduce and sustain steelhead populations, say steelhead are not native to the upper watershed of Malibu Creek and current conditions in the creek would not support a steelhead population.
The team of National Marine Fisheries Service scientists who studied the habitat, the federal proposal, “concluded that inaccessible reaches of Malibu Creek above Rindge Dam may be essential to the conservation of this ESU (environmentally significant unit),” which includes all of Santa Monica Bay and the coast up to Ventura County.
“They used the word ‘essential,’ Edmondson said. “In the 2000 rule the NOAA took the position they wouldn’t declare a habitat above man-made barriers in the Santa Monicas.” (The NOAA is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, under which the National Marine Fisheries Service operates. It is an arm of the Department of Commerce).
“We wrote letters saying it was the wrong approach,” Edmondson said. “The new rule takes a more thoughtful and more science-based approach.”
The government proposal, citing the singular importance of the Malibu Creek fish population, states: “… thus the re-establishment of larger populations [of steelhead] such as the one that historically occurred in Malibu Creek may be necessary to reduce the extinction probability of this ESU. We seek comment on whether unoccupied areas above Rindge Dam should be proposed as critical habitat.”
The Rindge Dam was built in 1926 by the original landowners in Malibu.
“It provided a benefit as water storage for less than 30 years,” Edmondson said. “And it’s been a public nuisance for 50 years. It’s basically a 90-foot high retaining wall.”
However, Rindge family descendant Ronald L. Rindge believes otherwise. In addition to wanting the dam declared an historical monument, he does not believe steelhead ever occupied the upper watershed.
“It’s my opinion that steelhead were planted in Malibu Creek, that upper watershed is not true habitat-in the sense that it doesn’t have year-round water, the streams go underground- [and that the creek water] is too hot [to support the fish],” said Rindge, who has extensively studied the history of the watershed.
“The dam was built because there was no water,” Rindge added, “It was stocked with fish for sportsmen.”
The dam, a classic thin-arched structure, is silted to the top.
“These [steelhead] are wonderful fish but they can’t jump 100 feet in the air,” Edmondson said. “They’re [the government] not saying blow up the Rindge Dam. They’re not saying how to deal with it … they’re saying that the habitat above is important for the resiliency of the population and the protection of the population.”
“I completely disagree with what they’re trying to do,” Rindge said. “The amount of money they’re spending on this is unbelievable.” Rindge added, “The dire straits of the human species” is what government officials should be concerned with, considering the state of “libraries, healthcare and education” among other things.
Edmondson said alternatives to removal of the dam include a fish ladder or preserving part of the dam for historical purposes.
The revised critical habitat proposal has been under fire for reducing by 10 percent of the areas, primarily in Washington in Oregon, designated as critical habitat in the year 2000 proposal. A court challenge by the National Association of Homebuilders asserted that the critical habitat designations did not take into account economic impact. The judge agreed with the home builders. Craig Wingert of the Southwest Region NMFS office said the fisheries service had relied on the tool of listing species under the Endangered Species Act to establish the critical habitat designations.
“The agency took the position that all costs came from [the] listing,” Wingert said. “Critical habitat was a small incremental impact.”
“They [the challengers] were right,” Wingert said. “We took a very broad approach. We realized if we fought it we would lose.”
In a 2002 deal, NMFS withdrew the critical habitat designations from 20 populations along the coast and started over. In the Pacific Northwest they used more specific, finer-scale techniques to find out where the fish live or, as the proposal says, are “presumed to occur.”
As a result, according to the proposal, “nearly all salmonid freshwater and estuarine habitats in Washington, Oregon and Idaho are now mapped and available in GIS (geographic information systems) at a scale of 1:24,000. Previous distribution data were often compiled at a scale of 1:100,000 or greater.”
To define the habitats in California, NMFS utilized the U.S. Geologic Survey’s watershed classification as a basis for the new data, in addition to other sources, including personal observation.
The NMFS is vigorously soliciting public comment on this proposal, and the clock is ticking. Comments must be received by Feb. 8, and requests for public hearings must be made in writing by Jan. 24. Access to the entire proposal, including contact numbers, can be made through the Southwest Region National Marine Fisheries Service Web site. Click on “NOAA Fisheries Proposes to Designate…” to get to the proposal published Dec. 10, 2004, in the Federal Register.
The first public hearing in this area is likely to be in Santa Barbara near the first of February.