Guest Column

When the vast majority of water rights in Oregon were given away in the early 1900’s there were no environmental considerations made. The water was, and still is, given away for free. It’s the only public resource I’m aware of that is not charged for. Grazing rights, timber, minerals, all have fees attached. Users of Oregon’s water like you, me, municipalities, industry and irrigators don’t pay the state for the use of that public resource that is owned by the citizens of the state. Folks only pay for the delivery systems provided by irrigation districts, cities etc. We don’t even pay enough to provide money to fund the Oregon Department of Water Resources, which is funded mostly by taxpayers not water users. That agency is seriously underfunded and does little to measure or meter the water that is being used. There is an old saying “if water isn’t measured it can’t be managed.”

The biggest users of water in our basin are the irrigators. Because they don’t pay for the water, just the fees to the irrigation districts, there is little inducement to conserve. They use over 80% of the water in the basin and oftentimes waste nearly 60% of that. Of the water that Central Oregon Irrigation District (COID) takes, at least 50% is wasted and of the remaining half 80% goes to hobby ranches, not commercial uses, according to a 2017 study. The hobby ranchers get farm tax deferrals because they use that water.

The damage the irrigators cause on the Deschutes River is devastating. The Deschutes used to be one of the best fisheries in North America. It had even, year-round flows, cool temperatures and exceptional feeding and spawning areas. At one time the fishing bag limit on the river was 125 fish per day. That’s right, once you caught 125 fish you had to quit. Bull trout were caught up to 20 pounds and huge redband trout were common. After Wickiup Reservoir was built Len Mathieson, the district fish biologist, did a spawning gravel survey and found that 90% of the spawning gravel in the upper river was covered by a foot or more of silt. Low winter flows are the primary limiting factor in fish and wildlife habitat in the Upper Deschutes. In the winter, the flows are reduced and the banks of the river freeze and thaw. In the springtime when the irrigation flows are released, they wash the silt down the river to spawning areas and other places like Mirror Pond.

So, the irrigators not only get the water for free, but they ruin the river in the process. I don’t call that a “perfect balance.” I could go on at length about how much public money is being spent on piping projects and how much we are paying to put some of that conserved water back instream. It would astound you. We give the water away for free and we are spending millions and millions to get it back. Does that make sense? A better solution would be to charge all users of this public resource for its use which would encourage conservation. The money would be used to better monitor its use and then maybe we could have efficient use of water and basic ecological flows in our rivers. A perfect balance.

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