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6A Daily News – Tuesday, March 6, 2012 Opinion Another Mill Creek massacre D NEWSAILY RED BLUFF TEHAMACOUNTY T H E V O I C E O F T E H A M A C O U N T Y S I N C E 1 8 8 5 Greg Stevens, Publisher gstevens@redbluffdailynews.com Chip Thompson, Editor editor@redbluffdailynews.com Editorial policy The Daily News opinion is expressed in the editorial. The opinions expressed in columns, letters and cartoons are those of the authors and artists. Letter policy The Daily News welcomes let- ters from its readers on timely topics of public interest. All let- ters must be signed and pro- vide the writer's home street address and home phone num- ber. Anonymous letters, open letters to others, pen names and petition-style letters will not be allowed. Letters should be typed and cannot exceed two double-spaced pages or 500 words. When several letters address the same issue, a cross section of those submit- ted will be considered for publi- cation. Letters will be edited. 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How to reach us Main office: 527-2151 Classified: 527-2151 Circulation: 527-2151 News tips: 527-2153 Sports: 527-2153 Obituaries: 527-2151 Photo: 527-2153 On the Web www.redbluffdailynews.com Fax Newsroom: 527-9251 Classified: 527-5774 Retail Adv.: 527-5774 Legal Adv.: 527-5774 Business Office: 527-3719 Address 545 Diamond Ave. Red Bluff, CA 96080, or P.O. Box 220 Red Bluff, CA 96080 Mill Creek begins its journey to the Sacramento River high on the slopes of Lassen Peak, a dormant 10,500-foot volcano in Lassen National Park. Mill Creek's water- shed encompasses an area of approximately 134 square miles, almost entirely within Tehama County, at elevations ranging from over 8,000 feet on Lassen Peak to 200 feet on the Sacramento Valley floor. The first several miles of Mill Creek's 65-mile length pass through pine-forested Lassen National Park before descending into the remote, steep-sided vol- canic canyon that guides it to its final miles across the valley to where it finally empties into the Sacramento River near the small town of Los Molinos. With the exception of the ham- let of Mill Creek at 4,700 feet and houses near its mouth in Los Moli- nos, Mill Creek passes through a wild, unpopulated and pristine landscape. The undisturbed, natur- al state of Mill Creek's watershed provides habitat for a number of rare and endangered species, from peregrine falcons and Sierra red foxes to spring run Chinook salmon and steelhead. Much of Mill Creek's watershed is privately owned, with public access restrict- ed to the areas within Lassen National Forest and Lassen National Park including the Ishi Wilderness Area. Water is extract- ed at two areas by the Tehama Colusa Irrigation District. Trails lead both upstream and downstream into the Ishi Wilder- ness area to the site of the first Mill Creek massacre, where the Yahi tribe was decimated by local ranchers, leaving Ishi to become known as "the last wild Indian" when he surfaced outside Oroville in 1911. Fast forward 101 years and we find a second massacre on Mill Creek afoot as urban building project developers in Napa County plan to take water from Mill Creek to meet its water requirements although they are more than 150 miles away. Let me explain. The Napa project has been in development since 2007. Develop- ers want to build a new neighbor- hood of 2,050 dwelling units, including a 150-unit retirement home and care facility, a 150-room hotel and multiple acres of parks and retail space within a 154-acre site three miles south of downtown Napa. In order to proceed they must receive approval from Napa County planning officials, to include provision for the water needs of their development. The Orange Cove Irrigation District, a public water manage- ment agency formed in 1937 that serves nearly 30,000 acres of east- ern San Joaquin Valley's Citrus Belt, bought surface water rights from some private farms along Mill Creek about 10 years ago. Since Mill Creek is a Sacramento River tributary those water rights can move via the Sacramento River to be withdrawn and sent via a pipeline to water lawns in Napa if the plan is approved. With its allotted water rights on Mill Creek, the Orange Cove district has offered to sell water to the Napa Pipe project developers and then to the housing develop- ment. After the required Environmental Impact Report was released in February, some oppo- nents to the plan wrote letters to the project lead- ers beseeching them to reconsider the use of Mill Creek surface water because the report didn't look at all the environ- mental impacts of taking water from the creek. As reported in the Red Bluff Daily News last week, Burt Bundy, a board member of the Los Molinos Mutu- al Water Company and president of the Mill Creek Conservancy submitted a compelling letter and attended a Feb. 21 public meeting of Napa County officials address- ing this matter. Richard Mazzucchi Positive Point report didn't even address the impacts of less water on the fish. Neither did the report address the shareholders of the Los Molinos Mutual Water Company, who could lose out in the arrange- ment, much less the owners of properties adjacent to the creek. It seems reasonable that the sale of water- rights should be restricted to counties of origin and should be limited to conservation or agricultural applica- tions. If the people of Napa, or Orange County for that matter need more water for their developments, have them desalinate and use abundant near- Thanks to his efforts, among others, the Napa planning officials are starting to recognize that Mill Creek is not a good option. Although revisions in the Environ- mental Impact Report did speak to some of the concerns they aren't accurate according to Burt. While Mill Creek is one of the few streams left that hold the native spring-run chinook salmon the by ocean water. A second public hearing on the Napa Pipe Project is scheduled for 6 p.m., March 19, at the Little Theatre, Building 1200, Napa Valley College, 2777 Napa-Vallejo Highway in Napa – I entreat you to voice your con- cerns to help prevent another Mill Creek massacre. I acknowledge the work of Daily News reporter Andrea Wag- ner and the website www.mill- creekconservancy.com in the preparation of this week's column. Richard Mazzucchi is a retired research engineer and can be reached at living-green@att.net. Your officials STATE ASSEMBLYMAN — Jim Nielsen (R) State Capitol Bldg., Room 6031 Sacra- mento, CA 95814 (916) 319-2002;Fax (916) 319-2102 STATE SENATOR — Doug LaMalfa (R) State Capitol Bldg., Room 3070 Sacramen- to, CA 95814 (916) 651-4004; Fax (916) 445-7750 GOVERNOR — Jerry Brown, State Capi- tol Bldg., Sacramento, CA 95814; (916) 445- 2841; Fax (916) 558-3160; E-mail: gover- nor@governor.ca.gov. U.S. REPRESENTATIVE — Wally Herg- er (R), 2595 Ceanothus Ave., Ste. 182, Chico, CA 95973; 893-8363. U.S. SENATORS — Dianne Feinstein (D), One Post Street, Suite 2450, San Fran- cisco, CA 94104; (415) 393-0707. Fax (415) 393-0710. Barbara Boxer (D), 1700 Montgomery St., Suite 240, San Francisco, CA 94111; (510) 286-8537. Fax (202) 224-0454. Corruption feeds the green energy rat hole Commentary The inherent corruption in gov- ernment-subsidized green energy rat holes is staggering in its breadth and combines corrupt economic, political, monetary and ideological policies. Our enviro-liberalist defenders of all things green and President Obama-related will like- ly take exception. However, the massive scope of what some have termed "Epic Greenfail" (search the term at www.powerlineblog.com) defies any rational defense other than to compel our Congress to investigate the causes and enabling of such wastes of taxpayer money. All but the most partisan will have to ulti- mately exclaim: "What were they thinking?" Just one company, Fremont- based Solyndra, which declared bankruptcy last August, pretty much encapsulates every type of corruption I listed above. Illegal preferences were given to the pri- vate investors over the taxpayer subsidies, more than half-a-billion dollars of our money went down the rat hole, tens of millions of dol- lars vanished via California tax credits (you were dinged twice, then, through federal and state taxes), and 1100 employees lost their jobs after taking supposedly stable, promising jobs in the grow- ing green energy sector. And please spare us Bush-deranged talking points about Solyndra start- ing under President Bush; it was neither approved nor funded prior to 2009. Campaign finance records show disturbing connections and money changing hands: The "cozy history" between Democrats, Pres- ident Obama, and shareholders and executives of Solyndra, involves literally hundreds of thousands of dollars of fundraising and dona- tions to Obama, etc. "Tulsa billion- aire George Kaiser, a key Obama backer who raised between $50,000 and $100,000 for the pres- ident's election campaign, is one of Solyndra's primary investors. Kaiser himself donated $53,500 to Obama's 2008 election campaign, split between the DSCC and Obama for America. Kaiser also made several visits to the White House and appeared at some White House events next to Obama officials." Executives and board members donated a total of $87,050 (Walter Russell Mead). While Solyndra was the poster- child for our green energy manu- facturing future, earning multiple visits by Obama, Biden and others, Solyndra's bankruptcy was one of three U.S. solar manufacturers to fail around that same time (fall of 2011). It was also not alone in the cozy, I would say corrupt, manner in which "Federal funds flow to clean-energy firms with Obama administration ties" (Carol D. Leonnig and Joe Stephens, Wash- ington Post, Feb. 14). "Sanjay Wagle was a venture capitalist and Barack Obama fundraiser in 2008, rallying support through a group he headed known as 'Clean Tech for Obama.' Short- ly after Obama's election, he left his California firm to join the Ener- gy Department, just as the admin- istration embarked on a massive program to stimulate the economy with federal investments in clean- technology firms. Following an enduring Washington tradition, Wagle shifted from the private sec- tor, where his firm hoped to profit from federal investments, to an insider's seat in the administra- tion's $80 billion clean-energy investment program." Wagle was "one of several players in ven- ture capital … who moved into the Energy Department" at the time that their industry "had a huge stake in decisions about which companies would receive govern- ment loans, grants and support." Not only did $2.4 billion in public funding flow to Wagles's former firm, "Vantage Point Venture Partners," and its clean-energy companies, but also "the Post found that $3.9 bil- lion in federal grants and financing flowed to 21 companies backed by firms with connections to five Obama administration staffers and advisers." Tip of the iceberg, any- one? Then, on February 18, blogger Ed Morrissey wrote "Friday Night Doc Dump: Did WH economic advisers raise red flags on Solyn- dra as early as March 2010?" Based on the voluminous emails released the previous night, the answer is clearly that yes, concerns were expressed by those as high as Obama's top economic adviser, Larry Summers, late 2009 to 2010. In May 2010, stimulus proponent Jared Bernstein wrote to Herbert Ziskend, a Biden adviser, raising flags about the high ratio of public to private capital involved in Solyndra, and that it would be unadvisable to talk about it with the press, "best not to go there," he wrote. Don Polson The way I see it Previously, in December 2009, Larry Summers' concerns about the DOE (green energy) program, surfaced in an email to an investor tied to Solyn- dra: "I relate well to your view that gov is a crappy vc [venture capitalist] and if u were closer to it you'd feel more strong- ly." In spite of all of the cautionary red flags, the rat hole of the Solyndra boondoggle got the go- ahead for bailouts in the form of funds and restructuring in Decem- ber 2010 and January 2011. From "Green Energy Industry Staggers" (blogs.the-american- interest.com), regarding the failure of Obama's green initiatives, we're told that because "alternative energy gener- ation is expensive and inefficient, it requires some combination of subsidies, high energy prices and forced purchases" for viability in the market. Obama and delusional greens thought cap and trade and other aggressive energy policies would artificially jack up energy prices to make pricey alternatives more competitive. While there will be no global carbon regime or cap and trade, programs like Cali- fornia's forced purchases of wind and solar will inexorably jack up our costs; thus, my bills demon- strated a 30 percent hike over three years. Don Polson has called Red Bluff home since 1988. He can be reached by e-mail at donplsn@yahoo.com.