Rebirth of a Refuge : U.S. Will Unveil $22-Million Program for Kesterson Waterfowl Habitat Monday

Nearly five years after a selenium pollution crisis forced officials to close the Kesterson National Wildlife Refuge in Merced County, the Bureau of Reclamation will unveil a $22-million plan Monday to restore the waterfowl habitat.

The plan, to be submitted to the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board at Fresno, would expand Kesterson’s wetlands by 4,464 acres and improve protection of 6,239 acres of existing wetlands. In addition, 23,000 acres of land would be acquired for the refuge.

The proposal calls for supplying Kesterson with 62,000 acre-feet of fresh water per year, instead of the agricultural runoff that caused the contamination, “so these wetlands can serve as models of ecological productivity,” U.S. Interior Department officials said.

The plan was hailed by Interior Secretary Manuel Lujan as a landmark commitment.

“With this proposed mitigation and enhancement effort, we will be turning what was once regarded as an environmental nightmare into a model of environmental responsiveness,” Lujan said. “We will be creating substantially more wildlife and waterfowl habitat than was originally lost to contamination at Kesterson.”

Kesterson was closed in 1985 after the discovery of large numbers of deformed waterfowl embryos within the refuge, a favored nesting place for ducks and other migrating birds. The deformities were attributed to selenium, a trace element leached from irrigated farmland in the San Joaquin Valley and transported to huge ponds within the refuge.

The contamination forced officials to close the San Luis Drain, a cement canal used to funnel waste waters away from farmland in the western San Joaquin Valley. The ponds were drained, and the bureau recently covered up the pond bottoms with fill dirt.

The bureau said it hopes that the restoration plan will end a long, contentious dispute between state and federal authorities and environmentalists over the future of Kesterson, considered perhaps the most pollution-threatened wildlife refuge in the country.

William Crooks, executive director of the Central Valley Water Quality Control Board, said he had not yet seen details of the plan and will not comment on its merits until the full report is received from the bureau.

The detailed plan will be studied by the board’s technical staff during the coming weeks. Crooks said he hopes that staff recommendations can be ready for the board’s regular meeting in late January. Another round of public hearings is expected to follow.

Environmentalists have viewed Kesterson as the first real test of the Bush Administration’s commitment to wetlands protection in the face of competing irrigation and agricultural interests.

Lujan and Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Dennis B. Underwood said the restoration plan is consistent with Bush’s pledge to prevent any loss of wetlands and his support of the North American Waterfowl Management Plan, which calls for enhancement of habitat for migratory water birds.

After the discovery of the deformed waterfowl embryos and the subsequent closing of the refuge, the state began proceedings to force the bureau to mitigate the damage.

One plan considered by the bureau called for scraping up about six inches of soil from the bottoms of the ponds, which covered 1,283 acres, and piling up the dirt at a central location. Scientists and environmentalists eventually concluded that the approach would be ineffective.

In recent months, the bureau has spent about $23 million to remove the pollution threat at the ponds by covering the contaminated bottoms with a thick layer of new soil.

The proposal to be unveiled Monday is designed as a long-term plan for restoring and maintaining the federal refuge.

Underwood, who was recently confirmed as bureau commissioner after serving as executive director of the Colorado River Board of California, said the plan is the most extensive of several options considered by the bureau over the last year.

“Basically we are taking the Cadillac version,” he said, “and that is a demonstration of the strong commitment. It is a demonstration of environmental sensitivity, and I think people are going to be supportive of it.”

Environmentalists deeply involved in the issue reacted cautiously, however.

“The Bureau of Reclamation has dragged its feet on mitigation at Kesterson,” said Hal Candee, an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council in California.

Candee said the bureau has tried in the past to find the cheapest alternative for restoring the refuge while denying that the state had the power to require more effective restoration efforts.

“Last spring, we were promised a different approach under the Bush Administration, and we remain hopeful that the new proposal will provide meaningful and adequate mitigation, but we will have to see the details to be sure,” he said.

“The key will be the acquisition of adequate wetland acres and a guaranteed supply of adequate fresh water,” Candee continued. “In the past, the bureau has relied on toxic drain water for wetland habitat in many areas of the West, and now we know that drain water is strictly unacceptable.”

Even if Kesterson is successfully restored, environmentalists contend, smaller, private holding ponds in the southern part of the valley have selenium pollution levels exceeding those reached in the refuge and posing a serious threat to waterfowl.

At Kesterson, state authorities and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service expect to continue detailed studies and observation for years.

Until the pond bottoms were covered in recent months, efforts had been made to drive birds away from them. Earlier this year, a monitoring report based on studies in 1988 said birds nesting at the site were still exposed to selenium levels above the safety limit of three parts per million in the food chain, enough to continue causing mutations. In addition, two of 11 coyotes taken in the area showed signs of poisoning.