This is a story from the Contra Costa Times.

http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/california/stories_statebrk/klam_20011011.htm

GRANTS PASS, Ore. -- Klamath Basin farmers filed a new lawsuit against the federal government Thursday, claiming a shut-off of irrigation water to protect endangered fish amounted to a seizure of private property worth $1 billion.

The move comes just days after farmers dropped another lawsuit citing environmental laws that tried to force the government to turn the water back on, and dropped out of federal mediation that has been searching for long-term solutions to the basin's water problems.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C., against the United States Government by irrigation districts and farmers served by the Klamath Project irrigation system, which was built in 1907 and is operated by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.

The lawsuit claims that shutting off water to 200,000 acres of the Klamath Project last April amounted to a violation of the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution, which requires the government to pay compensation for seizing property, and the Klamath Compact, which regulates irrigation water in the upper Klamath Basin.

The shut-off came after the Bureau of Reclamation decided that a drought left too little water to serve farmers after the Endangered Species Act needs were met for endangered suckers in Upper Klamath Lake and threatened coho salmon in the Klamath River.

"We have the water rights. We weren't allowed to use them. So they took our private property away," said Mike Byrne, a Tulelake, Calif., farmer who is among the plaintiffs in the case.

The Washington, D.C., property rights law firm of Marzulla & Marzulla is handling the case. The firm won a claim against the federal government earlier this year for shutting off water to farmers in the Tulare Lake area of California.

A U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge ruled last May in the Tulare Lake case that farmers denied water to help fish under the Endangered Species Act were protected under the Fifth Amendment. The amount the government owes the farmers has not been determined.

Jeff McCracken, spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, said the agency has not the seen the lawsuit and could not comment.

But earlier this year, officials said the two cases were different. In the California case, water users had specific rights to water spelled out in their contracts. On the Klamath Project, water is supplied to farmers when it is available.

Besides the Fifth Amendment argument, the lawsuit cites the Klamath Compact, which regulates sharing water from the Klamath River between Oregon and California. The lawsuit argues that the United States agreed under the compact not to impair water rights for irrigation without payment of just compensation.

"This is addressing no water this year," Byrne said of the new lawsuit. "We're still working every angle we can to get water from now on."

Earlier this week, farmers dismissed a lawsuit based on arguments the federal government violated processes set out by the National Environmental Policy Act when it decided to shut off irrigation water in favor of endangered fish.

They also dropped out of mediation with a wide range of parties in the basin, including federal agencies, Indian tribes and environmental groups, which was tied to the case.

Farmer Steve Kandra, the lead plaintiff in the old lawsuit, said that case had become moot since the irrigation season was over, and farmers did not see anything productive coming out of the mediation.

"Right now, the way the rest of the world looks at the methodology is punishment of the people you can get at," Kandra said. "The people you can get at are the people of the Klamath Project. What is their incentive to come to the table? there is no incentive."

[ 10-12-2001: Message edited by: Dog House ]