Fish Flow Project (low flow) is about to begin….The long awaited Fish Flow Project Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR), will be released Friday, August 19, 2016, and include a 60-day comment period ending on October 17, 2016. Subsequently, staff will respond to comments before a final version is approved. The project proposes to lower Russian River summer flows up to 50% and will be in effect each year between May 15th and October 15th through 2023 and probably extended through 2040.
The National Marine Fishery Service’s (NMFS’s) Biological Opinion (BO), includes a requirement that Sonoma County Water Agency (SCWA) reduce lower river minimum summer flows to as low as 60 cubic feet per second (cfs). In the past, minimum flows* between 1986 through 2008 were usually 125 cfs during normal rain years. The Biological Opinion, released in September, 2008, has regulatory powers and neither considered environmental impacts to the river between Forestville and Duncans Mills, nor was ever subjected to public environmental review.