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THURSDAY, JULY 12, 2001

The town of Klamath Falls has donated $100,000 to help Oregon farmers launch a lawsuit challenging the federal government's protection of endangered species.

Stung by a recent Department of Interior decision to protect the endangered suckerfish and the threatened coho salmon, the farmers have been taken matters into their own hands recently. At least three times, they have broken into a Bureau of Reclamation water project and opened up irrigation gates to restore the water the government has denied them.

Senator Gordon Smith (R-Ore.) has authored a bill to require the Interior to open the waters for the farmers. The language is included in a spending bill for the department.

Seattle Times guest columnist Elizabeth Furse argues that the federal fovernment is right to withhold water from the farmers. She alleges damages that irrigation has done to the environment.

Furse is a former 1st District Congressional Representative of Oregon.

Get the Story:
City helps irrigators sue U.S. for water (The Seattle Post-Intelligencer 7/12)
Farmers Get Ally in Fight for Water (The Los Angeles Times 7/12)
Government made right call on Klamath Basin irrigation (Elizabeth Furse. The Seattle Times 7/12)

Related Stories:
Authorities let farmers break law (7/9)
Farmers break into Ore. canal (7/6)
Farmers protest water for tribes, fish (5/8)
Water use upheld for tribes, salmon (5/1)
Tribes, groups discuss water project (4/24)
Klamath steelhead proposed as threatened (2/21)