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STATEMENT OF SHERL L. CHAPMAN 



Mr. Chapman. Mr. Chairman, thank you for allowing me to tes- 

 tify today. My name is Sherl Chapman, I am executive director of 

 the Idaho Water Users Association. 



We are an organization of irrigation districts and canal compa- 

 nies and as such manage most of the storage water in Idaho and, 

 in some cases, hold water rights to much of tnat storage. 



I will not read my testimony today because, as you pointed out, 

 you have it, you can read it yourself. I would just like to make 

 some comments and highlights along the lines of the issues that 

 have been raised. 



We think that the data is relatively clear that the reason that 

 we have major salmon declines in the Snake River basin is because 

 of the four lower Snake River dams that have been installed in 

 that reach of the river. If you look at the graphs of smolt to adult 

 survivor ratios, the other data that are available, it is very clear 

 that with each dam construction and completion, the runs declined 

 even further. It also is fairly clear to us that the water velocity be- 

 hind those dams has played a major part in the reduction of the 

 salmon runs. 



The issue seems to have precipitated or at least condensed down 

 to whether or not we ought to have flow augmentation and to what 

 degree, or whether we ought to have drawdown of those lower 

 Snake River dams, more than just about anything else. And oyer 

 the past few years, we have seen a move toward flow augmentation 

 as opposed to drawdown other than the one drawdown physical test 

 tiiat we had. 



We are very disappointed that the Corps of Engineers and BPA 

 have slipped the time frame for the next test of the drawdown, the 

 biological test, on into 1996. A couple of years ago, we were assured 

 that that test could be done by 1995, and because of that many of 

 us stepped up to the bar at o\ir state legislature and asked them 

 to change our Idaho water law so that we could cooperate in efforts 

 to recovery the salmon and protect the runs while those tests were 

 going on. That legislation is due to sunset the first of 1995, which 

 is going to precipitate a confrontation between the State of Idaho, 

 federal entities and others that are involved in this issue. 



It would seem to us that the issue is velocity, and it does not 

 matter whether you are a drawdown proponent or an augmentation 

 proponent, the bottom line is if you run water down, you increase 

 velocity. If you cause drawdown, you increase velocity. 



The problem is that we have a wide range of flows that people 

 are suggesting we need from about 85,000 CFS at Lower Granite 

 Dam to as much as 140,000 CFS equivalent. If you look at 1992 

 hydrologic data, you find that in order to get even to the 85,000 

 CFS data, you are going to need about 4 million acre-feet of water 

 out of Idaho. We do not have it — ^we do not have that kind of water 

 without drying up our entire agricultural economy. And we just 

 will not agree to that. If we try to stay with 140,000 CFS, it takes 

 somewhere in the neighborhood of 11 million acre-feet in the 1992 

 water year. So obviously there is not enough water in Idaho to 

 make augmentation the linchpin of any recovery plan. 



At the same time, we have a healthy agricultural economy in 

 nortii Idaho. They cannot stand a 5 or 6 month drawdown on that 



