175 



Having said all this, however, let me be quick to note that while it is true that the CVPLA's passage 

 may have been spurred by an urban-business-environmenlalist coalition, it also was more than fair to 

 the agricultural constituencies who had long been tlie CVP's prime beneflciaries. At the time the 

 CVPIA was being debated, the complaints heard loudest from the agricultural contractors of the CVP 

 involved the lack of certainty in CVP contracts, especially those surrounding CVP contract renewal. 

 In response, the CVPIA established firm rules for long-term contract renewals. 



The second loudest set of complaints from the CVP contractors involved their fears of an open-ended 

 potential liability for meeting apparently insatiable environmental water demands. In response, the 

 CVPIA established what the direct environmental water contributions of the CVP would be, including 

 an 800,000 acre foot annual dedication of CVP yield to fishery restoration, a firm-up of state and 

 federal refuge water supplies, and a confirmation of minimum releases to the Trinity River. 

 Otherwise, however, the Act left to a system of voluntary environmental water acquisitions and 

 investments in environmentally-oriented hardware the job of meeting the Act's environmental 

 objectives. 



Third, the CVPIA also produced a potentially huge economic benefit to the farmers who make up the 

 CVP's core constituency by establishing the right not just of the water district contractors but of their 

 farmer constituents voluntarily to transfer federal water at a profit In a partial offset for this new 

 right and economic benefit, the CVPIA did slightly reduce the contractors' historic subsidies by 

 increasing the cost of the water and power sold by the CVP, notably raising base annual CVP 

 agricultural water prices by $6/acre foot and urban water prices by $12/acre foot (both indexed to 1992 

 price levels). The revenues this generated were then dedicated, along with other increased revenues, to 

 a CVP Restoration Fund whose overriding purpose is to help the CVP meet its Cbngressionally' 

 mandated environmental objectives, as noted above, through the use of voluntary water acquisitions 

 and other non-coercive means. 



The CVPIA was the product of two years of intense legislative maneuvering and compromise . I 

 personally had the privilege of being an active participant in the deliberations which led to the bill's 

 passage. Indeed, during one crucial week in that history, a key representative of the CVP contractors 

 and I were loosely authorized by then-stalemated legislators and our respective constituencies to 

 explore possible avenues for bridging the gaps which divided our respective camps. On June 15, 

 1992, we released a joint legislative draft for open consideration by all involved parties. Regretfully, 

 my CVP contractor counterpart was not permitted to join me in explaining the contents of that effort 

 at a Congressional briefing scheduled for the next day, June 16. As a result, any momentum for an 

 open comprehensive legislative coalition effort where the affected interests were actively involved in a 

 cooperative spirit disappeared. Nevertheless, many of the concepts embedded in the infamous 

 Somach-Graff draft legislation did survive in tlie CVPIA as passed. Moreover, die interests of the 

 CVP contractors were actively considered and incorporated in the final version of the CVPIA, which 

 ultimately passed the 102nd Congress. 



