Farmland stretches across the Flathead Valley surrounding the Egan Slough around the Flathead River.
10-26-17 Most of the Flathead Valley is still unzoned by the county. Mostly, that unzoned land is used for farming. But the lack of zoning means it doesn’t have to be. Enterprising landowners can consider turning their land to something besides crops or livestock. One Kalispell landowner is trying to do just that. Instead of alchemizing water gradually into cherries or barley or beef, Lew Weaver — owner of the squat beige building — wants to pump water from the earth and bottle it for pantry shelves. https://www.hcn.org/articles/water-a-water-bottle-plant-raises-the-specter-of-development-in-montanas-flathead-valley .....................................
When Nestlé Waters North America came to McCloud in 2003, the community of 1,100 residents had just days to review the corporation’s proposal to pump 1,250 gallons a minute of spring water into a million-square-foot bottling facility. The McCloud Community Services District, the only local government, had entered into a closed-door agreement for a 100-year contract that placed no limits on the amount of surface and groundwater Nestlé could use. Locals feared that Nestlé would siphon off the surface water that supplies their homes and gardens — an increasingly precious asset threatened by climate change. A grassroots coalition challenged the contract in Siskiyou County Superior Court, which ruled it null and void. It took five years of pressure before Nestlé scrapped its lobbying and legal efforts….
Critics object to what they call sweetheart exemptions for bottling companies, citing a dearth of information about the water table and a lack of scientific studies on groundwater pumping’s impacts. Exporting groundwater out of the county requires a permit, but the ordinance exempts bottling companies, and it doesn’t apply to spring water. State laws requiring local regulation of groundwater do not apply because most of Siskiyou County is not considered a groundwater basin.
Cook coordinated a 2016 ballot measure that would have required a permit for all groundwater exports. Nearly 56 percent of the voters rejected it, however. Fears that bottling companies will drain community water are unfounded, says Jill Culora, a spokeswoman for International Bottled Water Association.
In an aquifer as convoluted as Shasta’s it’s not easy to determine the effects of pumping groundwater or diverting springs for bottled water, says Gordon Grant, a hydrologist with the U.S. Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest Research Station. With most of the 80 inches of annual (snow) precipitation seeping underground, some estimates suggest as much as 40 million acre-feet may be stored in the complex volcanic fissures — more than California’s top 100 reservoirs combined.
The residents of Mount Shasta City, 12 miles northwest of McCloud, want to learn more about their aquifer. They hope to bring some scientific scrutiny to Crystal Geyser’s proposal to reopen a Coca-Cola plant idled since 2010. Neighbors complained the previous operation depleted their household wells. But in 2013 Siskiyou supervisors authorized the new project with no public hearings and no caps on pumping groundwater, which pays nothing to the community. A citizens’ group demanded a review of the impacts and eventually won an environmental report certified in December. It was not the victory they hoped for, says Bruce Hillman, president of We Advocate Through Environmental Review. The report contains numerous factual errors, relies on “old scientific data,” and provides no way for the county to enforce limits on pumping if the operation affects neighboring wells, he says. Crystal Geyser officials declined to comment. (Big water bottling corps have won so far in Mt. Shasta, Weed and McCloud; it’s a mess. The mountain pure water goes into Crystal Geyser’s recycled plastic gallon jugs now which has very very low legal purity standards. -r, 2020)
Around the West other rural communities are also contesting bottling proposals. Nestlé’s decade-old effort to open a plant in Cascade Locks, on the Columbia River in Oregon, failed in October when Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, D, halted a critical exchange of water rights. In Southern California, Nestlé is disputing a state report that says it lacks proper rights to about three-quarters of the water it withdraws from the San Bernardino National Forest….
From her perch behind the ironing board at the McCloud thrift store Cook seems resigned to a long struggle over corporate prospecting for Shasta water. She shakes her head with a wry smile. “It’s nothing less than a water industry siege on Mount Shasta,” she says. https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.9/communities-challenge-companies-over-bottling-mount-shastas-water
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6-1-20 Nicole Hester was hit by as many as a dozen pellets in her face and body, leaving welts and narrowly missing an eye. She was with her fiance, freelance photographer Seth Herald, who was working for AFP, and Matt Hatcher, who was shooting for Getty Images.
John Hiner, vice president of content for MLive Media Group, said it is “outrageous that a police officer fired on working journalists who were doing their jobs. Journalists have a right and an obligation to be on the scene of breaking news, without being targeted. These journalists had credentials, identified themselves and were not posing any threat. We are demanding a full investigation of this unprovoked attack and assurances that journalists can do their jobs without threat or harassment.”
Herald said the group of photographers asked the police they encountered if they could cross the street. The photographers put up their hands, identified themselves as press, and had their camera gear around their necks.
Herald said it appeared to the journalists that the police motioned them to pass through. As they began to move forward one of the police officers fired from 15 to 20 feet away. “That can kill a person or put an eye out. (Hatcher) got hit in the mouth and luckily didn’t lose any teeth.”
(Detroit cop Daniel Debono, 32, charged, faces up to 4 years in prison.)
https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2020/05/mlive-photographer-among-journalists-fired-upon-with-pellets-by-detroit-police-officer-during-protest-coverage.html
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https://www.zerohedge.com/political/biden-unveils-775-billion-plan-universal-child-elder-care
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https://www.zerohedge.com/political/biden-unveils-775-billion-plan-universal-child-elder-care
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