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Red Flags Over Montezuma
Two environmental groups visited a Solano County courtroom this November to challenge the adequacy of an environmental impact report on Levine-Fricke's proposal to restore 1,800 acres of seasonal wetlands in Suisun Marsh to tidal wetlands.
"Restoring wetlands is a noble and good idea, except in this case, the 'restoration' site is simply a depository for contaminated dredge spoils," says one of the plaintiffs, Lesley Emmington-Jones with the Friends of Suisun Marsh.
Friends of Suisun Marsh and Save the Bay fear that the Montezuma Wetlands Project's use of 17 million cubic yards of dredge spoils to raise subsided peat soils to tidal levels may introduce contaminants harmful to the marsh's wildlife, including several endangered species.
Levine-Fricke says the dredged material has been thoroughly vetted and will be buried deeply enough - three feet below the surface - that any contaminants will not leach into groundwater or rise to the surface. "We're just as concerned - maybe more so - about contaminants as anyone," says project manager Doug Lipton. Lipton says concentrations of contaminants in sediments used at the site will be similar to existing levels in Suisun and other North Bay marshes. He adds that most of what the Friends of Suisun Marsh call "seasonal wetlands" are really just degraded grazing lands, and that only about 20 acres have been designated as high quality habitat for the endangered salt marsh harvest mouse.
The Port of Oakland's Jim McGrath says the Port is always looking for better ways to dispose of the material it needs to dredge to keep its harbors and shipping lanes passable, including about 5% that is not suitable for disposal in the ocean or Bay, where most of the material now goes. "The truly dirty stuff goes to landfills while modestly dirty material is dried and used in construction or beneath parking lots and golf courses," says McGrath. "All of this Montezuma material is much cleaner than that. If we're going to do something other than put this stuff in landfills, then we've got to find creative solutions, and they're going to have to be cost-effective. Jim Levine's solution - to recycle it, re-use it at levels at which the contaminants become nutrients or innocuous - is better." McGrath says the opposition to the project is "truly a tempest in a teapot," and that the S.F. Regional Water Quality Board's standards for using "non-cover" (the more contaminated) materials in restoration projects are very protective.
Not protective enough for the environmentalists, perhaps. In their lawsuit, the groups say they want to see the EIR address the potential impacts of 65 contaminants in the dredged sediment, some of which is unsuitable for Bay disposal. They also want the EIR to address the cumulative effects of the project rather than deferring mitigation to some future date.
Environmentalists are also concerned that use of dredge spoils and disturbance of the marsh may not stop at the Montezuma project's 1,800 acre boundary. The red flag suggesting that their fears of expansion could come true is Solano County's recent decision to rezone 57,000 acres around the project's 2,400-acre "rehandling facility" to industrial use. The facility would process 400,000 cubic yards of Bay sediments per year, pumping water from onsite shallow groundwater wells to rinse the sediments and then using them in the Montezuma project or eventually shipping them to various Delta locations for levee repair.
Save the Bay's David Nesmith says the potential impacts of this facility are not adequately addressed in the EIR. "This rezoning means that industrial use in the marsh could continue for a couple decades beyond restoration. What about the ongoing impacts from hauling dredge materials on and off site?" Enviros are also suspicious that the rehandling facility, the county's zoning changes and a toll road proposal could all add up to more development in and around Suisun Marsh. In their lawsuit, they ask that Solano County's amendments to its general plan, including the rezoning, be set aside until an adequate EIR is completed.
Meanwhile the "tea" in the pot is beginning to boil, as others add their voices to the fray. Tony Arnold with the Suisun Resource Conservation District (which represents duck clubs and private landowners in the area) says they've kept a low profile so far because it seemed prudent to "let the engineers decide what was best." But, he says, the district has begun to be concerned about contaminants from spoil material leaching into the peat. He admits that the clubs could use some "good stable material" to maintain their levees.
The Audubon Society's Arthur Feinstein is no longer willing to put complete faith in restoration engineers: "Increasingly we're seeing examples of restoration experiments that are not coming out right - where engineers have goofed measuring acreage, hydrology, and elevations. Maybe we're not ready yet to do restoration with contaminants." Stay tuned: Levine-Fricke's permits are pending before BCDC and the Army Corps of Engineers.
Contacts: David Nesmith (510)452-9261 or Doug Lipton (707)433-2094
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