 Once again the the hitches keep on coming with our panel today to the next speaker is Felicia Marcus She was appointed by Governor Jerry Brown to the State Water Resources Control Board for the state of California in 2012 and designated by the governor's chair in April 2013 For those who are not all that familiar with the board the board implements both federal and state laws regarding drinking water and Coal water quality and its implication implements the state's water rights laws The board said statewide water quality drinking water and water rights policy. Here's appeals of local regional water Quality decisions decides water rights disputes and provides financial assistance to communities to upgrade water infrastructure Before her appointment at the water board Felicia was served in positions in government the nonprofit world in the private sector in Government she served as the regional administrator of the US EPA region 9 in the Clinton administration where she was known for her work in bringing unlike the Apple allies Together for environmental progress and making the agency more responsive to the communities they serves particularly Indian tribes communities of color local government and agricultural business interest Prior to that Felicia headed the Los Angeles Department of Public Works She came to public works after extensive experience as a public interest lawyer and community organizer in Los Angeles Including being a co-founder and general counsel for Hill the Bay in the nonprofit World she was Western director for the Natural Resource Defense Council Prior to joining in our DC Felicia was the executive VP CEO of the trust for public lands She also was a private and non-profit sector attorney in Los Angeles. So you can see she has not been very busy So it's a great pleasure to introduce Felicia Marcus. Good morning now I Have to deal with the elephant in the room Because otherwise you won't hear a word that I have to say I know that Is not a salmon But I do want to tell you that finding appealing pictures of a talking salmon ate up at least two hours of my time Over the course of the last few weeks And so my plea to you before I begin my talk this morning is please send me your best pictures of Salmon who look like they're talking I Found a good one this morning And then of course I read the tag on the image and it was a dead smolt that had been found, you know after flood waters Receited so I didn't use it because it was just too painful And I knew that the rest of you would know that it was a dead smolt But I have to say okay, it's a striped bass I'll admit it big mouth Billy Bass to be sure and if all of you don't already have one of these It either means you're a lot younger than I am or You don't have a sense of humor because this was one of this is one of the best things that ever came out on the Christmas gift Market and I as I said I do my goal is to find someone techie enough to be able to get into its Inwards and change the word so I can have it say whatever I want when someone goes by But if a salmon could talk they would probably say kill this guy You know as often as you can So I found another talking fish What this particular fish as you know would say keep that cat out of my house? An event then if you haven't either don't have kids or you don't remember the cat in the hat But it was a more charming talking fish. So with that. Let me start my talk I have to say that it fills my heart and I anticipated it filling my heart To see so many people who are working on restoration activities in one place I spent a lot of my time in the word arena Which is sometimes more like the Roman arena of old more than even a sporting event And as you heard I've had a lot of jobs both in government and in the private sector in the nonprofit world I've done advocacy policymaking and management I've been in regulatory agencies and in operations Agencies and in the nonprofit world. I've been an advocacy and in-project delivery Organizations a trust for public land at the national level I got to see 200 plus miracles a year of people restoring a place together with people that they never thought they'd be able to Agree on lunch with so I've been through the world And had a taste of what you deal with Every day and I have to say it's been a good run And I've learned a lot met a lot of great people and I hope done some good work along the way But I have to say there is something really wonderful About working and being with people who are trying to get stuff done on the ground Whether land conservation Organizing the public to pick up trash restoring a wetland or just teaching a child about the wonder of the world around them Public works was my biggest and hardest job like that TPL's neck and neck with that with Heal the Bay and other local LA groups being my formative experiences There's something About being grounded in trying to change something real Whether it's restoring a salmon stream fixing a sewage system filling a pothole if you never fill the pothole It's a rush. I just have to say Or making sure that the trash gets picked up and recycling goes long, which is what we did in LA. That's just different Those jobs are the hardest and potentially the most rewarding But they also draw people to them have a combination of vision and heart and Connection to something bigger than they are so thank you for the work that you're trying to do Which is challenging but essential frustrating but noble and important to so many of us whether we have scientific skill or not where waiters and fleece or not Work outdoors or always behind a desk or can't even say fluvial geomorphology So I thought I'd start with a couple of quotes one in particular. Maybe just one You know one is it's a quote from Aldo Leopold that we used to really love and use a lot at TPL But I think of all the time One of the anomalies of modern ecology is the creation of two groups each of which seems barely aware of the existence of the other The one studies the human community almost as if it were a separate entity and calls its findings sociology economics and history The other studies the plant animal community and comfortably relegates the hodgepodge of politics to the liberal arts The inevitable fusion of these two lines of thought will perhaps Constitute the outstanding advance of this century That's what interests me most in some ways about this work Not the the line of specialization but drawing together the notion of the natural world and people and the fact that we are intrinsically Connected and trying to find those connections and draw in more allies to the restorative work of restoring say salmon Streams and salmon runs for the value to the salmon But more than that the value to ourselves individually and as a people So the title I chose was if salmon could talk Instinctively Park is a lot easier for us if they could And because so many people purport to talk for them on both sides of the water battles And it feels sometimes to me frankly like sometimes people are so focused Telling each other why they're wrong that they forget to focus on the fish And I have this vision of a fish to say excuse me. Excuse me As we're seeing the rhetorical battles about what they need So I was really happy to come here to thank you because you keep your eye on the ball, which is the fish actually I Just thought he was cute Or is it a she I don't know So Jay did a great job so I'm in a flash through way too many slides and forgive me if I glance over them But I had I had a lot I wanted to say but I really only have a few things I wanted to leave you with this morning for starters I know we'll have a chance to have more conversations now and for the future and so I'm going to talk a bit about the California water context, but Jay did a great job and did a lot of it And the other Jay will talk about the rest of it. So the Jays. I'm a Jay sandwich. No You're a Felicia sandwich. No, I don't know Sorry, I'm from LA. I you know forgive me From the Valley like really And I'm going to talk about I'm every woman that's who I am So I mean how many of you was Jay's Borg slide the best picture in the whole thing, right? Of course So I'll talk about Bay Delta But I cannot talk about California water fix and I will just say that that has been the issue that has sucked all The air out of the room about Bay Delta issues for a long time. I spend months in the room You know water rights hearing so I cannot talk about it. I can't take context wise I can't talk about it. I can't hear about it have to run out of the room when it comes up It's sort of I keep saying that California water fix is the new by Felicia because I got to leave the room if it gets Managed to go to a party lean against a refrigerator. Somebody walks through and says about that water fix and I gotta leave and Then I'll talk a little bit about the talking salmon. So forgive me as I roll through Well, I had a lot. I was going to say about California water policy And Jay said most of it, but I always as those of you know me know I always start with an elephant and You would say why an elephant and not a salmon or a salmon of some kind And it's because when we're trying to deal with California water policy Which I dealt with very intensively through the Bay Delta accord and other years and then ran screaming out of The water world because I was so tired of being the princess of peace all of the time And I like to say it's hard to be the princess of peace when you're pissed But I was tired of how often I had to get the warring parties to sit down and try and focus on the fish For example or to see where they had won a war But had to give up a battle because I had to give something up to folks is that's the way we move forward as a society with competing Interests and I left and went to land conservation because I wanted to work with folks who knew how to make a deal I wanted to work with folks who worked on tangible things on the ground with people a focus on the thing Versus at the other people or out in some intellectual Ozone and it was it was a restorative Experience for me and when I came back into the water world got dragged back into it When I moved back in the policy world and already seen got dragged into the 09 Legislation negotiations because I'm not so good or that smart But apparently people do behave better when I'm in the room because I just listened to all of them So we have a long way to go in our world. There are a lot of people who do it too, but I Was I guess I was kind of happy to be drawn back in but one thing that I noticed was it was the same people Saying the same things past each other across the decades and I also noticed because I was a little older and more mature That you had people who are really smart and knew a lot whether it was about fish or conveyance systems or dams or farming or you Name it and they knew it all very deeply and they knew one piece of the water pie and they would say Just this one thing will solve it all which of course isn't true and not recognizing that portfolio That J was talking about which is the way you actually solve things or the portfolio of things That we see in nature in an ecosystem as opposed to pulling out Single species or the like and it reminded me of that parable of the blind men and the elephant who are each touching a different part of this magical creature and describing something completely different and I I I There are a whole herd of elephants in most Policy rooms about Water but that I saw I always see that as part of the problem with moving forward on solutions that a regular person My aunt Charlotte my friends your friends would expect us to have conversations about in solving problems And so unless you deal with this weird log jam, whether you call it the elephant of the room or the elephant phenomenon or the Inability to see how other people see things We're not going to make as much progress as we need to and those of you in the room who know me for a long time And most of you don't know that I'm fond of saying that the biggest challenge before us isn't scientific technical engineering economic Legal you name it Even the complexity of ecosystem Management it is the challenge of ecosystem management and that does not mean big egos That means being able to actually see the people in the room that you need to get together with to actually do things On the ground, so I'll talk a little bit about that and that is my more of my focus So Jay did this Let's put an exclamation point on the climate change issue where with a few degrees temperature rise we lose a lot of or All of our snowpack over the next decades to come For anyone who's been working in this field if you see the water and the snowpack up north Being you know a third of our storage in an average year in a state that relies on storage above ground or Or below but where it doesn't rain and snow every year It doesn't rain and snow in the places where it's most used and that we've come to rely on it And not in the time of year a storage becomes very important That's why the emphasis on groundwater management because those basins are the only thing that can approximate in size the snowpack That we're going to lose and if we don't get off our duffs and start taking a different approach to water and doing a lot of things All of the conflicts we see today are going to seem like a picnic Compared to what's to come when we're going to be losing that so this is the picture on the bathroom mirror every day To motivate me to get things in motion for the administration Oh darn. I thought I made that faster. I apologize We have taken a portfolio approach and I'm not going to go through everything in the water action plan But I give it to you for the context that of what our administration has been trying to do Relentlessly for the past few years and it came out a Year before the end of the last term and it was our five-year promise To everyone that these were the things we were going to focus on for the next five years to lay a foundation for a more sustainable Water future. It's an all of the above strategy. It is a portfolio Strategy is all and also let's get off our butts and stop talking and start doing Strategy I come with me if you want to live we are in motion Trying to do all these do we do every single one of these things everywhere? But we've got to do them where they're appropriate and where they go and I just wanted to highlight to I mean I generally highlight providing safe water for all communities because I actually think that is the top issue of our time and our top Priority because it has to be with so many Californians not having clean safe and affordable water But right up there achieving those co-equal goals for the Delta You know because it is the vortex of so many things ecosystem water supply the people there Any number of things and it's a challenging system that we need to deal with But I also want to point out for protecting and restoring important ecosystems Which is getting ahead of the curve not waiting until something's endangered and trying to take that single species approach But trying to do go long on Restoration again the drought has delayed a lot of what we were doing But many of you are no doubt engaged in the work that we're doing both on the north coast Salmon streams and elsewhere to try and make some headway the work that Chuck Bonham and others have tried to do Starting to have a conversation about upper watershed work mountain Meadow Restoration and the like there's a lot a lot going on there And I invite you to work with us on that with Cal eco restore and all the money that was in the bond that Chuck has And others have to spend we can make a little dent, but it's just a down payment on what we need to do There's more to it Where'd that go? Oh, so now it's doing both. Thanks. What are you doing this? I can't blame the machine on This is me too late last night trying to make it go faster that didn't work So so we've talked about the drought a little bit I won't I won't go into too much detail just in the interest of time. This was the slide that broke our hearts, of course this was the worst snowpack in modern history from April of 2015 that sent in motion much more dramatic actions on our part and caused incredible amount of devastation with all the caveats that Jay Mentioned it is extraordinary that we came through this as well as we did with all Sensitivity to people who were hurt and there were a lot of people who were hurt, but I do have to put my happy slide up And it is just my happy slide to make you a little happier But I have to say we can't be totally happy yet because flooding can cause a mayhem death and destruction And so as I've been explained to people they say are you just thrilled and happy that it's rained and snowed and all I can say is I'm getting a little more sleep. I Oh, I owe Bill Croyle a really good bottle of scotch Because he doesn't get to relax at all, but I'm containing my euphoria Until we really are out of the woods in the flood risk Season and I have been saying we want all the rain and snow we can safely handle for the last four years Because I don't want to be the one who asked for all the rain and snow in the world and caused that death and destruction Is that like a wonky way to Live I can't have to contain my euphoria. So sometime mid-June I'm told we'll have a party and you'll see me dancing on stage Which could be the first time that ever happens So Jay talked about a lot of the impacts and obviously the fish and wildlife ones were huge the communities out of water Were huge the fallowed fields and people out of work Could have been a lot worse, but was really pretty pretty darn terrible We did a lot of things. I won't go through All of them now some of them were really good and I will Talk I did my doubts to say on water rights. We went beyond where anyone has gone before That was for Jay But I will say that we we made some decisions and this is one of the things I did want to say here And I've said elsewhere where because we were seeing such an Unprecedented confluence of challenges and we were looking at what was left in the project's Storage and trying to figure out how to balance and maintain salinity control in the delta So that we didn't lose it and therefore make the water unusable for who knew how long for People or farming in the delta or south of the Delta We didn't know how we were going to deal with both spring flows As Sam will we're trying to I'm oversimplifying of course salmon trying to get out But trying to hold enough water for temperature and Largely temperature control Through the fall We cut it a little too close. I mean I want to My hats off to the fish agencies who did the heavy lifting of working with the projects to try and come up with what they thought might work both sides have a lot of arrows in their back from the their respective Constituency groups we at the water border kind of In the middle of his we're supposed to balance that we do obviously have a thumb on the scale for fish and wildlife and environmental Issues and and I think folks did a good job of trying really hard but far better than any time I had seen before certainly better than the 90s But we missed it on temperature control a couple of years and we lost an awful lot of Salmon eggs and I will take that one to my grave as something that I really wish we had been more conservative that Second year, but I do want to say on behalf of the Folks who who worked so hard to try and make it work. It wasn't for lack of caring about the fish It was for making some really hard choices that are really easy for people who don't have to make those choices To think they could have made Better because you do have to own all those competing interests and what's happening I can say that to a lot of people but that that was one of the things I wanted to say We also got that water bond pass, which isn't The end of the story, but certainly a good beginning and the money in there for ecological restoration is really really important And as I understand it and I'm sure you've heard from Chuck and others it is Whether you call it Project EcoRestaur or just the other projects that they've been able to Get more done in the past couple years than the past 20 because we've sort of unleashed Folks into trying to actually focus on let's get projects done on the ground And hopefully there'll be many many many more and hopefully many of you are getting more funding on projects that you Care about so that that's pretty important. There's more there, but I'll keep going now People think I'm fixated on this slide and some of you have seen this I am not doing a whole talk about beer this morning because we're talking about fish, but I love this quote You know because so many people can be patronizing about people But really about the value of real facts and about how people if given the right facts the real facts can Rise to the occasion and they certainly did during the drought And then I love this thing about the great point is to bring them the real facts and beer and as many of you know I won't go through it all I did a lot of googling late night on that one and and you know looked for quotes about beer I mean you have the Ben Franklin ones, but many of them Reportedly by him, but I looked at Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy Maron Raegan and beer and I got nothing. I just want to say nothing that was really good I did get from Martin Luther the original that popped up whoever drinks beer. He is quick to sleep long Does not sin Whoever does not sin enters heaven Let us drink beer Which I thought was really pretty good. So this morning. I actually tried googling a blink You may think I just have too much free time. This is just my I could be playing video games, you know I tried a blinkin and salmon. I thought hey, he might have gotten something good there I got zip, but I didn't spend that much time. I but I did get this I Have simply tried to do what seemed best each day as each day came. I Decided those were words to live by even if I can't put a fish in the picture So what's the reality? We're dealing with and Jay talked about a lot of this that loss of snowpack is the biggest one Sea level is gonna rise. What does that mean people right now are using that as a weapon depending on who they are? It's something we have to deal with and restoration particularly in the Delta is one of the key things that can help deal with it Many of you know that the Delta needs our help The ecosystem the people in it and the people dependent on it So we've got to get off our butts and figure out how to how to not break the Gordian knot but make some real improvement there Here's the reality that makes it hard to sleep at night Which is all the people in this state who rely on wells that are contaminated if you're in these aren't all The ones who rely on walls if you're in a large urban area as As Jay's slides talked about you can afford to treat it blend it, etc If you're in a small rural urban community relying on shallow groundwater wells, you cannot and even under the the Systems that we regulate which is small systems over 25 We know there are you know hundreds of Communities that can't just can't meet modern treatment standards, and we're making headway. We've got money on it We've gotten authority to consolidate. We've gotten all kinds of tools from the legislature But we still the big thing to watch for this year is can we get an operation and maintenance funding source? Because they will never be able to afford even to keep a system running Even if we build it and this is the issue of our time for Californians I think Californians if you give them this information We'll absolutely contribute a few bucks a year or a month so that people can have clean safe and affordable drinking water So let's hope they get that chance Population's gonna rise our infrastructure. It's actually the issue is more a lot of little problems rather than the big one But it's such a good picture This is one that California agriculture it painted as a demon by many who are advocates for salmon I think that's short-sighted Is also a precious resource for all of us only only five Mediterranean climates in the world that can grow the level of healthy fruits and vegetables we can Now there aren't I need better slides on this, please I just the invitation for my slide deck. I was just trying to pull things out. It just looks bad If I go really fast you can see it looks really bad, but it's still not the best set of slides, but that is critically important and massively oops Jay is gonna talk about this really well, but it's a great picture And really more importantly the reality is there's a lot we can do through integrated water management the portfolio approach that Jay Talked about which is part of why we're pushing so hard to figure out how to move forward versus being stuck on it It's this one thing. No, it's not yes. It is is so is not your jerk. No, I'm not that's the level of discourse We have a lot of the time that is not gonna get us where we need to go And the reality is there's a lot of good I know a lot of words on this slide, but as every time I look at it, there's more going on I mean as you see concert recycling we got a billion dollars out the door in Low-cost grants and loans to get stuff off the drawing board and on to into the ground I got three billion backed up in requests far more than we can ever spend It's exciting what people want to do conservation what the urban public did when finally given the information Was hitting it out of the park They've learned that they don't need to hemorrhage water on their lawns when people put out when agencies put out rebates They got snapped up in weeks people are transitioning to drought tolerant if they can't afford it I think people are good and people want to try and do the right thing But again remember I rolled out a recycling program that one made a lot less sense of dealing with it with water It made sense But it was driven by a public sensibility that they didn't want to waste and they wanted to be part of a solution So my bias is I do believe in the public and they'll rise to the occasion You also had farmers in the Delta agreeing to court senior water rights holders in the Delta agreeing to take 25% less water why well then they knew they could bring in 75% crop And a curtailment But if you read all of the stories and you read the reason why they also didn't want to be seen as part of the problem They did not want to be seen as we're senior you can't touch us when fish and wildlife and people Were hurt and that has never happened before at that scale and was pretty exciting And of course you had a lot of the fish farmer when wins You all are a part of them where folks have tried rice has an awful lot of them But they're not the only place and drought angels helping each other It's such about a lot and the groundwater management movement which Jay will talk about a bit Which is underway again slower than some would like better really heavy lift. There are a lot of great things happening Let me just say that because those were a bunch of Debbie Downer slides I'm not going to go through this just except to give you a sense that we're busy and Overall the goal is to implement that water action plan, you know come with me We're going so come with us give me a better way, but don't stand on ceremony. I just say it's one thing It's not one thing. It's a lot of things So there's a lot here and I put cannabis curve at the bottom as many of you know because it is the tsunami of pain Coming our way. It already is a lot of pain and we've been able to get resources to deal with it But we'll see if the approach That the legislation which gave us a lot more authority quicker to set in stream flows and do a number of things If it'll get us where we need to go and I know a lot of you are on the front lines That that's a huge thing that we're dealing with the Bay Delta plan you hear a lot about I use this one because it actually shows Those rivers as you know what we need to do and this this is the most fraught biggest deal highest-takes politics We deal with where we have to update the Bay Delta plan Last was done 21 years ago 21 years ago It didn't work out as planned. I mean did some good But didn't work out as planned as people diverted at different times of year and different things happened You know more than 10 years ago the board identified the need for the update And we've been working hard on it a lot of it was delayed for a full three years as all the same people Were working on the drought and then we got some more staff to get it going and I won't get into all the detail because some of you know But it's tough one of the key things we're doing is focusing up the Tribs the old plan ended up being implemented by a Settlement where the projects took on all the responsibility down sort of at the confluence of all of the Tribs And we certainly this isn't why we did it this way We certainly found during the drought that the projects alone don't have the capacity to deal with all the issues That are there, but we moved up the tributaries because the fish Live and live their lives and the critical parts of their life cycle up the tributaries But that has brought in a whole host of more serious Opposition as they see The need to that there'll be a need to contribute where they are The idea is an idea of unimpaired flow people have taken those words and twisted them and said they mean all kinds of Different things what so they can punch it as a punching bag the whole notion of that is a different way to approximate Flow right now we do it by calendar date based on how much how wet it was sort of the week Before where you have these stair steps. Those are the things we had to relax Or felt we had to relax during the Drought which was an unprecedented use of the Temporary urgency change orders, but this whole idea is to use unimpaired flow as an approximation of nature as a way to just at least share the river with fish and wildlife in many of these Areas 80 or 90 percent of the water is diverted out At many times while fish and wildlife can't survive that regular people people understand that they have people had no idea That we're diverting that much out of the river even if you know the dry Sandwalk part of middle of the San Joaquin There's a lot more that runs dry or nearly dry and you again I'm preaching to the choir here, but we knew that that alone wasn't the perfect thing It'll simulate the cues in nature that fish have evolved for but our whole idea and a key part of it was this Olive branch isn't really the right word But this awareness that humans coming together with fisheries agencies farmers irrigation districts You know some reasonable group of stakeholders coming together and deciding how to shape those flows In an adaptive management framework trying something one year and something else the next coming up with biological Objectives keeping their eye on the fish are gonna have a different dynamic and a different human energy brought to this That might actually get us a lot further than just a piece of paper That says a percentage with enforcement It's been taken that we want that sort of Standard unimpaired flow that that's the answer. No, that's kind of the backstop But it's really a way to approximate how you could help the fish best with an offer To come together and maybe get some discount on The amount of water if you do all those other non-flow things that we also know that fish need and it's important because obviously You know flow is essential to fish You don't need to have a fish talk to know that but but other things are too and so figuring out how we can Create a circumstance where we leverage that great human energy Around trying to solve a problem is really important to us and I will just say without telling a lot of stories I mean I'm I'm getting older now and I am a veteran of the sewage turnaround in LA But it really the constructing the conditions under which people came together Changes the dynamic of how they talk and did probably the biggest environmental turnaround in the country in that decade It was all because of the individual people in the room who stopped fighting and talking past each other and actually got to Business trying to solve some problems. So that's we're as much about that process as not and then we do have some salinity things I'm happy to talk about if you're interested that are actually very important to people in the Delta I don't know how well that'll turn out phase two is similar that goes up This was on the lower San Joaquin tributaries phase two is in a slightly different place. It is It's at the scientific basis report stage. We did an awful lot of engagement. Some of you were very engaged Extra comments on the draft. We're sending it out to peer review blind peer review to shortly We got ISP review independent science board review on it as well And we'll have a proposal next summer the framework of it is similar To that that whole construct I talked about but it also has a lot more in it to get inflows outflows You've got interior Delta Flow issues, you know similar to what the biological opinions have dealt with cold water habitat So there's just more in it. So watch that space. This is all you know, you can buy popcorn to watch this This is a pretty fraught series and people feel very strongly on all sides and some people Do the pissing at each other? Sorry. Can I I've said piss twice? That's probably bad I get three times. Thank you three times. I'm out But there are also a lot of people trying really hard to figure out how to bridge divides and really get something to happen here So common components I already talked about some of it. I probably talked about all of it. There you go Let me keep moving. I'll move faster again. Again. I talked about why to focus on flow Flow is essential. It's clearly not adequate now and it helps with all the other Stressors whether we're talking about predation or temperature, you know, you name it you all know the detail So I won't explain it in In detail, but fish definitely need more than flow and I know they would say that I know that I'm not the Lorax Or whatever the fish Lorax is someone will have to someone has to write the fish Lorax book now and there's just our time panel. All right Don't forget this is my point here. But again dialogue is the biggest problem Okay, that's not that helpful. It's one way of putting it. I see that all the time I understand the emotion of it I get it. I think it unfortunately it produces an equal and opposite reaction versus attentive empathy, which is what we really want This one that many of you saw recently Here's another one Which I have to say has been bemoaned by many many thoughtful farmers Who are trying beneath the radar outside the microphones to actually make something happen on the ground And who speak about the need to preserve nature as something they do as farmers But also as something they want to do for fish And I suspect we'll talk a little bit more about the rest of this in In q&a it is we are in different different times This is also not the greatest way to talk about the need to save the fish Folks may see it in a graph. It's not particularly poetic Or inspiring might be motivating for people who know but it's not obvious to people who don't Know and we have to learn to talk about The magic and the importance um Not just the magic magic might be dismissed, but The possibility and the strength of being able not just to protect fish through restoration But to do other things the flood plain multiple benefit idea in a more poetic way This was my life during the drought Where folks jumped on one thing it's an interesting thing where and vilified it As if it were the whole problem and it was I mean these things have issues They're definite issues depending on where they are But it wasn't the drought issue and of course my favorite example is bottled water Which has all kinds of problems and I've spent years in different jobs dealing with the scourge of Of too many bottles, but there are times when that water is important To a community that can't get water any other way To a kid to make sure they hydrate out on a hot day where you don't have a tap Or a clean stream And most importantly it takes more water to make a beer Should we ban beer? That always got the point across Again And then finally There's a saying some of you know In chinese I can't actually say it, but i'm not going to Where they say it's a phrase like a chicken talking to a duck Which means where you're talking past each other, but you don't understand each other and some of you were at the science Conference heard me talking about my china story, but so let me tell you Some others I see this everywhere. This is the thing I see Sometime back in the 80s. I was at a community meeting on a bayona lagoon Restoration it's down in los angeles right near where I live I went because I lived in the community and people Asked me to go because they knew I was a public interest lawyer And I watched one set of participants talk about This beautiful wetland This glorious ecosystem They were practically crying getting misty eyed or crying About the importance of saving This wetland The other folks got up and said it's a stinking mud hole Why are you going to take our money disrupt our lives do whatever for this stinking mud hole? And in response the other people would just get more misty eyed And more Aggrieved and I told people I couldn't take this Case for a variety of reasons, but I was happy to sit in the back and give them advice And at the end folks came up to me and said okay. What do you think I said? I think you kind of have to see it their way And what you need to say before you talk about the wonders of nature and how great it is you have to say I know it looks like a stinking mud hole But here's why there's beauty in this that perhaps We can't all see and actually explain it versus expecting them To explain a small thing but a way to connect either at the microphone or off the microphone is to acknowledge a perception That frankly if someone doesn't come from your circle, they might not understand Robert greenfield and servant leadership has a concept of sort of verbal reinforcement that people Form self-congratulatory circles and they talk to each other and they have their own language and they agree with each other So they gird themselves then against the world because then the other people who don't agree with them must be stupid venal, you know or or you know Pick your shot and that ends up being the nature of the dialogue So my point of this is that you have to figure out how to puncture that natural Tendency as opposed to saying we're right. They're wrong. It's about empathy. It's about asking questions It's about trying to figure out how to say it in a way people can understand and I I'm going to run out of time I probably already have so I have myriad examples of this It's smog check where I went when I got to epa the state was at war with epa on that And I went and instead of bringing an entourage or to speaking and hearings. I visited every Legislator on both sides of the aisle who had anything to do on either of the transportation Committees and I had one particular. Oh, I took it off. I was going to wear my id card I I I took it off and I said to him, you know, senator rustle I know that you're being told that we're requiring this strict separation of testimony instead I won't get into the whatever and he said But but I said, but we're not really we prefer it I can tell you why because of fraud and other things But I can accept a deal from the state as long as it meets certain criteria And he looked at me and he said no EPA is requiring, you know insert in his mind big fat stupid thing because that's what he would have expected epa to do And I said no really I get that you're being told that but that's not what we're proposing You know, we like it better. I can tell you why but we can do something else He says no epa is requiring blah blah blah So I I I remember some of these stories and I pull my id card in my bag And I held it up to him with my picture on it and the big epa logo And I said honestly senator. I swear to god. I work at epa now and we're not And he looked at me and went oh Well then and that was the breakthrough in the negotiations And so I can do a minute just a couple of weeks ago. I was sitting with two Farmers who I have known for a very long time. They are my friends We were having coffee and dessert And we were talking about all the fractious discussions And they both kept repeating to me What the state board was requiring In the in the in the plan And we were requiring unimpaired flow. It was so stupid. We were harsh blah blah all this and I went No, really we proposed this thing with the settlement encouragement and adaptive management everything and you all are doing a lot of these projects, you know We need and they just kept repeating what we were doing and so what did I do? I got really pissed off. That's my third one They're my Yeah, oh good. I I got really mad at them because they were my friends and I and they then made the worst mistake You can ever make and and the women maybe anybody in this room will appreciate it One of them told me to calm down Never tell an angry woman to calm down. I just want to say that is a universal truth If you did not know that before You're welcome But afterwards I thought oh my god, I can't believe I reacted that way that was not the right way to react and So now I have to go meet with them again and ask them why and so the the point is don't be chickens talking past ducks Or thinking you speak duck when you don't okay, or Sam and lover talking I had a loving fish person and a friendly farmer. I just couldn't find better pictures Um, I hear water users and editorial writers talk about environmental advocates as haters of agriculture as people who don't value food We in government are trying to dupe them or we're just plain stupid I think the headline in the medesto be editorial which invoked my name liberally Was conspiracy or incompetence, which is better He would love that I talked about it though. I'm sure he would love it. Don't tell him Um They also talk about water diverted from them that doesn't appear to have helped fish and they want to understand why they should give more For some it's redirect and for others. It actually feels like the truth that they truly feel I also hear a lot from those in agriculture who want to work on the basket of restoration and other actions that can truly help fish But can't find willing partners or ears. They feel from the environmental world I hear fish advocates feel that no one cares or is listening or who have watched salmon stocks let alone smell plummet and other species plummet They and many of you and many of us are in a panic about it. What was that between panic and What complacency I'm closer to panic. I believe at the moment But all too often I also hear them talk about numbers on a piece of paper Or litigation and flow as a panacea dismissing the other things that salmon need to Like habitat food and evening the odds against predators So each side has thinks the other has all of the power that is a truth And that whichever the co-equal goals of ecological restoration or reliable water supply they care about is the one that's out of balance The delta folks sometimes feel left out of the whole equation all together Even though they're also an integral part of it Each side thinks the other knows everything their circle does and is choosing to dismiss it And there are too few olive branches or efforts to bridge the divide or even translate language There's beauty magic and something of intrinsic profound importance in restoring ecosystems As we as a society that we have degraded and there's something truly wondrous and heavenly about the amazing life cycle of salmon There's something important to us as humans as I've said and reconciling with the natural world through acts of restoration But we don't communicate that very well as we talk numbers and papers and litigation threats Similarly people in agriculture feel it's so obvious that they're doing something equally wondrous And important to our humanity beyond the nourishment they create But they can also lead with rhetoric and dismissal of the creatures we share this earth with If we can see that we have competing goods We don't have an instant solution, but we have the beginning of a conversation That can actually lead to better a better and more productive way to make a difference that helps the ecosystem and people And I also as I've said see people who are struggling to make these connections and to make it work So if the salmon could talk in closing Oh If a salmon could talk in closing, what would they say? Well, they might settle the discussion and let us know how much flow and non-flow measures they want most and where that'd be nice I think they'd tell us to get off our high horses and talk to each other and get past the word words and into action I do definitely think they'd ask for more water Maybe even 60 of what he's having But they'd also ask for evening the odds against predators They'd ask for food cooler water places to rest and grow and ready themselves for the next leg of their remarkable journey A little help please Or there might be royally. I can't say it now royally mad and not Not before and not day to speak to us So we have to do our best whether a scientist and advocate or someone taking action on the ground to communicate for them In a way that can be heard to bridge divides But most important we need to take action to do the things that we can do Which is what so many of you do every day with inadequate resources Inadequate certainty of what others can do to help and without certainty that everything you do will yield returns And we do need to draw as many allies as possible into the work Not to fight the other guy but to add their voices and energy and effort to help make a difference We need to welcome and encourage the overtures even as we continue to press for more resources or regulation or water So I'm not without hope And seeing all of you fills me with more. Oh, sorry. I was there yesterday Patrick Coppell and Erica were there but with Farmers irrigation districts and environmentalists trying to do some great things on the Tuolumne River This I just Share with you some Wendell Berry as I leave you He really got the importance of both the land and ecosystem and farming But I really like most you cannot save the land apart from the people or the people apart from the land And if you haven't read him, I recommend it So most of all, I think the fish would say thank you to all of you For the remarkable work that you do through a combination of ingenuity Intelligence heart and plain old hard work They'd say thank you for caring and let's hope for more of you and more resources for more of you And I wanted to say thank you too For all of that and for the inspiration to find new ways to make real progress on the ground with people To break through the rhetoric and get to the heart of things Your work does more than help the fish It bridges divides and it solves problems and you know that sometimes that takes the A thousand cups of tea we used to talk about at TPL it helps us all be better So thank you and let's get more of that hopeful story out there. I look forward to working with you in the months ahead We have time for one or two questions. Yeah, I took too long. Sorry. That's okay And yet you persisted and yet I I have the hat I have I have that All right, think of your question throwing break and This will be back up with us at the end folks We have about 15 minutes to stretch your legs get a drink of water and be back in your seats