The May 1945 contract did not resolve the city's surplus energy problems. In Washington, representatives and attorneys for the Modesto Irrigation District (MID) and the Turlock Irrigation District (TID) were deeply involved in the discussions. The city and the two districts had compatible power needs. Essentially, the irrigation districts needed a power supplier, while San Francisco needed a market. On March 12, 1945, R.V. Meikle,TID's representative, and MID chief engineer Clifford Plummer signed a contract whereby the two districts would purchase all of the surplus Hetch Hetchy power. To ensure compliance with the Raker Act, the contract stipulated that neither district could resell the power to PG&E nor any other private utility
The two irrigation districts had evolved into more than their names might imply. By 1940 they provided both water and power for their rural and urban customers. At the time that San Francisco built the O'Shaughnessy dam, the TID and MID combined their financial resources to construct the Don Pedro Dam on the lower Tuolumne River. The dam stored irrigation waters, but the powerhouse created valuable electricity. Initially, the Modesto Irrigation District Board of Directors intended to wholesale its 35 percent share of electricity to the Pacific Gas and Electric Company, the electricity provider for the town. However, the people of Modesto voted to have a publicly owned utility company. For some 20 years the Modesto Irrigation District and PG&E maintained competing electrical systems and fought for each customer. During that period the MID would have favored purchase of Hetch Hetchy power, but under the 1925 power agreement with PG&E, San Francisco had to deliver all of its power to the private company. The 1925 agreement not only worked well for PG&E in San Francisco but also gave the company considerable leverage against the MID.51 Yet the majority of the people of Modesto kept fighting, determined to have public power. Finally on June 10, 1940, PG&E capitulated, selling its competing infrastructure for $325,000.52
The Turlock Irrigation District never suffered a fight for public power. The Don Pedro Darn contract called for two-thirds of the power to be delivered to TID, more than it would need for a number of years. While MID bought power at retail prices from PG&E, TID sold its surplus to the utility company at wholesale prices. Ironically, both irrigation districts accepted the doctrine of public ownership so central to the Raker Act, while San Francisco-where it was to apply-rejected the principle.
The March 1945 agreements between San Francisco and the irrigation districts worked well, and minor violations became less important in 1946, when Ickes bade farewell to the Interior Department. Oscar Chapman, the new secretary, had no ideological cross to bear; thus Ickes's "strict construction" of the Raker Act gave way to loose construction under Chapman and continued with the Republican ascendancy under President Eisenhower. The term reasonable compliance came back into vogue. In truth, however, with increased deliveries to the Modesto Irrigation District, the city was complying with the Raker Act. Quarterly reports from the San Francisco manager of public utilities, J. H. Turner, indicate that in 1951 and 1952 the city did not dump any power into PG&E lines.53 Over the past 50 years, there have been investigations and efforts in San Francisco for municipal ownership. However, they have been brushed aside, and the dichotomy remains in San Francisco between a publicly owned water system and a private power company.
NEW ISSUES, HOWEVER, arose. As the need for electricity grew, San Francisco significantly increased the power output of the Hetch Hetchy system by developing the Tuolumne River and its tributaries below the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. A dam on Lake Eleanor had been the first city project, but in 1949 the city, in conjunction with the Modesto and Turlock irrigation districts, signed a contract with the Army Corps of Engineers to develop Cherry Valley, to the west of Lake Eleanor. Workers constructed 26 miles of mountain road in 1950 and brought in heavy equipment. By 1956 city engineers completed the huge Cherry Dam, 330 feet high, 2,600 feet long, and 1,320 feet thick at its base. This facility sits outside Yosemite National Park. Six miles downstream on Cherry Creek, the city built the Dion R. Holm powerhouse. The massive dam and powerhouse had a dual purpose-to store water for power generation during peak periods, but also to provide the MID and TID with downstream water deliveries promised under the Raker Act.
The other major facility was the Kirkwood power plant. Engineers located the plant, finished in 1967, at the termination point of the Canyon Power Tunnel, which carried most of the Tuolumne River from the O'Shaughnessy Dam 11 miles down the canyon. With the Moccasin Creek, Dion, and Kirkwood powerhouses the city had the capacity to generate more than two billion kilowatt-hours of power per year. San Francisco consumed about 25 percent of that power, mostly through use in municipal buildings, street railways, and street lighting. The irrigation districts took the other 75 percent, although questions remain regarding the city's total compliance with section 6.54
One other cooperative project should be mentioned because it impacts the future use of the Hetch Hetchy system. In 1923 the two irrigation districts completed the Don Pedro Dam. However, by 1949 San Francisco, the Army Corps of Engineers, and the MID and TID combined their interests and monies to construct a massive new dam. The new Don Pedro Dam, dedicated by Mayor Joseph Alioto in 1971, dwarfed the old one, submerging it in 200 feet of water and creating a 165-mile shoreline. For its $45 million dollar investment, San Francisco received from the irrigation districts a Hetch Hetchy credit of 740,000 acre-feet of exchange-water storage space. Considering that the total capacity of both Lake Eleanor and Hetch Hetchy Reservoir approximated 366,000 acre-feet, this additional reserve gave the Hetch Hetchy system the kind of security against drought that it needed. The Tuolumne River, which averaged an annual runoff of approximately 1,800,000 acre-feet, always left the city unprotected against the inevitable dry years, since the irrigation districts were entitled to 1,090,000 acre-feet of that water. San Francisco needed about 453,000 acre-feet annually. However, as historian Alan Paterson has noted, such figures do not account for the wide variations in runoff from year to year. The huge reservoir behind the new Don Pedro Dam gave San Francisco abundant carryover storage for those lean years.The Don Pedro addition increased the city's high-mountain storage space to 1.4 million acre-feet, enough to provide a daily delivery capacity of 400 million gallons. Finally, San Francisco could realize the amount of water that John Freeman promised in 1913, although according to Patricia Martel, past general manager of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, the system only delivers a little over half that amount.55
Although the Raker Act forced cooperation in the development of the Tuolumne River, the 1945 power contract conditions were not satisfactory to the irrigation districts. Under this contract the city furnished all the electrical energy the two districts required. However, if the districts' needs exceeded the available supply, San Francisco purchased power from PG&E and then resold it to the districts, passing along the higher costs of supplemental purchases. As the demand continued to grow, the districts chafed under the arrangement, but there was little that San Francisco could do. In 1968 the two districts contracted with R. W. Beck and Associates to draw up their own power project for the lower Tuolumne River between Cherry Creek and the Don Pedro Reservoir. The consultants came up with a rather elaborate plan known as the Clavey-Wards Ferry project. They envisioned building two small reservoirs and 19 miles of 1o-foot-in-diameter tunnel to transport much of the river to a powerhouse at Wards Ferry, just above the backwater of the Don Pedro Reservoir. The generating station would operate only at peak periods. It would be expensive to build, but the electricity would be valuable.
In April 1976 the Turlock Irrigation District and Modesto Irrigation District applied to the Federal Power Commission for a temporary permit. San Francisco joined the cause. The three partners did not envision serious challenges, but now they faced a new antagonist in the growing environmental movement. In the same year that R. W. Beck and Associates drew up the Clavey-Wards Ferry project, Congress passed the Wild and Scenic River Act, affording protection from such development f
or rivers that might qualify. Also in that year, 1968, kayakers Gerald Meral and Richard Sunderland, both members of the Sierra Club, ran the white water from Lumsden Bridge to Wards Ferry, the last remaining free-flowing section of the Tuolumne River. In the years to follow, more and more kayakers and rafters enjoyed the challenge of the river, and by 1972 commercial rafters began scheduling trips. These recreationists had created a viable commercial use of the lower river. Pressure to save the river emerged from environmental groups as well as commercial interests, resulting in a law in 1975 to provide for the studies needed to justify wild and scenic river designation.
Thus by the time the irrigation districts applied to the commission, the environmental interests were organized, led by the Tuolumne River Preservation Trust. By July 1977 the state, rafting organizations, and the Sierra Club prevailed upon the FPC (soon to be renamed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission [FERC]) to withhold a permit until a detailed study could be made showing the impact on the Tuolumne Canyon of the Clavey-Ward Ferry project. Perhaps anticipating the passage of the National Environmental Protection Act of 1980, the environmental interveners simply wanted the two districts to produce an environmental impact statement. Beck did the best it could to minimize impacts, suggesting that the contractors use helicopters for much of the work, but the plan faced serious criticism. One fatal blow came from the United States Forest Service when it announced that no matter what FERC decided, the agency would not issue a special use permit.56
Despite the slim chances of gaining a permit, the districts fought on. Although San Francisco remained neutral, the districts found support from other water agencies, chambers of commerce, and labor unions. However, public hearings in Columbia, Modesto, Oakdale, and San Francisco revealed strong public sentiment against the project. The state of California, environmental organizations, and white-water rafting companies all testified to keep the river flowing. Friends of the River, a new environmental group that had cut its teeth in opposing the New Melones Dam on the Stanislaus River, presented a petition with 18,ooo signatures. Nationally, Readers' Digest and the New York Times recounted the wonders of the Tuolumne River. The fight was essentially over when influential California senator Pete Wilson sided with the river interests. Finally on October 2, 1979, President Jimmy Carter asked Congress to make the Tuolumne River part of the wild and scenic river system.57 The districts would have to look for other ways to generate electricity.
The fight to save the remaining Tuolumne River white water brings the story full circle, back to the original Hetch Hetchy Valley struggle. Both struggles were, in essence, to save natural places and remarkable scenery for recreational use. Both were about the river. Both involved respectable gov- erninent agencies intent on doing the right thing, which they perceived as improving the lives of the people they represented. Both fights pitted the forces of engineering and technology against the natural river.Yet the out comes were very different. The river below Hetch Hetchy Reservoir had been bulldozed, tamed, channeled to the point that virtually nothing natural remained. In 1913 the defenders of the valley had said "stop" and failed. Now the defenders of the river said "enough" and won. On the Tuolumne River the limits of human control had been reached. By 1980 it was evident that the Hetch Hetchy system and its civil engineers would no longer prevail and that further modifications would be fought by river protectors with intensity and tenacity-a legacy their forefathers had established some 70 years earlier.
CHAPTER 9
The Legacies of Hetch Hetchy
"If San Francisco cannot properly cooperate with its generous landlord, the relationship had better cease and the Federal Government resume exclusive use of the park area."
CONGRESSMAN LEWIS CRAMTON, 1927
"Hetch Hetchy-Once Is Too Often."
ROBERT CUTTER
DESPONDENCY DESCENDED ON John Muir and his fellow defenders of the Hetch Hetchy Valley when they lost their fight. But a glimmer of hope re- mained.The forces of technological progress and the power of San Francisco won control of the valley, but Americans had awakened to the vulnerability of scenery and the national parks. Writing to Henry Fairfield Osborn, Muir predicted that "wrong cannot last, soon or late it must fall back home to Hades, while some compensating good must surely follow"I
What might that "compensating good" be? First, the National Parks Act of 1916, often called the Organic Act, must be credited to those who fought for the valley. Also, the National Parks Association, created in 1917, drew its origins from Hetch Hetchy. An equally significant result of the fight came in the challenge to assumptions regarding the value of dams, particularly their erection in national parks, including two notable clashes inYellowstone National Park.When new reclamation projects surfaced on the Colorado River in midcentury, an invigorated Sierra Club, harkening back to Hetch Hetchy, took on the dam builders with striking success. Perhaps most important was the way in which the controversy established boundaries between the claims of outside interests and the National Park Service. Succinctly, between 1915 and 1930 the city of San Francisco often acted as if one-third of Yosemite Park was its domain, based on the federal grant of the Hetch Hetchy. Valley. San Francisco's aspirations drew heavy fire from Park Service administrators and congressional leaders, leading to a subservient position for the city and a statement of authority byYosemite National Park. Finally, the legacy cannot always be measured, especially when it is an idea or commitment to the national parks. "Remember Hetch Hetchy" has never been a popular chant, yet the Yosemite case worked in more silent, deeper ways, influencing and inspiring dedication. It can be seen as the first environmental cause that attracted national support, one that should not be forgotten.
For San Francisco, the city gained a magnificent reservoir site and an unequaled water supply, of which it is justly proud. It also acquired the right to develop hydropower, a valuable and needed product. From the city's perspective the Hetch Hetchy agreement of 1930 demonstrated that a public agency and the National Park Service could work together, with each gaining what it needs. Essentially, a few areas of a park could be multifunctional, while most should be reserved for scenery. Hetch Hetchy sanctioned this dichotomy, and it provided the opening wedge in which other public or private organizations would work together with the Park Service toward a common end.
Finally, the Hetch Hetchy story has an intellectual legacy. Environmental activists and historians have perpetuated the myth that the idea of wilderness preservation rested at the heart of the defenders' case. There is another myth, one largely of my own making. When I began research, I expected to find sufficient evidence to state that the defenders of the valley used a "rights of nature" argument. However, my search of the voluminous documentation of Hetch Hetchy turned up no such evidence. Perhaps a few seeds of the wilderness preservation and "rights of nature" ideas can be discerned, but the full flower would not come until 30 years later.
THE DEFENDERS OF Hetch Hetchy discovered that guarding the national parks against a determined invader requires an organization to argue, lobby, and, if necessary, make sacrifices. San Francisco had hardly finished celebrating its victory when those who had opposed the project began working to make sure it would not happen again. How could the national parks and exceptional lands be protected? It was not enough to have a few environmental and mountaineering groups, almost always short of money, trying to defend against powerful forces. If the Hetch Hetchy fight accomplished anything, it magnified the need for a federal agency committed to the parks. The agency would administer parks, but more significant, define their meaning and mission and, when necessary, defend them. Such an agency would help to heal the weak and wounded system and give credence to Muir's hope that the fight for Hetch Hetchy had not been in vain. The 1916 National Parks Act partially fulfilled Muir's hope.2
However, passage of the National Parks Act was not a direct result of the Hetch Hetchy "steal." The effort was well under way before passage of the Raker Act. After i9o9 the nature lovers fought on two fronts:
one to save Hetch Hetchy, the other to protect the national parks. There was, of course, a decided overlap between the two objectives. When William Colby outlined three preservation objectives to save the valley, he included a fourth: to "lobby for a general bill to safeguard the National Parks."3 Thus, the effort to retain the valley and to establish a National Park Service moved in concert. There was also an overlap in personnel committed to both ends. Perhaps most representative was J. Horace McFarland, sometimes called "the father of the National Park Service.."4 In 19io McFarland, on one of his frequent trips to Washington, stopped by the Department of the Interior, seeking national park information, but he could find no desk, office, or even a responsible individual. He vented his frustration to his good friend Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. and did not hesitate to do the same to Secretary Richard Ballinger. Consequently, Ballinger invited McFarland to confer with his staff and to draw up a national parks bills
McFarland and Olmsted realized the need to empower a new agency based more on recreation and tourism and committed to preservation of historical objects and natural scenery. They wished to create a federal agency that would view land and water and mountains with a different mission than those of the Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Forest Service, both of which emphasized the commodity value of natural resources. This proposed agency might provide a declaration of independence for land from capitalist enterprise and economic development. Under the National Parks Act of 1916, then, a small portion of the land would be managed "to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations." The long and bitter debate over Hetch Hetchy influenced the shape of this mission statement, the touchstone for managing the parks and "the principal criterion against which preservation and use of national parks have ever since been judged."° McFarland would later comment that had a proper mission state ment been on the books in 1910, the loss of Hetch HetchyValley could have been averted.?
The Battle over Hetch Hetchy: America's Most Controversial Dam and the Birth of Modern Environmentalism Page 25
