Last month, the Mendocino County Inland Power and Water Commission held a Town Hall meeting in Potter Valley to engage and inform residents about water storage solutions in light of the impending loss of Scott Dam and Lake Pillsbury. Much of the meeting was technical talk by water engineers. During the public comment portion of the meeting, Potter Valley resident Hannah Foster stood up and voiced her frustration about the loss of Lake Pillsbury, a beloved local recreation spot. “Hi everyone, I don’t have a question. I have Save Lake Pillsbury hats for sale. Love you, Potter Valley, f—k you, PG&E!”
For Foster, whose family has lived in Potter Valley for 6 generations, the loss of Lake Pillsbury is personal. Foster’s grandfather worked for the US Forest Service at Lake Pillsbury, and her family has vacationed there for generations. The lake is a resource for firefighters. Her extended family lives in Upper Lake, Covelo, and Potter Valley. She has spent most of every summer at Lake Pillsbury. “I don’t know any other home,” said Foster.
Foster acknowledges that the Scott and Cape Horn Dams, and the Potter Valley Project, which diverts Eel River water through a tunnel into Potter Valley, would probably not be constructed today. This system of hydroelectric power generation and water delivery has been in place for more than a century and serves over half a million people. PG&E says that Scott and Cape Horn Dam are not up to today’s seismic standards and that it is not economically feasible to repair the hydroelectric power generating equipment. PG&E has petitioned the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for permission to surrender the project. No buyers came forward to take the Potter Valley Project off PG&E’s hands. The Eel River water users, fisheries groups, and others, want the dams removed.
Sonoma and Mendocino County water agencies are in the process of negotiating with PG&E, and designing and funding a new seasonal diversion to be used in the rainy season once the dams are gone. There are estimates of how much water will come through the tunnel in the seasonal diversion, but nobody knows, as it hasn’t yet been built.
This means that Lake Pillsbury will be gone forever. Foster feels that PG&E is not concerned with what will happen to Potter Valley and the communities surrounding Lake Pillsbury.
Foster said, “We heard whispers of PG&E’s plan to decommission Scott Dam about 8 years ago, but PG&E did not engage with people in Potter Valley. There was closed-door decision-making happening.” In 2020 she heard more about the decommissioning plans, which over the years began to solidify. This triggered Foster to do something.
What about the Mendocino Inland Power and Water Commission and the Potter Valley Irrigation District, which have been discussing PG&E’s plans in their regular board meetings? Those meetings are open to the public, and meeting minutes are available on their websites. (Here is a link to the MCIWPC meetings web page.) Foster says people are busy. “There is no way for citizens to engage. The talks happen in back rooms, led by bureaucrats. There is no way for the average person to say, ‘Hey, please stop this!’”
The decline of local news coverage from traditional newspapers can be blamed for people’s feelings of being uninformed. News reporting is transitioning from newspapers to online media sites. The local papers that are still in business do not provide the level of in-depth reporting as in years past. Many people don’t know how to find online news, and don’t know which sites are trustworthy.
Foster explained her decision to start selling “Save Lake Pillsbury” merch. “There aren’t a lot of opportunities for the average person to do anything to try and help save the lake. I’ve commented to FERC, I’ve shared on social media, I’ve written/tagged my representatives. I decided that since the people who are really trying to wash their hands of the dam are the ones I was being asked to send comments to, I’d try and support a group doing the work to fight removal instead. I figured generating awareness was a way I could help, in a form that was funny and familiar. I started selling [hats] from my booth at Potter Valley Rodeo and it took a while, but we’ve gotten a lot more traction as more people become aware of the possible loss of Lake Pillsbury, Scott Dam, and the Potter Valley Project.”
Foster supports, but is not a member of, The Lake Pillsbury Alliance, a 501(c)(3) organization formed by homeowners’ groups at Lake Pillsbury. “LPA has a board of members who do a lot of background work like attending regulatory and workgroup meetings and staying on stop of what other groups are doing behind closed doors. They don’t necessarily have an arm for active membership and their fundraising supports their legal fees to continue fighting removal.”
Foster got the idea to sell trucker hats and other merchandise from watching TikTok videos. After recovering costs, Foster donates all profits to The Lake Pillsbury Alliance. She is not affiliated with The Lake Pillsbury Alliance, and all opinions expressed are her own.
Foster has raised almost $2500 through the sale of merch, and donates the proceeds to The Lake Pillsbury Alliance. “I reserve some from each batch to continue printing the merch with a local screen printer, which I pay for personally.” Hats are $40, including sales tax. Foster sold hats at the California Deer Association dinner in November. They are currently available at Hometown Store Kitchen & Gifts, 290 South School Street in Ukiah. Foster added, “I’m hoping to [resume] online shipping again when the Christmas retail season slows down at my shops. We will have shirts available again in the spring in a new color too.”
Foster said, “I hope that people will take a look at where the water in Lake Pillsbury actually goes, and the amount of storage captured in the Lake Pillsbury basin. Water storage is critical for our communities and there’s so much captured in Lake Pillsbury that can be utilized up and down the North Coast. Our state government isn’t recognizing its important role, and I hope the federal government will.”
Read the MendoFever.com article on the Potter Valley Town Hall meeting.
I like my hat and have it in my truck at all times. The short sighted democrats who are supported by voters in Sonoma and Mendocino Counties will learn quickly as soon as additional droughts hit how expensive water will be. The state has already mandated water restrictions and increased costs. There should be a solution before we lose this resource not after the fact.
Is it really a partisan issue? Grow up.
I love how your comment is so perfectly spilt with likes. How pertinent.
Are the Democrats in the room with you right now?
Or is it Corporate Capitalist PG&E that is closing the dam?
Sonoma County is hungry for water, the more the better. Mansions, vineyards, wine tourism. Eel river advocates mock Sonoma county for stealing their water to maintain their million dollar mansions. Maintain the diversion is what our county supervisors care about. They have paid McMillen for a design of a replacement for Cape Horn dam that will be a “diversion structure.” One thing that makes you think is that allowed diversion will depend on whether the Eel can afford it without compromising salmon habitat. That seems to imply that during years of severe drought diversions will not even be allowed. So when Sonoma county wants and needs the water the most, it won’t get any.
What about the rural people of Humboldt and their generational recreation ?
Won’t be affected. It’s been this way for 110+ years
Um what. It continues to affect it. It’s been affecting it for over 100 years. Ya’ll are partying on water reverse watersheded and stored for grapes downstream. You’re contradicting yourselves. Fuck pg and e but keep the lake cuz my family goes there for fun? Lame. I mean, are you a hick or a hippie? Save the river or lake which one?
I agree the people of potter need disaster relief money from pg and e for closing their dam, but I also think it would be cool if we did something drastic and put the river flowing the way it was. That perfect place where water goes either north or south…that fing magical spot where that happens, and ya’ll are still trying to deny it? That’s nature. Potter was dry traditionally, OVER 110+ years ago. And it will be again.
The idea of tearing down dams and emptying lakes is nothing but disastrous! Our state should be protecting and creating more water storage. The Russian River will be dry like in the old days. The fish somehow survived in those dry summers. We, however, may not.
The fish remained in the ocean unspawned until another wet year when the sediment from their birth river is washed out to the ocean when they “smell” it and swim back upstream to die. The dams prevent this natural washout of sediment for BOTH river systems.
It isn’t just about fish not being able to jump over dams. It’s more than just storing water in man made puddles. It’s about storing water in the whole ecosystem. It’s about keeping it in the cycle at all. We are taking it out of the cycle . Don’t ya’ll get it? This is bigger than your rootin tooting 3 gun shooting camping with your family childhood memories. Your ancestors took this gem and fucked it up. This is the consequence. You ate from pg and e with a silver spoon and now you’re crying when mommy pulls her tit away.
The Lake Pillsbury Alliance is dedicated to the preservation of Lake Pillsbury for public benefit. We strive to be a voice for ALL stakeholders who believe removal of Lake Pillsbury will harm people, fire protection, wildlife and fish within our Region. As far as we are concerned, Hannah Foster is one of us!
Make T shirts and sweatshirts!!!
Oct 8th 2024 Authorize Sonoma County Water Agency’s General Manager to execute an agreement with McMillen, Inc., for engineering and design services for Eel-Russian Facility Planning and Design in the amount of $1,999,861.
The Potter Valley Project is an inter-basin water transfer project, In 2019, PG&E chose not to relicense the project with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Sonoma Water obtained a planning grant from the California Department of Water Resources to evaluate the feasibility, and risks associated with acquiring and modifying existing diversion facilities and constructing new infrastructure to continue importing water from the Eel River into the Russian River Watershed. The preferred alternative, the New Eel-Russian Facility (NERF), will include substantial removal of Cape Horn Dam, construction of a pump station, and modification of the Van Arsdale tunnel intake infrastructure on the Eel River.
Just FYI on what Sonoma County is up to.
Save Lake Pillsbury. If they remove those dams within one or two generations, everyone will realize it was the biggest mistake this region has ever made in regards to water resources. And fisheries. Removing the dams will not restore the fish. Not with climate change. I have said this so many times I’m blue in the face. And I’m done arguing with people over this issue on this platform. But I’m glad to know where I can buy some of these hats. SAVE LAKE PILLSBURY!!!!
Per the norm, you certainy don’t let the breadth of veritable and reproducible facts get in the way of your “beliefs”.
Way to stick to stick to your guns.
Now that Trump is gonna take office on January 20. I think we should start a mass letter writing campaign to him to save Lake Pillsbury and add it to the Mendocino national Forest. I don’t know if the lake itself is owned by PG&E or leased, but it is entirely enclosed and surrounded by the Mendocino national Forest. With one signature he could add the lake and Scott Dam to the Mendocino National Forest and the Army Corps of Engineers could take over control of the dam and retrofit it. This would take a miracle, No doubt. And a lot of money. And there would be tons of backlash from the opponents from the left. But I think if you love Lake Pillsbury, we should all start writing letters to the White House.
We all know how much President Trump loves sticking it to the left. He would love to monkey-wrench Jared Huffman. This is something that could catch on if we were to attract enough attention. I won’t give up until they ignite the dynamite and level that dam. I will fight. But once it’s gone, I abandon California because Pillsbury is the last thing that keeps me holding on to staying here. If you are not about Saving Lake Pillsberry, then keep your comments to yourself. I will not read them and I will not respond. Go pound sand.
Back when PGE released their plan to surrender the #77 FERC license, it was determined that it would cost ~$13 million to complete the necessary feasibility studies and preliminary engineering to keep as much of the PVP infrastructure intact & operational as possible and to upgrade infrastructure to meet the current reality & science based laws & for use through the next FERC licensing period.
What with all the interests in Marin, Sonoma, Mendo, & Lake counties (especially the multi-billion $ wine industry), you all couldn’t pull together $13 mil within a year?
That, in and of itself, is telling.
2yrs later, there’s a lot of whining, thrashing about, and tantrums, but still no real or concerted attempts or commitments made to retain it shown beyond the serious moves made by Sonoma and the Mendo IWPC to pivot.
The writing is on the wall.
Much like the Elwha and Klamath, the salmonids can be expected to swim beyond the former dam boundary within weeks of the final breach and river course realignment.
Anadromous fish are one of very few Keystone species the entire ecosystem is built upon.
If humans want to stay here long term, they will need these fish species to survive.
If you love Creation, then be a good Steward and care for it.
Carry on with the tantrums.
Not to worry, the adults will handle it, as usual.
I don’t eat fish. I eat venison. That I hunt around Lake Pillsbury and Mt. Sanhedrin.
You continue to miss THE fundamental issue.
It’s NOT about you. It’s about everything & everyone.
Humans needing the fish in order to survive in this area/region does NOT hinge on whether YOU (or I, or any other person) eat them.
The entire basis of the larger regional Pacific Crest Ecosystem is founded upon the Anadromous Fish and Eels.
The deer you harvest continue to exist en masse because their food sources (and the food sources of the deer food sources, and on and on…) are founded upon these anadromous creatures and the phosphorous and nitrogen & sulphur based proteins (and and and etc) that they onload onto the continental shelf from the ocean.
Isotope tracking has revealed the presence of salmon & trout sourced carbon (and plenty of other nutrients) isotopes to be widespread & throughout ALL living species of Pacific Western ecosystems from sea level to the Mt peaks.
This is NOT new information.
It is a long and well defined, verifiable, and reproducible emperical fact supported by reams and reams of data from over decades.
See “Keystone Species”.
I hope your continued misunderstanding isn’t an indication of willful ignorance and unfettered selfishness, Bradley.
We need solutions that support and allow for continued Long Term survival and local presence of both humans AND fish.
If it has to be one or the other, long term, humans will lose.
We will all see how it plays out in the end. The tides have changed.