Water Resources: Hydraulics and Hydrology
president of the Sierra Club was quoted as saying, "The end justifies the means." They
exaggerated and misrepresented facts on the basis that the end justified the means. That's
pretty hard to deal with when you're operating in good faith and within the limits imposed
by the Congress. We were continuously updating the same reports each year as prices
escalated, and were doing nothing really constructive. That's why I retired.
Or giving depositions or something, I imagine.
Or in court.
So that early '70's period was a very difficult time for the Corps across the board?
The thing is the Corps was really trying to implement NEPA in good faith within the limits
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of our authorities.
What was the general attitude in the organization at that time, fairly defeatist?
No, the attitude was, "We're doing the best we can." Sacramento District had a recreation
section in the planning branch before
and it became the environmental section in the
early '70's. We had wildlife biologists, archaeologists, and recreation specialists. They had
to interact with the State Fish and Game Department, and the National Fish and Wildlife
Service more than we did. One of the agencies that caused us the biggest problems was State
Fish and Game. Their approach seemed to be to demand "as much as the traffic would bear."
What they wanted in mitigation was totally unreasonable in many cases.
I've heard from a lot of people that the Fish and Wildlife Service was the worst federal
agency they
to deal with, as far as a lot of their projects were concerned.
As far as federal, probably, but in Sacramento, even the Federal Fish and Wildlife Service
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had a problem supporting the demands of State Fish and Game.
So they had trouble?
Yes. Basically, I think we understood the environmental problems better than the
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environmentalists understood the engineering. I was a bird watcher long before
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