On July 19th a hearing was held in the US Senate on Oregon Senator Ron Wyden’s S.482 – The Klamath Power and Facilities Agreement Support Act. If it becomes law, Wyden’s legislation would provide a new taxpayer subsidy to irrigators within the federal Klamath Irrigation Project.
Virtually all US agricultural producers are subsidized. However, as KlamBlog has documented, the Klamath River Basin’s federal irrigators are far and away recipients of the most taxpayer subsidy dollars annually as compared to all other agricultural producers in the Upper Basin, Shasta Valley and Scott Valley. That is why KlamBlog has labeled those federal irrigator the Basin’s Irrigation Elite.
So why does Senator Wyden think a new subsidy is needed at this time. And why is that subsidy specifically targeted toward only one irrigation district among several which operate with federal irrigation water?
