Valley Journal
Valley Journal

This Week’s e-Edition

Current Events

Latest Headlines

What's New?

Send us your news items.

NOTE: All submissions are subject to our Submission Guidelines.

Announcement Forms

Use these forms to send us announcements.

Birth Announcement
Obituary

BIA isn’t the only one with issues

Hey savvy news reader! Thanks for choosing local. You are now reading
1 of 3 free articles.



Subscribe now to stay in the know!

Already a subscriber? Login now

Editor,

I think many of us would agree with some of Mission District Commissioner Tim Orr’s criticisms of the Bureau of Indian Affair’s costly bureaucratic procedures (Valley Journal, 1/23/19). But I wonder what it would be like to brief a Secretary of Interior or Senator on the refusal of the Jocko and Mission irrigation districts to pay this year’s full operation and maintenance fees and their frequent demands “to operate the FIP.”

The briefing will probably end with the Secretary of Interior shaking his head in dismay. These are some of the questions an Interior Secretary (or Senator) might ask a staff member and the answers they would get:

Commissioner Orr compares the BIA’s poor performance with the positive performance of the Cooperative Management Entity from 2010 to 2013. But didn’t irrigators cause the demise of the CME? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Didn’t irrigators reject a BIA proposal in early 2014 to maintain the CME? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Did irrigators repay the US government for irrigation project construction costs? No, sir, Mission Valley Power electricity users paid off the debt many years after the US government built the project.

When the Jocko and Mission districts controlled the FJBC after 2013, didn’t the FJBC sue us in Federal court demanding local irrigator project control and didn’t they lose? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Didn’t the FJBC illegally cancel an FJBC election in 2016? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Didn’t a local court dissolve the FJBC in January 2018 because it was illegally formed? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Mr. Orr continues to second guess local project management decisions, but when he was an FJBC commissioner, didn’t the FJBC fail to properly manage its only employee and as a result lose thousands of dollars of irrigator money and end up with an ongoing FBI investigation? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Isn’t it difficult for Jocko and Mission irrigators to plan and finance their farm and ranch operations this year given the districts’ refusal to pay the full O&M fee? Yes, Mr. Secretary.

Dick Erb
Moiese

Sponsored by: