Useful Fools

The envirowackos have won again… birds encroaching on a temporary dry lake have been granted property rights!

Read on….

Arizona is in the midst of an extended drought. The largest storage reservoir, 80 miles east of Phoenix, is almost dry. With the normal lake bottom now exposed, several hundred “endangered” Southwestern Willow Flycatchers have set up housekeeping.

The Salt River Project, operator of the lake, was faced with quite a problem. The environazis threatened to sue to keep the lake from being refilled - an action that could have left over 3 million Arizonan’s short of water. On the other hand, if above normal winter rains came, the reservoir would have filled faster than the water could be discharged, putting SRP in big trouble by chasing off the birds. [A side note… the runoff would be even greater than normal due to the burn area of the huge Rodeo-Chedeski fire… also partly a result of environmentalist obstructionism]

So SRP did what those who spend other peoples’ money often do: they caved in to the enviros. They have now agreed to create a permanent bird habitat elsewhere, essentially giving property rights to the flycatchers. Far into the future, Phoenix water and electricity users will be subsidizing protection of birds who had never naturally been on SRP’s land!