I am a retired Forest Service hydrologist and soils specialist and have lived in Baker County for 22 years. We all have our passions, and mine is water — in our streams, our snowpacks, our wetlands, and in our faucets. It is from this place that I write to correct continuing misrepresentations of the DEQ Water Quality Management Plan/Total Maximum Daily Load for fecal bacteria (TMDL) process.

First, I can appreciate early concerns regarding the TMDL process after DEQ’s first presentation effort in August 2023. It left many questions. However, when DEQ staff realized that more and better information was needed, they responded immediately, making clear it was important that we understood the process and had our questions answered.

Let’s contrast DEQ’s response with Idaho Power’s behavior and response related to B2H, where the negative impact to Baker County will be great. For three years, I analyzed Idaho Power’s B2H project related to soils, gave repeated testimony, and spent hours responding to IP’s expert witness’s convoluted arguments and IP’s legal challenges. The soils analysis was a joke, completely inadequate, blatantly wrong in places, and frequently contradicted itself. I watched agencies that should have had our best interests at heart make decisions that will put Eastern Oregon at increased risk of wildfire and invasive weed expansion if the towers are built and high electrical voltage flows through the lines. It was exhausting and many locals worked even longer on that effort. Very different responses from DEQ and Idaho Power, and those differences tell us a lot about corporation or agency intent and desired outcomes.

Good water quality is essential to our well-being. Maintaining good water quality or restoring it requires monitoring. Data collection and analysis are time intensive and costly. We are fortunate to have this first broad assessment completed as DEQ has many basins to serve and parameters to analyze. Therefore, one of the disappointing consequences of repeated demands for more data, cries of tyranny, and claims of a noose around our neck is that they have slowed our ability to correct our water quality problem. Who benefits from this delay when good water quality is so important to all of Baker County?

Once DEQ’s plan is approved, the next step is for our local designated management agencies (i.e., Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, ODFW, Baker Valley Irrigation District) to create water quality plans for lands under their jurisdiction. It is their plans, not DEQ’s, that will do the deep dive into source type, locations, and solutions. So why delay and prolong the period that leaves our kids, dogs, fish, wildlife, and livestock drinking and swimming in contaminated waters?

Protecting our water quality or restoring it are signs of respect and stewardship. Yes, we are an agricultural community with cattle, but also much more. We are a community of small farms with a variety of products, of vibrant arts, theater, music, and quality recreation, of small businesses and education opportunities, of caring committed volunteers working on a host of issues that improve conditions in our county. All of us need and deserves high quality water.

Paying attention will always be part of our job as citizens. We helped pay for this assessment as taxpayers. It is time to allow our local agencies the freedom to create plans and identify sources of fecal bacteria inputs so we can improve conditions. Let part of our legacy be that we restored high quality water to our streams for the benefit of all.

Suzanne Fouty

Baker City