River council calls
on Congress

By DAVID HULSE

NARROWSBURG — Admittedly moved in large measure by John Hutzky’s January 17 editorial in The River Reporter, the Upper Delaware Council (UDC) is calling for congressional oversight of New York City’s recent reservoir policies as it relates to the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River.

Members of the UDC Water Use and Resource Management Committee on January 17 directed preparation of a letter to U.S. representatives Benjamin Gilman (R-NY20), Maurice Hinchey (D-NY26) and Don Sherwood (R-PA10). Bill Douglass, UDC Executive Director said one possible result of the UDC request could be formal congressional hearings.

Douglass said he anticipated legal research for the letter would be completed in time to allow the full UDC to approve it at its February 7 meeting.

Hutzky, a former Upper Delaware National Park Service Superintendent,who now writes a regular TRR column, took river management officials to task in the editorial, arguing that federal Wild and Scenic Rivers legislation carries the authority to review and check actions detrimental to the river, even those by New York City. He challenged officials to invoke those authorities.

The city draws water from the Delaware watershed as the result of a 1954 Supreme Court decision. While reserving preferred East Branch waters, city officials have all but drained the Cannonsville reservoir on the West Branch of the Delaware to provide downstream flows during the ongoing drought.

The UDC has repeatedly argued that the city should provide filtration that would allow its use of Hudson River water and take usage pressure off the nationally protected Delaware.

The city has balked at the estimated multi-billion dollar cost of installing filtration, preferring to rely on stream and groundwater quality programs in the watershed. The NYC Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) on January 14 filed a new five-year “filtration avoidance plan” with the federal Environmental Protection Agency. Heralding its resource management, the DEP cited four pages of some 34 measures undertaken for watershed resource protection planning programs. The plan did not reference any protection of the two main branches below the Cannonsville and Pepacton reservoirs.