Salinity Barrier in Franks Tract

crawdaddy · Post by **crawdaddy** » Tue Mar 27, 2018 8:42 am

Take a minute to read. I pulled this from Lauritzens.com (Which is also a great resource for accurate weather forecasts and a lot of tide and water info).

IMPORTANT FOR EVERY BOATER

CA Dept. Fish & Wildlife via UC Davis research is asking for more people from Discovery Bay to answer their survey. The more I’ve found out about this project, “Franks Tract Feasibility Study," the more concerned I have become. If you boat or fish, please fill out this online survey: Franks Tract & Little Franks Tract User Survey <https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIp ... sp=sf_link>
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIp ... A/viewform

Their plan is to fill the western half of Franks Tract and Little Franks Tract with dirt making a high-tide marsh, put up a salinity barrier wall and dam on the east side of that fill (down the center of Franks Tract).

RESULT: It would wall off key marinas and businesses from direct boat traffic (everyone would have to come in/out via Piper Slough) and basically destroy Bethel Island's economy and Northern California's key bass fishing site. Franks Tract IS a State Recreational Area, after all. While the new tidal marsh is labeled as smelt habitat, they admitted the project is (1) a salinity wall so they can continue to export at the current high level as salt water intrudes and (2) a project to help the endangered smelt . . . BECAUSE the smelt being endangered and caught in the pumps keeps causing the pumps to get shut down. So it’s to yet another project to keep exporting more water than they should be exporting.

So if you boat, if you take your big boat out through False River and don’t want to always go all the way around when heading to Pittsburg, Benicia, San Francisco, (this puts a dam on False River north of Franks Tract, so same as when there was the other False River Dam), then let them know that.

If you are a bass fisherman and don’t like the idea of them filling in so much of a designated State Recreation Area, known throughout the U.S. as one of the primo bass fishing sites, let them know that.

If you think it’s a big problem to wall off Bethel Island marinas that boats can now get to directly by going through Franks Tract, where Big Cat Poker Runs make a stop at Rusty Porthole and that levee opening will be filled in, and where the bass fishing tournaments go in/out from Russo’s or Sugar Barge from their openings in the levee which will be filled in, let them know.

And if you like the Frozen Bun Runs where skiers head out directly from Rusty Porthole into Franks Tract, and that will be walled up, let them know. There’s a big concern in general by restaurants and marinas that will get walled off from Frank’s Tract so that boats would have a long way to go around and up Piper Slough to visit those establishments. Will they go out of business?

If you boat in/around Franks Tract and/or visit establishments there, please fill out the survey. Thanks!

For more information, see https://nodeltagates.com/2018/01/10/fra ... ity-study/

/
Jan/
Janet McCleery, President | STCDA
925-978-6563
www.noDeltaGates.com <http://www.nodeltagates.com> | www.facebook.com/SaveTheCaliforniaDelta ... orniaDelta>

Begin forwarded message:

The online survey can be accessed via this shareable link: Franks Tract & Little Franks Tract User Survey <https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIp ... sp=sf_link>
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIp ... A/viewform
Survey responses will be collected on a password protected google spreadsheet, accessible exclusively to project researchers (Brett Milligan, Alejo Kraus-Polk). Survey responses will remain anonymous (individual identifying information will not be gathered). Participation is voluntary.

PeteD · Post by **PeteD** » Tue Mar 27, 2018 10:03 am

Took the survey

StogieMan · Post by **StogieMan** » Tue Mar 27, 2018 10:07 am

I took the survey!

Post by **WB Staff** » Tue Mar 27, 2018 2:21 pm

We posted it last December... http://www.westernbass.com/forum/propos ... lit=franks

Dont know how many actually took survey

scott h · Post by **scott h** » Tue Mar 27, 2018 8:58 pm

Done.

Mitch · Post by **Mitch** » Wed Mar 28, 2018 10:19 am

DONE !!

M Pollard · Post by **M Pollard** » Wed Mar 28, 2018 12:46 pm

Kentuck · Post by **Kentuck** » Wed Mar 28, 2018 5:11 pm

Added my two cents worth

lcates · Post by **lcates** » Wed Mar 28, 2018 6:18 pm

Done this is such a waste of money to do nothing to help the river and just grab water for their good dam almonds this state is so screwed up they will destroy one of the best fisheries this country has just for greed of money

Par · Post by **Par** » Wed Mar 28, 2018 6:46 pm

took the survey

basshol · Post by **basshol** » Wed Mar 28, 2018 10:17 pm

Took the survey. I posted something in the past when they blocked off false river last time.i said it was a test to stop the inflow of salt water. I guess I was right.Any thing to steal water and turn delta drinking water to salt.

frankstractfutures · Post by **frankstractfutures** » Wed Jul 31, 2019 3:31 pm

The Franks Tract restoration planning process is entering into a new phase and is seeking additional input from people who live, work, and play on the Tract:

Please let the project team know where you fish and boat on the Tract in the new map-based survey:

https://app.maptionnaire.com/en/6547/

Feel free to share this link widely!

mark poulson · Post by **mark poulson** » Wed Jul 31, 2019 3:50 pm

frankstractfutures wrote:The Franks Tract restoration planning process is entering into a new phase and is seeking additional input from people who live, work, and play on the Tract:

Please let the project team know where you fish and boat on the Tract in the new map-based survey:

https://app.maptionnaire.com/en/6547/

Feel free to share this link widely!

Your survey doesn't ask real questions, it only points people toward choosing which alternative they would choose from choices that all support the project.
As Josh Ireland said, backfilling Franks would cause the water in Piper Slough to rip, causing a real economic hardship on businesses that sit on the levee there, like the Rusty Port Hole, and Russo's Marina, and lowering property values all along Piper Slough. It would probably have similar effects on Taylor Slough, too. All the water that flows into and through Franks now will have to go somewhere else.
All you're doing is making water delivery to the pumps at the Forebay faster.
This project is a water grab disguised as a "restoration" project.
Franks isn't the problem.
Taking water from the Delta for the San Joaquin Water Districts and almond farmers is the problem.
The salmon, stripers, black bass, and the Delta smelt all coexisted just fine until the Aqueduct System was built. You can look at the salmon numbers, and the water pumping numbers, and see how they are connected. The figures from the DFW on the decline of the salmon, and from the Aqueduct's own water flow numbers, don't lie.
There is a direct correlation between the pumping of the Delta water and the decline of the fisheries.
The cure for ailing salmon numbers, and the ailing San Francisco Estuary ecosystem, is to Stop Pumping Water.
It really is that simple.