Riverkeeper
On the wall maps in Monty Schmitt’s San Francisco office, the San Joaquin River reads as a thin blue line; but he sees much more. “To me it’s not just a physical, geographic form. I see the backdrop of the river, how it’s managed, its political context, the many stakeholders – even how it varies so tremendously over its course,” he explains. Schmitt ’86 is a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), where he spends the bulk of his time overseeing the San Joaquin River Restoration Project, the outcome of the 2006 settlement in a landmark lawsuit aimed at restoring life-giving flows and historic salmon runs to a 150-mile stretch of California’s second largest river and improving the management of water supplies in the region.
Schmitt points to the southern Sierra – the San Joaquin’s source – and traces the river’s path to its terminus in the San Francisco Bay Delta estuary. He explains that in the early 1940s the federal government built Friant Dam and the river began to run dry, its once-mighty flow diverted off to satisfy the demands of the Central Valley’s burgeoning agricultural region. The river’s Chinook salmon runs once the second largest in the state, was wiped out in the process and water quality in the lower river declined. A coalition of fishing and conservation groups intervened and filed suit against the federal government in1988 for violating a state law requiring protection of fish, after a lengthy court battle farmers, water districts, conservation groups and the federal government reached a historic settlement agreement that created one of the largest river restoration efforts in the nation. Schmitt’s work on to the river’s restoration began in 2000 and was supposed to be a temporary – but the work to restore the river is not complete.
“I was hired for six month contract as NRDC’s lead scientist,” says Schmitt, “but I’ve been here for thirteen years now, and it’s the best of jobs. I can’t imagine a better way to use my training or my love of the environment.”
Schmitt’s twin interests, in the outdoors and in science, were kindled by a childhood spent amidst the Central Coast’s axis of rivers, ocean, and mountains, and by the curriculum -- first at Santa Barbara Middle School and then at Cate. “The natural beauty of the Santa Barbara area is unparalleled,” he says, “and that wasn’t lost on me.”
In college at UC Santa Cruz, he gravitated toward the natural sciences, majoring in biology and environmental studies. His first job landed him along the Sacramento River, working for The Nature Conservancy to restore riparian habitat, which included planting trees and building irrigation systems – he calls it a “hands-on tractor-driving job where I could see very tangible results.” The result for him: “I knew I had found the work I wanted to do.” A position as the assistant director at the Ventana Wilderness Society in Big Sur was the next step, where he oversaw habitat restoration and environmental education programs as well as efforts to reintroduce condors. After obtaining a master’s of science in natural resources management from California State University, Humboldt, moved to the San Francisco Bay Area and began his work to restore rivers .
Since then, Schmitt and a broad array of other interests have been involved in the challenging process of reviving the San Joaquin River and its salmon runs while continuing to support the regions agricultural economy. While much remains to be done to restore the river, there have been notable milestones. April 21st 2011 was an especially proud day for them, when twelve-hundred juvenile Chinook salmon were released into the river, with 40 percent of those fish successfully migrating 150 miles downstream. The following fall, 175 adult Chinook salmon were released in the upper San Joaquin, where they successfully spawned for the first time in over 60 years. Last fall, over 360 adult fish were released in the upper river and this coming spring, they plan to release over 54,000 juvenile fish which will sow the seeds of future generations of returning adults. The long-term goal is to restore an average of 40,000 salmon per year.
California’s current drought is a challenging development for the river restoration effort, Schmitt admits, but he points out that the complex legal settlement took into account future years of both drought and flooding. “In wetter years, we’ll be allocated enough water to improve fish habitat and establish new riparian trees, but in dry years we get less and in the driest of years like this one, the river will barely get any water. In that way, we – the river, environmental groups, farmers, and other stakeholders – are sharing the pain.”
However, the key to the on-going success of the restoration effort has been to adapt to changing conditions. The restoration effort had to move more slowly to weather the recession and in this dry year, they will capture and move the progeny of last fall’s adult downstream so they can eventually make their way out to sea and return three years later as wild adults. It’s a move that’s controversial among farmers, including Cannon Michael ’90, a Central Valley farmer (profiled in the fall 2013 issue of the Bulletin), who argue that the expense is not justified.
Schmitt remains undaunted, pointing to the commonalities borne out of the years of working on rejuvenating the river, including among those parties historically at odds. “We have a new generation of resource managers,” he says. “When you build trust, everyone comes out a little stronger. Look how far attitudes have come since the 1940s, when everyone thought it was okay to dry up a major river.”
Regardless of current weather and climate conditions, Schmitt’s goal is for the river to regain enough of its former status to once again become a thriving ecosystem. “Thousands of salmon will again spawn there, and lush riparian forests – sustained by year-round flows – will line the river’s banks, providing food and shelter to birds and other wildlife,” he projects. “The river is a vitally important resource for communities in the Valley and will increasingly become a place of recreation and relaxation for all Californians – a place to fish, boat, bird watch, or simply watch the water go by.”
Two hundred miles away from the river, Schmitt readily, even cheerfully, acknowledges the irony of being a well-trained scientist landlocked on the 21st floor of an office building in the Financial District of San Francisco. “We all get older,” he says wryly, “and get promoted out of the field.”
“Don’t get me wrong; there are days when I want to get my hands dirty and stand in that river. But I know where I can have the most impact now. My years of experience and scientific expertise help guide my work in the policy arena to protect the health our rivers for the benefit of wildlife and people. That’s where I can generate good things.”
This article appeared in Spring 2014 issue of the Cate Bulletin, a water-themed issue.
