DWR still prefers secrecy on Oroville mess

It took a few months, but the state Department of Water Resources finally admitted to poor communication in the wake of the Lake Oroville spillway disaster last February.

DWR’s ham- handed approach to communication with the public and even other government agencies was bothersome early on, but not surprising to anyone who knows the agency and its history.

This is a public agency prone to telling other public agencies not to talk to the public.

From slapping a gag order on participants in a relicensing agreement 11 years ago to ordering workers not to talk to anyone about an accident at the Hyatt Powerplant under the dam eight years ago, DWR established a pattern that didn’t change with this crisis.

Beginning before the evacuation, DWR wasn’t forthright with information, and its acting director made comments that upset many.

In public meetings much later, DWR officials apologized for a lack of transparency and poor communication and vowed to do better.

But four incidents in the past two weeks belie that vow:

• At a regular informationsharing meeting, the DWR didn’t bother to tell the head of Oroville’s police and fire departments about an Aug. 15 generator fire at the spillway.

He was told only after asking because of a prompt from our reporter. Really? No one thought that might be interesting to him?

• Some locals say DWR is pressuring them not to sign a letter asking the federal government to delay DWR’s longsought relicensing of the Oro- ville project until more is known about the causes of the spillway collapse.

“The DWR has verbally come out against this request for a delay with the DWR making subtle threats to some of the signatories,” said Oroville Chamber of Commerce CEO Sandy Linville.

Not exactly the best way to gain the community’s trust.

• The DWR dumped spawning gravel in the Feather River so adult salmon this fall will have a place to lay eggs.

Much of the gravel was washed away in the spillway flooding, leaving a silty bottom not conducive to spawning. It’s just a fraction of what must be done for fisheries to repair environmental damage. DWR says it will do much more, if it gets the license renewal.

Wait. Shouldn’t DWR be fixing environmental damage regardless?

• After the Chico paper ran a story about the latest report by the Board of Consultants looking into the spillway failure, headlined “Board of Consultants has concerns about temporary roller compacted concrete,” a DWR public affairs assistant director took exception to the use of the term “concerns.” She said using the term was subjective and overstated.

So DWR has time to critique nouns by reporters but not enough time to report a fire at the spillway construction site?

This just keeps getting worse.

At a regular information-sharing meeting, the DWR didn’t bother to tell the head of Oroville’s police and fire departments about an Aug. 15 generator fire at the spillway. He was told only after asking because of a prompt from our reporter. Really?