Suction dredging outlawed in California
• Temporary ban on motorized mining effective immediately • Seen as a move to boost fish populations
A mining practice that dates back to the Gold Rush has been banned in California, effective immediately Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday signed legislation by state Sen. Patricia Wiggins, D-Santa Rosa, to place a short-term ban on suction dredge mining, a gold mining technique that its opponents say threatens vulnerable fish populations, and pollutes rivers and streams. Ms. Wiggins’ measure, SB 670, places a moratorium on motorized suction dredge mining in California streams until the state Department of Fish and Game finishes a court-ordered overhaul of regulations governing the practice. Ms. Wiggins says her legislation will help address the alarming decline of salmon, steelhead and trout populations throughout California. She says the governor’s support for the bill “is a boost for the state’s commercial fishing industry and local economies and is a victory for the fish“. “The current ban on salmon fishing affects the livelihoods of thousands of commercial fishermen, fish processors, and charter boat operators. The ban has eliminated hundreds of thousands of dollars in economic activity – especially in rural areas,” she says. An opponent of her bill, state Sen. Sam Aanestad, R-Grass Valley, says the ban will put the makers of the suction dredging equipment out of business. SB 670 passed the Legislature with a bi-partisan two-thirds “urgency” vote, which means the law takes effect immediately. Other forms of mining are unaffected and miners will still have access to mining claims. Suction dredge mining involves engines on pontoons that suck up sediment from stream bottoms in order to sort for gold, and then spit the debris back into the river bed. Opponents of the practice say fish eggs and larvae are killed when sucked through the machines, and the stream beds are altered, leaving unstable spawning beds for salmon. In the Sierra, dredging stirs up long-buried mercury, left over from the gold rush, threatening communities downstream and getting into the human food chain. The DFG was ordered by the courts to overhaul regulations governing suction dredge mining on streams as a result of a 2005 lawsuit by the Karuk Tribe. Pushed by suction dredge miners, the courts ordered the department to complete a California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review before it acted. That review was supposed to be completed by July 2008, but DFG only recently finished the contracting process. In July, the Alameda County Superior Court ordered a moratorium on new dredge permits pending resolution of a complaint charging that taxpayer money is illegally subsidizing issuance of dredging permits by the DFG. That order applies only to future permits; SB 670 immediately halts all suction dredge mining. Go Back 
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