Klamath Irrigation Dist. v. U.S. Bureau of Reclamation

• Decision Date: 25 September 2020
• Docket Number: No. 1:19-cv-00451-CL, No. 1:19-cv-00531-CL,1:19-cv-00451-CL
• Parties: KLAMATH IRRIGATION DISTRICT, et al.; Shasta View Irrigation District, et al., Plaintiffs, v. UNITED STATES BUREAU OF RECLAMATION, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Oregon

489 F.Supp.3d 1168

KLAMATH IRRIGATION DISTRICT, et al.; Shasta View Irrigation District, et al., Plaintiffs,

v.UNITED STATES BUREAU OF RECLAMATION, et al., Defendants.

No. 1:19-cv-00451-CL

No. 1:19-cv-00531-CL

United States District Court, D. Oregon, Medford Division.

Signed September 25, 2020

ORDER

McSHANE, District Judge.

Magistrate Judge Mark D. Clarke has filed a Findings and Recommendation, ECF No. 89, concerning Motions to Dismiss filed by Intervenor-Defendant Hoopa Valley Tribe and Intervenor-Defendant the Klamath Tribes, ECF Nos. 74, 75. Judge Clarke recommends that the motions be granted and the consolidated cases be dismissed.

Under the Federal Magistrates Act, the Court may "accept, reject, or modify, in whole or in part, the findings or recommendations made by the magistrate judge." 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1). If a party files objections to a magistrate judge's findings and recommendations, "the court shall make a de novo determination of those portions of the report or specified proposed findings or recommendations to which objection is made." Id. ; Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(3).

For those portions of a magistrate judge's findings and recommendations to which neither party has objected, the Act does not prescribe any standard of review. See Thomas v. Arn , 474 U.S. 140, 152, 106 S.Ct. 466, 88 L.Ed.2d 435 (1985) ("There is no indication that Congress, in enacting [the Act], intended to require a district judge to review a magistrate's report to which no objections are filed."). Although no review is required in the absence of objections, the Magistrates Act "does not preclude further review by the district judge[ ] sua sponte ... under a de novo or any other standard." Id. at 154, 106 S.Ct. 466. The Advisory Committee Notes to Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b) recommend that "[w]hen no timely objection is filed," the court should review the recommendation for "clear error on the face of the record."

In this case, Plaintiff Klamath Irrigation District ("KID") and Plaintiffs Shasta View Irrigation District, Klamath Drainage District, Van Brimmer Ditch Company, Tule Lake Irrigation District, Klamath Water Users Association, Ben Duval, and Rob Unruh (collectively "SVID Plaintiffs") have filed objections, ECF Nos. 93, 94. Intervenor-Defendant Hoopa Valley Tribe and Intervenor-Defendant the Klamath Tribes have filed Responses to Plaintiffs' Objections, ECF Nos. 95, 96. The Court has reviewed the portions of the F&R to which Plaintiffs have objected de novo and finds no error. The Court therefore ADOPTS Judge Clarke's F&R. The consolidated cases are DISMISSED and final judgments shall be entered accordingly. All other pending motions are DENIED as moot.

It is so ORDERED and DATED this 25th day of September 2020.

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATION

CLARKE, Magistrate Judge

This case comes before the Court on two motions to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(7) for failure to join a required party under Rule 19, filed by the Intervenor-Defendants, Hoopa Valley Tribe and the Klamath Tribes (#74, #75). For the reasons below, the motions should be GRANTED, and these consolidated cases should be dismissed. Previously filed motions to dismiss (#63, 64) should be denied as moot.

INTRODUCTION

This case centers around the water located in the Klamath Basin, and the groups of people who rely on that water for cultural, spiritual, agricultural, and economic subsistence. The history of these issues, between these parties, dates to the nineteenth century, at least. To say it is multifaceted is to lose the true complexity of the long timeline, the rich cultures, and the many adversities the people groups involved have faced and overcome. This includes the people groups of the Hoopa Valley Tribe and the Klamath Tribes, as well as the generations of farmers, irrigators, and families of water-users in the Klamath Basin. As the federal agency tasked with distributing water in this region, the Bureau of Reclamation has the nearly impossible job of complying with numerous important, long-standing obligations. In this time of frequent drought and water-scarcity, these obligations take on even more significance, conflict, and dire implications for everyone involved. The Court's task today is not to solve the ultimate predicament of competing water rights in the region, but to determine who is required to be at the table when these issues are challenged and decided. As discussed below, the Hoopa Valley Tribe and the Klamath Tribes are so required. Entitled to sovereign immunity, they cannot be forcibly joined. This case must be dismissed for failure to join a required party under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(7) and 19.

BACKGROUND

I. The Klamath Water Basin

The Klamath Basin occupies approximately 12,000 square miles in south-central Oregon and northern California. AR 76065. Upper Klamath Lake (UKL) is controlled by Link River Dam (owned and operated by Reclamation), such that it stores water during higher runoff periods that can be diverted for irrigation, or released to flow downstream, when natural run-off has diminished. AR 76117-8. The Klamath River proper begins downstream of Link River Dam and flows approximately 240 miles before it reaches the Pacific Ocean. AR 76037. Iron Gate Dam is approximately 64 miles downstream of Link River Dam. AR 76153. Salmon in the Klamath River cannot move upstream beyond Iron Gate Dam. AR 76166. Four major tributaries, and numerous smaller tributaries, add volume to the Klamath River as it flows downstream from Link River and Iron Gate Dams. AR 76076.

II. The Klamath Tribes and the Hoopa Valley Tribe

Since time immemorial, the Klamath Tribes and their members have used, and continue to use, the natural resources of the Klamath Basin in what is now the states of both Oregon and California for subsistence, cultural, ceremonial, religious, and commercial purposes. Gentry Decl., (Dkt. #31) ¶ 3. C'waam (Lost River sucker or Deltistes luxatus ) and Koptu (shortnose sucker or Chasmistes brevirostris ) have played a particularly central role in the Tribes' cultural and spiritual practices, and they were once the Tribes' most important food-fish. Id. ¶ 4; Klamath Tribes v. United States Bureau of Reclamation , 2018 WL 3570865, at *1 (N.D. Cal. July 25, 2018).

In 1864, the United States and the Tribes entered into a treaty whereby the Tribes ceded their interests in millions of acres of land and retained a reservation of approximately 800,000 acres, along with "the exclusive right of taking fish in the streams and lakes, included in said reservation, and of gathering edible roots, seeds, and berries within its limits." Treaty Between the United States and the Klamath and Moadoc Tribes and Yahooskin Bank of Snake Indians, October 14, 1864, 16 Stat. 707. The Ninth Circuit has recognized that the Tribes' treaty fishing rights include "the right to prevent other appropriators from depleting the streams waters below a protected level." United States v. Adair , 723 F.2d 1394, 1411 (9th Cir. 1983).

Similarly, the Hoopa Valley Tribe and its members have, since time immemorial, relied on the water and fish resources of the Klamath and Trinity Rivers, which both flow through its Reservation. The United States located and set aside the Hoopa Valley Reservation on August 21, 1864. Mattz v. Arnett , 412 U.S. 481, 490, fn. 9, 93 S.Ct. 2245, 37 L.Ed.2d 92 (1973) ; Short v. United States , 202 Ct. Cl. 870, 875-76, 486 F.2d 561 (1973) (discussing Reservation history). On June 23, 1876, President Grant issued an Executive Order formally setting aside the Reservation for "Indian purposes." Short , 202 Ct. Cl. at 877, 486 F.2d 561. Traditional salmon fishing was one of the "Indian purposes" for which the Reservation was created. Parravano v. Babbitt , 70 F.3d 539, 546 (9th Cir. 1995). The Klamath and Trinity Rivers flow through the Reservation, which encompasses a 12-mile square historically inhabited by Hoopa people. Karuk Tribe of California v. Ammon , 209 F.3d 1366, 1370 (Fed. Cir. 2000).

In 1864, the United States determined the Reservation a suitable permanent homeland for Hoopa Indians for two principal reasons. The Reservation is within the heart of the Tribe's aboriginal lands, which Hoopa Indians occupied and fished upon for generations. Parravano , 70 F.3d at 542. Hoopa Indians possessed fishing and hunting rights long before contact with white settlers and their salmon fishery was "not much less necessary to [their existence] than the atmosphere they breathed." Id. at 542, quoting Blake v. Arnett , 663 F.2d 906, 909 (9th Cir. 1981). Second, the Reservation set aside resources of the Klamath and Trinity rivers for Hoopa people to be self-sufficient and achieve a moderate living based on fish. United States v. Eberhardt , 789 F.2d 1354, 1359 (9th Cir. 1986) (noting Indians' right to take fish from the Klamath River for ceremonial, subsistence, and commercial purposes); Parravano , 70 F.3d at 544-546 (recognizing Hoopa's reserved fishing rights); Baley v. United States , 942 F.3d 1312, 1323 (Fed. Cir. 2019) (citing state and federal cases recognizing Hoopa reserved fishing rights).

In 1993, the Interior Solicitor published an opinion reaffirming Hoopa reserved fishing rights. Solicitor Opinion M-36979, October 4, 1993. Somerville Declaration, Exhibit A (Dkt. #24-1). Solicitor Leshy examined the "history of the reservations, the Indians' dependence on the Klamath and Trinity River fisheries, the United States' awareness of that dependence, and the federal intent to create the reservations in order to protect the Indians' ability to maintain a way of life, which included reliance on the fisheries." Id. , at 3. Solicitor Leshy found "it is now well established that the Yurok and Hoopa Valley Indians have federal reserved fishing rights, created in the nineteenth century when the lands they occupied were set aside as Indian Reservations." Id. at 14-15. "The ... Hoopa Indians had a ‘vital and unifying dependence on anadromous fish.’ "

Id. at 22. "[T]he...