Irrigation districts deserve kudos for conservation efforts

One of the important concepts of the federal law creating the Yakima River Basin Enhancement Project is that before additional storage facilities are built, emphasis should be placed on conserving and stretching current water supplies.

Add the Benton Irrigation District to the list of those doing just that, in conjunction with an even more ambitious project by the Sunnyside Irrigation District. The end result promises to be not only more efficient delivery of water, but more of it left in the Yakima River. That will be a big help toward enhancing fish runs in summer months when stream flows are lowest.

As this newspaper reported earlier, the 4,600-acre acre Benton district is embarking on a three-year, $16 million improvement project to install a piped system to reduce seepage, evaporation and maintenance. Also part of the plan is moving the district's diversion from Sunnyside Dam at Parker, south of Union Gap, to Benton City, leaving the water in the river longer.

The 99,000-acre Sunnyside Division is working on the first phase of a $45 million project to build small off-canal reservoirs to better manage water supplies. A $67 million second phase calls for the piping of up to 30 water-delivery laterals that serve nearly half the division.

Sunnyside officials say that up to two-thirds of the water saved will remain in the river.

Both projects are being funded mostly by state and federal money under a 1994 federal law that helps irrigators be more efficient and improve habitat for fish.

Conservation has always been a critical component of the enhancement project. But it stretches available supplies, it doesn't increase them. Irrigation experts over the years have consistently maintained that the added storage facilities must ultimately be part of the mix, realizing that will take time, and lots of money.

In the meantime, kudos to the two districts for these much-needed initiatives to create means of more efficient use of our water. If they could, the fish would most likely thank them, too.

Best of luck to Central football in the playoffs

It has been a long, painful year for the many local followers of University of Washington and Washington State University football. We won't go into the dismal numbers.

But let's not let that overshadow the fact that there's a pretty good college football team up the freeway at Central Washington University in Ellensburg.

The Wildcats enter the NCAA Division II playoffs Saturday, traveling to Canyon, Texas, to square off against West Texas A&M -- after chalking up a 10-1 season that included winning all eight of their Great Northwest Athletic Conference games. Central is 20-4 over the last two years, with back-to-back DII playoff berths for the first time in school history.

And what a fitting end to the regular season came Tuesday when Mike Reilly, CWU's record-setting quarterback, was named GNAC offensive player of the year, and Blaine Bennett, who led them to the playoffs in his first season with the Wildcats, was named the conference's coach of the year.

It may not be the PAC-10, but those are some pretty good numbers and well-earned honors racked up by a solid, smaller-school program. We wish the best of luck to the Wildcat team and personnel as they enter the extended season.

* Members of the Yakima Herald-Republic editorial board are Michael Shepard, Sarah Jenkins, Bill Lee and Karen Troianello.

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