In addition, they’ve agreed to reduce the amount of water taken by more than half — pumping 200 million gallons per year instead of the originally planned 521 million acres.

This, Undergrounders, mean’s we’re halfway there.

Renegotiate!

What remains is the renegotiation of multinational predator Nestle’s rapacious contract with the McCloud Services District — the five-member elected board who negotiated the existing contract in secret and approved it after a single public meeting.

While little is official at this point, the new project looks like this:

• 350,000 sq. ft. plant (instead of a million sq. ft. monster)
• 200,000,000 gallons of water annually (521,000,000 gallons)
• Agreement to monitor flows in Squaw Creek for two years prior to building the plant

Presumably, the number of truck trips will be reduced from the mind-boggling, road-grinding 600 trips per day.

The Mount Shasta Herald suggested that changes to the specifications of the contract could mean renegotiation of all the terms of the contract, so it’s possible McCloud will be able to do away with the “negotiated-by-monkeys” contract that pays 1/100th the value of the water, and offers no increase in rates for 100 years.

This is good news, Undergrounders. And while Nestle says rising fuel costs and the construction of a Denver plant drove this decision <coughbullshitcough>, a careful look at last year’s financials suggests their water market is no long growing, and that public backlash is badly damaging correctly identifying the company’s image.

UPDATE: The Protect Our Waters Coalition (CalTrout, McCloud Watershed Council and Trout Unlimited) have weighed in:

“While it certainly is a smaller plant than it would have been, it nonetheless uses a large amount of water. It’s still a major operation,” said Severn Williams, a spokesman for the Protect Our Waters Coalition.

It plans to lobby for a higher price for the water and a clause that limits Nestle to pumping only water from the springs around McCloud while prohibiting the company from touching the aquifer.

Williams also said the coalition wants a contract with a shorter timeframe than McCloud’s current 100-year commitment to sell its water exclusively

More water news as it happens, Undergrounders. It’s not a bad way to come back home.

Technorati Tags: nestle,nestle waters,bottled water,mccloud,mcloud river,squaw creek,bottled water backlash,multinational predators

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Apparently, that’s easier than fixing the problems that got them in hot water to begin with, but if you want to read an intelligent writer’s take on Nestle’s problems with the town of Fryeburg, Maine, then consider Elizabeth Royte’s soon-to-be-available book: Bottlemania

You can read an excerpt here. Frankly, it looks like fascinating stuff, and Royte is heavy hitter, with credits from Harper’s, National Geographic, Outside, The New York Times Magazine, the New York Times Book Review, and OnEarth.

See you in Maine, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: bottlemania,elizabeth royte,nestle waters,bottled water,fryeburg,multinational predator

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That’s why it’s heartening to hear the Protect Our Waters Coalition (CalTrout, Trout Unlimited, and the McCloud Watershed Council) have hired a few legal gunslingers of their own:

The McCloud Watershed Council and California Trout, who, along with Trout Unlimited, comprise the Protect Our Waters Coalition, announced today that they have engaged the national law and consulting firm of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, LLP. The firm will represent the Coalition in their fight to safeguard the rights and quality of life for residents of McCloud, California and beyond who would be affected by operation of a planned Nestle Waters North America water bottling plant in the Mt. Shasta area. Progress on the proposed plant, which would be the nation’s largest, is mired in unanswered questions and conflicting economic and environmental assessments.

Are they any good? Hell if I know, but at least the good guys aren’t walking into this one unarmed.

I do know lawyers (in addition to making good bait) are expensive, so it’s probably a good time to join CalTrout (if you haven’t already).

See you in the conference room, Tom Chandler.

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Bottom Line: They should fire/tar and feather the fools who signed the original contract and start again, or, better yet — cut out the middleman, bottle "McCloud water," and sell a lot less of it for a lot more.

Sadly, selling McCloud Water is a cool idea, though the problem lies with a distribution channel dominated by a small handful of mega-corporations; they prevent new players form entering the marketing by tying up/buying up/monopolizing the retail shelf space (can anyone say anti-trust?).

Our economist hits it smack on the head with:

Nestle is really running a mining operation, and the natives — as usual — are not getting a very big piece of the pie. Instead of thinking "wow, Nestle is going to build a 1,000,000 sq foot plant and run 600 trucks/day through our town of 1,350 people — we’d better give them a good price," they should get a BIG share of the pie — more like $5,000/AF, since that’s still only about 1.5 cents/gallon.

More as it happens, Undergrounders.

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After all, Nestle’s getting the water for about 1/4000 the cost paid by a similar plant in Ohio, and you can almost hear the uneasy murmurings from the crowd in this passage from the Mount Shasta Herald story:

It lists a “Coca-Cola or Pepsi” water bottling plant in Twinsburg, Ohio that pays $107,531 per acre-feet of water on the high end. On the low end is Nestle’s proposed McCloud plant at $26.40 per acre-feet of water.

“The average price of water we found is $1,500 to $2,000,” stated Anderson. “We know our water in McCloud is great, so the value should be way up there.”

In his response, Palais noted that Nestle would be paying a negotiated set price for the water used, and that the price is more than the current rate for McCloud citizens.

Tim Rajeef couldn’t cast across the gap between $107,000 and $26, and Nestle Corporate Hit Man Representative Dave Palais’ unimpressive response (paraphrased: "bite me") wouldn’t settle my stomach much.

Want to Know the Whole Nestle Story?

You’re only getting snapshots of the Nestle story here on the Underground; if you want to read an excellent aerial view of the whole messy situation (McCloud’s become ground zero in the bottled water wars), read this beauty from those flaming water liberals at BusinessWeek.

It skips over a lot of Nestle’s less-savory antics (like their intimidation lawsuits target individuals), but at least you’ll know the setting — and start to understand why so many folks are tired of Nestle’s community-splitting, watershed-draining tactics.

What Water’s Really For

Nothing makes me want to get out on the river (even a river that’s fishing like hell) like a Nestle story; trout may be stupid and often uncooperative, but they live in cool places, and I don’t count greed and vanity among their sins.

See you on the river, Tom Chandler.

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Then again, I doubt they’ve missed us much, being as they’ve been busy making all the "World’s Worst Corporation" lists (’#10 with a bullet), suing small towns in Maine into oblivion, trying to illegally obtain new water sources, and splitting the town of McCloud in two over a rapacious contract they’ll do anything to protect.

At the Underground, we have to wonder: Where do they find all the time? 

The McCloud Update

In McCloud, Nestle was finally browbeaten into re-issuing their wholly inadequate Environmental Impact Report, which somehow failed to quantify the downstream impacts of removing a few bazillion gallons of water from Squaw Creek (among other omissions).

Fans of local intrigue will no doubt be pleased to know the McCloud Services District — the collection of individuals who negotiated what has to be one of the worst contracts of all time — recently lost a member.

Rather than replace the lost member (as per custom) with the person receiving the next-highest number of votes in the last election, they bypassed him because he "couldn’t be objective about the Nestle proposal."

Instead, the district board installed the postmaster, a Nestle proponent. Apparently, being "objective" is all about being pro-Nestle.

You see this happen everywhere Nestle appears; they show up quietly, identify likely targets, spread a little money around, make a few promises, and let the small-town politics split the community.

Am I exaggerating? Read on…

The Maine Update

Regular readers will remember the town of Fryeburg, Maine — a small town that repeatedly said "no" to Nestle’s attempts to open a truck loading station (complete with 100 truck trips per day, 24/7).

Sure, the town rejected Nestle’s application many times; voted "yes" on a moratorium prohibiting this kind of project; and beat Nestle like a cheap rug three times in court (including an argument in front of the Maine Supreme Court), yet — showing the kind of stick-to-your-guns grit popularized by corporate sleazes self-helpers everywhere, Nestle’s not done with Fryeburg.

They filed yet another legal appeal, and it’s clear the goal isn’t to prevail because their cause is just, but to bankrupt those fighting the project.

Unintentionally funny quote of the week?

"I think all parties would like to reach a conclusion," said Philip Ahrens, one of three attorneys representing Poland Spring…"

See, given that Fryeburg’s residents (and the courts) have said no, and no, and no again, I thought they had reached a conclusion.

Dollars From Heaven

Sure, it’s a good time to be Nestle’s legal representatives - billable hours are falling from the sky like $500 bills from heaven - but we’ve gotta ask; is bankrupting a small town trying to defend itself really part of their "good corporate neighbor" policy?

We’re just asking is all.

Still, all this litigation makes me nostalgic for the good old days here in Mt. Shasta — those halcyon days when Nestle subpoenaed the private financial records of project opponents in what you’d have to call a clear attempt to intimidate those who would speak out against them.

Ahh, good times. Good times.

More on The Maine Update

Lest you think Nestle’s attention is wholly occupied by the town of Fryeburg, Maine, we’ll point your attention towards another quasi-legal attempt to circumvent what the rest of us foolishly consider "laws" (and what Nestle considers obstacles to be brushed aside).

They want to pump water from a watershed within the town of Sterling (though the reservoir itself is owned by the town of Clinton).

The problem? It seems it’s illegal (here, here and here), but that crafty, gritty bunch at Nestle — can-do folks if we’ve ever seen them — don’t really care.

Today’s Most Telling Quote From a Maine Resident? Coming right at ya:

"We were being told by these corporations that there was not much that we could do to limit their activities, and it did not seem that our select board had much authority either. It seemed to me that these corporations were telling us that we must accept these damaging activities into our town, even though the majority of our citizens objected," said MacLeod.

Welcome to the Wonderful World of Nestle. It’s highly likely you won’t enjoy your stay.

The Summary Update

Frankly, I’ve abandoned all hope of keeping Nestle out of McCloud; their water contract with McCloud is so lopsided — buying water at 1/10 the current rate for the next 100 years and selling it at above-gasoline prices — that Nestle will do anything to protect it.

What’s left is a tiny thread of hope the town can negotiate more favorable terms, and that the McCloud River (and Squaw Creek) aren’t terminally harmed by the project, especially in the face of the uncertain effects of climate change.

In a decade or two, it’s possible the town’s costs of supporting Nestle will outstrip the payments made by the company, and Nestle’s exclusivity clause would even bar businesses like micro-breweries from locating in the town.

And for all this, McCloud "benefits" from a handful of $10/hour jobs, sells its water at 1/10 the going rate, and gets saddled with the costs of maintaining the wells and infrastructure.

If that’s real economic advancement, I’ll crack open a bottle of Arrowhead/Nestle water and drink it.

See you drinking tap water, Tom Chandler.

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First, the county’s resource policy was surprisingly turned into raw materials for paper airplanes, and now Nestle has been forced to make several key project concessions before re-releasing the McCloud project Environmental Impact Report for more public comment:

Nestle Waters of North America announced in a press release Monday that community feedback led to its decision to make changes to the proposed water bottling plant project in McCloud.

• Elimination from the project description of the potential use of groundwater wells at the bottling facility;
• Imposing a firm 1,600 acre-foot per year cap on the overall water use at the proposed facility, including amounts used for bottling and all other purposes
• Conducting additional stream flow and habitat monitoring studies.

The Underground’s political pundit-level analysis (translation: I have no idea, but I speak with absolute confidence) suggests Nestle was taking too many hits on these points, which amounted to loopholes in the contract you could drive a couple hundred Nestle tanker trucks through.

This “death by a thousand paper cuts” strategy — effectively implemented by the Protect Our Waters Coalition (CalTrout, TU, McCloud Watershed Council) — has made it politically impossible for the county to say “yes” to Nestle’s “biggest building in Northern California” project, despite the fact they badly want to.

It’s an excellent example of a grassroots organization chipping away at the facade of a larger entity, who is trying like hell to pretend they don’t have bigger plans for our water than they’re letting on.

What Does This Mean To You?

In addition to insuring a stream of raw materials for snarky, Nestle-flavored posts, it means:

• We get a second shot at making public comments on the project EIR
• When Nestle repeatedly said the EIR and contract prevented them from taking more than 1,600 acre feet of water from the project, they were lying (Curtis Knight of CalTrout has repeatedly slapped them on this issue)
• Nestle will now actually measure in-stream flows (Squaw Creek) downstream of their project, and be forced to deal with those impacts (amazingly, the prior environmental impact report didn’t cover this)

There’s more to this, but sadly, the Underground has come down with the same flu afflicting the L&T this whole week.

It’s been a winter for disease — my immune system apparently sputtering and backfiring like a Ford Pinto that needs a tuneup — and I’m just going to curl up in the corner and feel every individual air molecule bounce off my skin.

See you in sickbay, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: nestle,mccloud,evil rapacious multinationals

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We’ve seen it in McCloud, where they stated categorically their withdrawals wouldn’t affect Squaw Creek — without even bothering to monitor existing flows.

In Maine — after being told repeatedly by the people of Fryeburg that Nestle’s proposed 50-trucks a day loading station wasn’t welcome — they filed suit, lost, appealed to the Maine Supreme Court, and lost again (here’s the YouTube video of the arguments).

Yet they’re still not done trying to force 100 truck trips per day down the small, rural town’s throat. From the MaineBiz site:

After a long, drawn-out battle with the town to set up a water trucking station where 50 trucks a day would load up with spring water from a nearby aquifer, the planning board in November said the facility did not fit within the town’s rural zoning district.

In the last two years, the case has circulated through the planning board and appeals board, and up to the Oxford County Superior Court and the Maine Supreme Judicial Court. Both courts remanded the matter to the planning board, according to the Sun Journal in Lewiston.

In November, Fryeburg residents approved a six-month moratorium on the bulk transport and processing of water in town.

Now the bottled water company, owned by Nestlé Waters North America, is trying to get another verdict from the board of appeals.

Notice that the residents of Fryeburg said “no” to Nestle’s trucks — loud and clear — and Nestle doesn’t care.

Nestle even argued before the Maine Supreme Court that their right to grow their market share superceded the town’s right of self-determination.

Good corporate citizen?

Apparently, when “good corporate citizenship” clashes with their bottom line, Nestle’s real character is revealed — and not even their extensive PR department can hide it.

I have few illusions about the Underground’s ability to bulldoze a predatory multinational out of Siskiyou County, but I’m even less amenable to the idea of standing around with my hands in my pockets.

If you’re inclined to let Nestle know you’ve noticed their words don’t match their actions, then consider visiting the Protect Our Waters Coalition Web site.

The coalition includes CalTrout, Trout Unlimited, and the McCloud Watershed Council, and they’re dedicated to protecting all of Siskiyou County’s water (which includes a hell of a lot trout rivers and streams) from predators like Nestle.

They’re not a membership organization, but if you’re inclined to join something, make it CalTrout — they’re doing more for fisheries in the state than anyone.

See you on the river, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: nestle,nestle waters,fryeburg,mccloud,bottled water,predatory multinationals

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Clearly, I’m no fan of multinational predator corporation Nestle, but you have to admire their ability to squelch, throttle, and drown out opposition to their watershed-killing water bottling plants.

In this case, Nestle Waters’ local minions re-released a bought-and-paid for Economic Impact study (based on data supplied by Nestle) on the same day the McCloud Watershed Council released their independently conducted study detailing the negative economic effects of the Nestle plant on McCloud.

Nice touch, Nestle. When you can’t intimidate the opposition with subpoenas, try to drown them out with bullshit studies.

Given the sad state of journalism today, the tactic works more often than not, so I though I’d pass along a few items you might find interesting (but won’t read in the Redding Wretched Record Searchlight)

Here’s What You Really Need to Know

Just so we’re clear about what we’re talking about, here are a few bullet points about the pro-Nestle study that Nestle would rather you overlooked:

• The Economic Development Council (pro-Nestle) report was based solely from Nestle’s data and projections. (In other words, it’s Nestle’s version of Fantasy Island, only on paper.)
• The report writer admitted the report didn’t even consider negative economic or environmental impacts (Apparently, Nestle Corporate only sees the good in everything…).
• The writer admitted the report wasn’t significantly different from the earlier report it replaced (suggesting it was simply revised and released to compete with the Watershed Council’s Report)
• The Nestle report is only five pages long (the Watershed Council report is 63 pages long)

Why Was Nestle Afraid Of The Watershed Council’s Report?

Lots of reasons. Within the 63 carefully researched pages of the ECONorthwest report (you can read the executive summary here), you’ll discover Nestle’s paying $26 an acre foot for water that everyone else is paying at least 3x times as much for (water’s selling for $2,000+/acre foot in the Southern half of the state).

In other words, not only is the McCloud Services District selling its soul to Nestle for a whole century, they’re doing so for next to nothing.

Of course, I keep reading about all the jobs this plant will bring (less than 240 at full build), yet the only jobs the locals will see are sub-living wage menial gigs — the same jobs which go begging at nearby bottling plants.

Hot damn.

Fishermen? Who?

It turns out Nestle’s concern for the local fly fishing-based economy didn’t motivate them to study the downstream environmental impacts of their water bottling plant, which means their environmental impact report somehow neglected to actually study environmental impacts.

Simply put, they want to pull 500 million gallons per year out of the McCloud river watershed, yet they couldn’t be bothered to study the flows in Squaw Creek — the stream most affected by the withdrawals and a major trib of the McCloud River.

It turns out this isn’t an accident — it’s part of the Nestle Playbook we’ve seen at their other plants. Nestle fiercely resists any pre-construction flow studies, so later — when it’s clear they’re harming the watershed — they plead ignorance and keep pumping through the litigation.

Of course, it’s not all bad news for McCloud. In addition to a sinking tourist economy, the town will enjoy the benefits of 600 truck trips per day, (including noise, dust, pollution and accidents), and they’ll never have to worry about getting any additional money for their water for the next 100 years, so presumably their accounting costs will be low.

For a less pissed-off look at this issue, visit the Aquafornia blog.

Technorati tags: mccloud, mccloud river, squaw creek, nestle, bottled water, corporate predators

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The City of Guelph is currently asking us to be conservative with our water, which means that under the water restrictions we can’t water our gardens when we want to. However, Nestle can keep taking 3.6 million litres of our water per day to put in millions of plastic bottles that get shipped all over the U.S. and the world.

Apparently, Nestle held a “public information meeting” (where they banned recorders and video cameras) where they tried to pretend the water bottled in Guelph wasn’t heading to the USA. Naturally, the person writing the letter knew they were lying (their lips were moving):

…they don’t ship to the U.S. or other parts of the world. What they didn’t say is that their customers and distributors do, and there is nothing prohibiting that.

Gotta love ‘em.

Technorati Tags: nestle, guelph, bottled water, mccloud

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