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Office of the Governor
For Immediate Release: Friday, May 3, 2002
For More Information: Bob Mercer or Mike Mueller, 773-3212
Janklow Says Corps Destroying Lake Francis Case
(Pierre) – Gov. Bill Janklow said Friday the public needs to understand the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is "purposely, knowingly and deliberately" destroying the fishery of Lake Francis Case in an attempt by the Corps to turn South Dakotans against each other.
"They’re playing their same old game of divide and conquer. The Corps agreed to protect Lake Oahe and turned right around and started draining Lake Francis Case. They want to pit people against one another in South Dakota. They want to pit South Dakota against the other upstream states of North Dakota and Montana and Wyoming," Janklow said.
"The Corps needs to understand its game-playing won’t work. The Corps needs to know the people of South Dakota stand together and the upstream states stand together. Even people in the downstream states are beginning to see how important this is in the big picture," Janklow said. "The Corps time after time has been willing to wipe out the Missouri River fisheries in South Dakota and the other upstream states, just to keep an economically obsolete barge industry afloat in the downstream states. The economic and environmental facts are clearly on the side of the upstream states, so the Corps instead is trying to manipulate the river in such a way that the Corps hopes will make us fight among ourselves."
On April 25, the State of South Dakota filed a lawsuit in federal court to stop the Corps from drawing down Lake Oahe for a month to protect the reservoir’s fishery during the spawning period. The Corps agreed to hold Oahe steady but began draining Lake Francis Case at a rate of about 4 inches daily, or about a foot every three days, at the peak of the Francis Case fishery’s walleye spawn.
State Game, Fish and Parks Department fishery experts believe that more than half of the walleye eggs laid this spring have already been killed in Francis Case as a result of the Corps dropping the water level since April 25. "The effects of this on the walleye will be felt for years to come," Janklow said. "We asked that Corps be stopped from sacrificing the fisheries of all the reservoirs, not just Oahe. Instead the Corps went ahead and did this to Francis Case. It’s just immoral." The lawsuit is pending in federal court.
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