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The Fresno Bee reports that "Environmentalists say (the San Joaquin) is dying; a farming empire depends on it. Can we restore a river without devastating an economy? ... The federal government (60 years ago) dammed the state's second-longest river to save Valley farmers from economic ruin at the end of the Great Depression, an exchange of natural wonders for water that now supports a multibillion-dollar farming empire...Today the river appears poised to turn on the Valley it was engineered to sustain. The San Joaquin River has made the list of the nation's 10 most endangered rivers....The river needs a good flush to clean out pollutants and revive wildlife and habitat, but there isn't enough water to do that in most years. In past decades, water for farmland has been given priority over water for fish. That thinking started to change in 1988...."

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