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Pro-dam board elected GPID vote reinforces defiance of state officials By BETH QUINN In the biggest election turnout in the history of Grants Pass Irrigation District, patrons overwhelmingly endorsed the leaders whose defiance of state water officials last week cost irrigators one-third of their water. The new GPID board of directors will include dam-proponent Carl Stein, who will fill out a one-year term, and incumbents Don Greenwood and Marjorie Spickler, each re-elected to three-year terms. Ballots in GPID's first mail election were counted Wednesday. With 40 percent of 3,808 eligible voters returning ballots, the results looked like this: Spickler earned 59 percent of votes cast in Division 2, garnering 326 votes to challenger Richard Michelon's 226. Stein earned 52 percent of votes cast in Division 3, garnering 237 votes to challenger Judy Gove's 216. Greenwood earned 54 percent of votes cast in Division 4, garnering 287 votes to challenger Eric Larsen's 242. Earlier this year, Greenwood and Spickler joined directors Dennis Becklin and L.H. Kirtley in reversing the board's past approval of a 1994 plan to replace 77-year-old Savage Rapids Dam with electric pumps to improve passage of fish, including coho salmon protected on the endangered species list. Michelon, Gove and Larsen all favored sticking with the dam-removal plan, in part to avoid the cost of litigation that they believed could bankrupt the district. As a result of GPID's change of course, the state Water Resources Commission last week canceled one of the district's water rights, putting at risk one-third of irrigators' water. Irrigators plan to appeal that decision to the Oregon Court of Appeals. The pro-dam board advocates further study of fish passage problems and earlier this year received $450,000 from the state Legislative Emergency Board to install screens to protect migrating fish. Federal fishery officials favor dam removal, saying the screens are too little too late. They could block GPID's future irrigation to save endangered salmon. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1998, Medford, Oregon USA