This Federal government salmon plan is not working out very well
Back in May the Oregonian ran a guest opinion where US Representatives Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and Doc Hastings (R-WA) touted the long-litigated biological opinion on the Federal Columbia River dams would supposedly protect the Snake River salmon and steelhead runs. They posed these questions,
What if a regional salmon plan was supported by three Northwest governors, six Indian tribes and the Obama administration? What if the plan had undergone rigorous review by some of the most respected scientists in the nation, who all agreed it was a sound plan well grounded in the best science? And what if it had bipartisan support across a wide spectrum of the Northwest’s diverse political interests?
The question is why do our elected officials keep supporting these Federal agencies’ salmon conservation plans that repeatedly are found to be violating Federal law?
A month ago today on August 3rd, Federal District Court judge James Redden found the Federal government in violation of the Endangered Species Act. The third time in eight years. This is no small feat. It recalls an earlier era when managers of the nation’s Federal forests in Oregon and Washington were found in repeat violations of the ESA. Back then Judge William Dwyer pointed out, “More is involved here than a simple failure by an agency to comply with its government statute,” but also “a remarkable series of violations of the environmental laws”
The failure to protect the salmon and steelhead runs is a time honored tradition of the US Army Corps of Engineers and the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA). The NOAA Fisheries office is a relative newcomer since it’s been about twenty years since Snake River salmon have been protected by the ESA, while the Corps’ dams and the BPA power marketing has been inimical to salmon going back some fifty years. And it’s BPA’s money from hydropower revenues that pays the bills for NOAA fisheries research, a situation that compromises any potential for independent judgement of BPA’s actions.
Our elected representatives should know better than to endorse the work of these Federal dam and resource management agencies, now four-time losers in protecting salmon. They should know better than to shill for Federal agencies who ignore science except in the case where the agencies involved commission and pay for the science. Rather, as people’s representatives they take care to listen to independent scientists and what they have to say and be a fair broker for the public interest in order to protect the Pacific Northwest’s great natural resource legacy - the salmon.
