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Rocky Barker
The Idaho Statesman | Edition Date: 09-06-2004
The Bush administration is counting on new legal interpretations, not new science, to take dam-breaching off the table in a salmon plan it expects to release this week.
Federal fisheries officials and dam operators announced Tuesday that the new court-ordered biological opinion on its operation of federal dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers would not include dam-breaching as an option. The Clinton administration also had chosen a salmon-recovery plan in 2000 that excluded the breaching of four dams on the lower Snake River.
But the Clinton plan, finalized in the early days of the Bush administration, required federal fisheries officials to reconsider dam breaching in 2005 and 2008 — in part because of the strong scientific evidence that breaching may be necessary to save Idaho's salmon. Four years later, salmon numbers have soared due to favorable ocean conditions, such as a cyclical increase in food and a reduction in the predation from warm-water fish.
The numbers of Snake River fall chinook, for instance, have increased by more than 217 percent over the several hundred returning fish counted when they were first listed as a threatened species in 1991.
But the majority of fisheries biologists still believe Idaho's salmon are not rebounding at a rate of return that will sustain populations in the long term. They worry that the salmon populations will decline sharply again when the ocean cycle shifts.
New data have brought more knowledge to the debate. But for the most part, biologists' views have not changed.
"The case for breaching is as strong as ever," said Earl Weber, a fisheries biologist with the Columbia River Intertribal Fish Commission in Portland whose opinion is typical of the majority view.
On the other side is James Anderson, a professor at the University of Washington, one of the first scientists in the early 1990s to predict the rebound from changing ocean cycles. He argued then and now that barging and other bypass strategies to get fish around the eight dams between Idaho and the Pacific would be enough to sustain salmon runs without breaching.
"I would say there is an improved forecast of survival and that the chance of extinction is much less," he said.
Robert Lohn, Pacific Northwest director of the National Marine Fisheries Service, which is responsible for protecting salmon, said agency scientists have not been able to determine whether salmon that are collected at the dams and barged to the ocean do better than salmon that migrate in-river.
"What we do know is doing things the way we have been doing them has yielded an increase," Lohn said.
Weber and the majority of fisheries biologists say new data show that both barged salmon and those that migrate in-river suffer from stress and other factors that kill them after they reach the mouth of the Columbia. Snake River salmon return at a rate of up to a third less than those that only go through the four Columbia River dams.
"We continue to see evidence that the Snake River fish are doing a lot worse," said Charles Petrosky, Idaho Department of Fish and Game fisheries biologist.
Though the scientific debate has not changed, the way the Bush administration interprets the Endangered Species Act has. U.S. District Judge James Redden ordered the administration to rewrite the 2001 biological opinion because it had no way to enforce many of the measures proposed to offset the effects of the dams.
The administration went beyond, shoring up rules on ranchers, loggers, miners, farmers, homeowners and others whose activities threaten salmon habitat.
Administration lawyers now argue that the dams were already in place when the salmon were listed as endangered. They say the Endangered Species Act requires them only to evaluate the effects of dam operations on salmon — not the dams themselves.
If Redden or other courts accept that argument, then the dam operators face an easier test in meeting the requirements of the ESA.
Even if that plan is accepted, Lohn said, that does not reduce the Bush administration's commitment to restoring salmon throughout the region. He said the administration has increased the budget to more than $300 million for fish and wildlife programs in the Pacific Northwest, most of which is earmarked for salmon.
"Few, if any, environmental problems in the United States are getting as much attention or financial assistance as this program," Lohn said.
The new biological opinion will shift the burden to ranchers, farmers, loggers and others without restoring salmon to harvestable numbers, said Pat Ford, executive director of Save our Wild Salmon, a coalition of fishing groups, businesses and environmental groups that advocate for salmon.
By ruling that the federal dams don't jeopardize the survival of salmon, the administration takes the pressure off itself and places it on individuals, states and rural communities.
"Museum-piece management of Snake River salmon — especially when the hydrosystem is in non-jeopardy but nothing else is — is the worst of all worlds for Idaho," Ford said.
"It simply causes trouble for various Idahoans, without moving the ball toward a large, sustainable rural economy."
Lohn counters that the administration's goal is returning to harvestable salmon numbers.
"I've heard it from the very top, the president: The Snake River stocks will be restored," Lohn said.
The Idaho Statesman | Edition Date: 09-06-2004
The Bush administration is counting on new legal interpretations, not new science, to take dam-breaching off the table in a salmon plan it expects to release this week.
Federal fisheries officials and dam operators announced Tuesday that the new court-ordered biological opinion on its operation of federal dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers would not include dam-breaching as an option. The Clinton administration also had chosen a salmon-recovery plan in 2000 that excluded the breaching of four dams on the lower Snake River.
But the Clinton plan, finalized in the early days of the Bush administration, required federal fisheries officials to reconsider dam breaching in 2005 and 2008 — in part because of the strong scientific evidence that breaching may be necessary to save Idaho's salmon. Four years later, salmon numbers have soared due to favorable ocean conditions, such as a cyclical increase in food and a reduction in the predation from warm-water fish.
The numbers of Snake River fall chinook, for instance, have increased by more than 217 percent over the several hundred returning fish counted when they were first listed as a threatened species in 1991.
But the majority of fisheries biologists still believe Idaho's salmon are not rebounding at a rate of return that will sustain populations in the long term. They worry that the salmon populations will decline sharply again when the ocean cycle shifts.
New data have brought more knowledge to the debate. But for the most part, biologists' views have not changed.
"The case for breaching is as strong as ever," said Earl Weber, a fisheries biologist with the Columbia River Intertribal Fish Commission in Portland whose opinion is typical of the majority view.
On the other side is James Anderson, a professor at the University of Washington, one of the first scientists in the early 1990s to predict the rebound from changing ocean cycles. He argued then and now that barging and other bypass strategies to get fish around the eight dams between Idaho and the Pacific would be enough to sustain salmon runs without breaching.
"I would say there is an improved forecast of survival and that the chance of extinction is much less," he said.
Robert Lohn, Pacific Northwest director of the National Marine Fisheries Service, which is responsible for protecting salmon, said agency scientists have not been able to determine whether salmon that are collected at the dams and barged to the ocean do better than salmon that migrate in-river.
"What we do know is doing things the way we have been doing them has yielded an increase," Lohn said.
Weber and the majority of fisheries biologists say new data show that both barged salmon and those that migrate in-river suffer from stress and other factors that kill them after they reach the mouth of the Columbia. Snake River salmon return at a rate of up to a third less than those that only go through the four Columbia River dams.
"We continue to see evidence that the Snake River fish are doing a lot worse," said Charles Petrosky, Idaho Department of Fish and Game fisheries biologist.
Though the scientific debate has not changed, the way the Bush administration interprets the Endangered Species Act has. U.S. District Judge James Redden ordered the administration to rewrite the 2001 biological opinion because it had no way to enforce many of the measures proposed to offset the effects of the dams.
The administration went beyond, shoring up rules on ranchers, loggers, miners, farmers, homeowners and others whose activities threaten salmon habitat.
Administration lawyers now argue that the dams were already in place when the salmon were listed as endangered. They say the Endangered Species Act requires them only to evaluate the effects of dam operations on salmon — not the dams themselves.
If Redden or other courts accept that argument, then the dam operators face an easier test in meeting the requirements of the ESA.
Even if that plan is accepted, Lohn said, that does not reduce the Bush administration's commitment to restoring salmon throughout the region. He said the administration has increased the budget to more than $300 million for fish and wildlife programs in the Pacific Northwest, most of which is earmarked for salmon.
"Few, if any, environmental problems in the United States are getting as much attention or financial assistance as this program," Lohn said.
The new biological opinion will shift the burden to ranchers, farmers, loggers and others without restoring salmon to harvestable numbers, said Pat Ford, executive director of Save our Wild Salmon, a coalition of fishing groups, businesses and environmental groups that advocate for salmon.
By ruling that the federal dams don't jeopardize the survival of salmon, the administration takes the pressure off itself and places it on individuals, states and rural communities.
"Museum-piece management of Snake River salmon — especially when the hydrosystem is in non-jeopardy but nothing else is — is the worst of all worlds for Idaho," Ford said.
"It simply causes trouble for various Idahoans, without moving the ball toward a large, sustainable rural economy."
Lohn counters that the administration's goal is returning to harvestable salmon numbers.
"I've heard it from the very top, the president: The Snake River stocks will be restored," Lohn said.
