Ithaca 37
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Flip-flop on salmon habitat raises lots of questions and worse!!
The federal government is recommending a huge change in how it would protect rivers for salmon and steelhead.
That means the feds have some explaining to do — a job made more difficult considering their recent, poor record on salmon issues.
With a single rule proposed Tuesday, the government now asserts that tens of thousands of miles of Western rivers are no longer critical for scarce salmon and steelhead. The turnabout is stunning.
Clean, pristine rivers are essential to restoring one of the region's most threatened and remarkable wild species; preserving other creatures, such as bears and eagles, that depend on a thriving salmon population; and ensuring a fishing season that could be worth tens of millions of dollars a year to small towns along Central Idaho's Salmon River. The question is: How much habitat is enough?
About 27,000 miles of river from Southern California to the Canadian border, according to NOAA Fisheries, the federal agency assigned to handle salmon recovery. While that's a lot of river, it's also an 80 percent reduction from what the agency deemed critical less than five years ago.
At issue is critical habitat — rivers considered essential to salmon and steelhead survival, according to the Endangered Species Act. Critical habitat signals other agencies that they must consider the needs of endangered species before they approve projects in an area.
In February 2000, during the Clinton presidency, NOAA Fisheries spelled out what it considered critical habitat and said these designations would have no economic impact. The National Association of Home Builders disagreed and sued. A federal court ruled that the agency had failed to consider economic costs of critical habitat. The result was the NOAA Fisheries' proposal Tuesday to scale back critical habitat to areas where salmon and steelhead have been observed or where a biologist with local expertise "would presume them to occur."
The precise impacts on Idaho are unclear. NOAA Fisheries spokesman Brian Gorman was unsure Wednesday how many miles of Idaho river would remain critical habitat or how many miles would lose that designation.
NOAA Fisheries' idea has some logic to it: identifying and improving "the most beneficial biological habitat" for salmon, said Bob Lohn, the agency's regional administrator. That's why Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, likes the new rule; he thinks it would focus recovery efforts where they would do the most good, spokesman Sidney Smith said.
Perhaps it would. Or perhaps it would limit habitat work so much that it would actually set back recovery. Bill Sedivy of Idaho Rivers United, an environmental group, wondered aloud Wednesday: Will Idaho sockeye salmon — pushed to the brink of extinction and to a portion of its historic range — be relegated only to Redfish Lake near Stanley?
As the administration tries to explain its turnabout, its recent, abysmal history on salmon doesn't lend much credibility. The administration has argued that genetically similar — but less hardy — hatchery fish are as valuable as wild fish in recovering salmon and steelhead. The administration has argued that manmade dams are simply part of the natural environment young fish must navigate en route to the Pacific Ocean.
That doesn't make the administration's new "critical habitat" definition wrong. But a flip-flop of this magnitude does raise questions about how reliable the administration's fishery-management decisions really are.
http://www.idahostatesman.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041202/NEWS0501/412020327/1052/NEWS05
All of a sudden we have 80% less river habitat that is important for salmon?! Do you think this administration is concerned about salmon recovery?
Here's more: "U.S. Rules Out Dam Removal for Salmon Recovery"
"A Bush administration decision to eliminate the possibility of removing dams to save endangered U.S. Pacific Northwest salmon species is a huge blow to protection efforts, an environmental group said on Wednesday.
"The decision is a giant setback, essentially it is a plan for extinction," said Todd True, an attorney for the EarthJustice law firm.
The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration on Tuesday found that hydroelectric dams on the Columbia and Lower Snake rivers were built before a dozen salmon species were listed under the Endangered Species Act of 1973.
Therefore they are "pre-existing conditions" and part of the basic environment.
NOAA said that other steps would protect salmon such as the construction of spillway weirs and physically transporting juvenile fish around the dams.
True scoffed at the government measures.
"Those removable spillway weirs and other gizmos simply will not make extinction happen any faster -- species recovery was never even part of the equation," he said.
The decision effectively reverses a Clinton administration ruling in 2000 that permitted dam removal as a last resort for salmon recovery.
Brian Gorman, a spokesman for NOAA Fisheries, said environmentalists have focused on dam breaching even though NOAA cannot order that of the dam operators.
"It was never really considered -- only mentioned as an option in 2000," Gorman said. "Now we are more confident that our provisions will sufficiently protect fish so dam breaching doesn't even enter into the equation."
Also this week, NOAA unveiled a proposal to reduce federally protected salmon habitat by 80 percent. Under the plan, it would be easier to develop land along streams and rivers as well as areas of Puget Sound.
It follows a lawsuit filed by groups including the National Association of Home Builders and the Building Industry Association of Washington.
They argued that the previous administration had allowed blanket protection of all salmon habitats -- about 150,000 square miles -- without biological basis. "
I hope you realize, now, what a sleazy anti-wildlife administration this is! Imagine this; they build dams, the dams cause drastic reduction in salmon returns (no doubt about it. Don't even try to argue otherwise) , then they say the dams were pre-existing before efforts to save endangered species were enacted, so they can't be considered as part of the problem.
Kinda like saying a shot thru the heart happened before death, so it wasn't the cause.
The federal government is recommending a huge change in how it would protect rivers for salmon and steelhead.
That means the feds have some explaining to do — a job made more difficult considering their recent, poor record on salmon issues.
With a single rule proposed Tuesday, the government now asserts that tens of thousands of miles of Western rivers are no longer critical for scarce salmon and steelhead. The turnabout is stunning.
Clean, pristine rivers are essential to restoring one of the region's most threatened and remarkable wild species; preserving other creatures, such as bears and eagles, that depend on a thriving salmon population; and ensuring a fishing season that could be worth tens of millions of dollars a year to small towns along Central Idaho's Salmon River. The question is: How much habitat is enough?
About 27,000 miles of river from Southern California to the Canadian border, according to NOAA Fisheries, the federal agency assigned to handle salmon recovery. While that's a lot of river, it's also an 80 percent reduction from what the agency deemed critical less than five years ago.
At issue is critical habitat — rivers considered essential to salmon and steelhead survival, according to the Endangered Species Act. Critical habitat signals other agencies that they must consider the needs of endangered species before they approve projects in an area.
In February 2000, during the Clinton presidency, NOAA Fisheries spelled out what it considered critical habitat and said these designations would have no economic impact. The National Association of Home Builders disagreed and sued. A federal court ruled that the agency had failed to consider economic costs of critical habitat. The result was the NOAA Fisheries' proposal Tuesday to scale back critical habitat to areas where salmon and steelhead have been observed or where a biologist with local expertise "would presume them to occur."
The precise impacts on Idaho are unclear. NOAA Fisheries spokesman Brian Gorman was unsure Wednesday how many miles of Idaho river would remain critical habitat or how many miles would lose that designation.
NOAA Fisheries' idea has some logic to it: identifying and improving "the most beneficial biological habitat" for salmon, said Bob Lohn, the agency's regional administrator. That's why Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, likes the new rule; he thinks it would focus recovery efforts where they would do the most good, spokesman Sidney Smith said.
Perhaps it would. Or perhaps it would limit habitat work so much that it would actually set back recovery. Bill Sedivy of Idaho Rivers United, an environmental group, wondered aloud Wednesday: Will Idaho sockeye salmon — pushed to the brink of extinction and to a portion of its historic range — be relegated only to Redfish Lake near Stanley?
As the administration tries to explain its turnabout, its recent, abysmal history on salmon doesn't lend much credibility. The administration has argued that genetically similar — but less hardy — hatchery fish are as valuable as wild fish in recovering salmon and steelhead. The administration has argued that manmade dams are simply part of the natural environment young fish must navigate en route to the Pacific Ocean.
That doesn't make the administration's new "critical habitat" definition wrong. But a flip-flop of this magnitude does raise questions about how reliable the administration's fishery-management decisions really are.
http://www.idahostatesman.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041202/NEWS0501/412020327/1052/NEWS05
All of a sudden we have 80% less river habitat that is important for salmon?! Do you think this administration is concerned about salmon recovery?
Here's more: "U.S. Rules Out Dam Removal for Salmon Recovery"
"A Bush administration decision to eliminate the possibility of removing dams to save endangered U.S. Pacific Northwest salmon species is a huge blow to protection efforts, an environmental group said on Wednesday.
"The decision is a giant setback, essentially it is a plan for extinction," said Todd True, an attorney for the EarthJustice law firm.
The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration on Tuesday found that hydroelectric dams on the Columbia and Lower Snake rivers were built before a dozen salmon species were listed under the Endangered Species Act of 1973.
Therefore they are "pre-existing conditions" and part of the basic environment.
NOAA said that other steps would protect salmon such as the construction of spillway weirs and physically transporting juvenile fish around the dams.
True scoffed at the government measures.
"Those removable spillway weirs and other gizmos simply will not make extinction happen any faster -- species recovery was never even part of the equation," he said.
The decision effectively reverses a Clinton administration ruling in 2000 that permitted dam removal as a last resort for salmon recovery.
Brian Gorman, a spokesman for NOAA Fisheries, said environmentalists have focused on dam breaching even though NOAA cannot order that of the dam operators.
"It was never really considered -- only mentioned as an option in 2000," Gorman said. "Now we are more confident that our provisions will sufficiently protect fish so dam breaching doesn't even enter into the equation."
Also this week, NOAA unveiled a proposal to reduce federally protected salmon habitat by 80 percent. Under the plan, it would be easier to develop land along streams and rivers as well as areas of Puget Sound.
It follows a lawsuit filed by groups including the National Association of Home Builders and the Building Industry Association of Washington.
They argued that the previous administration had allowed blanket protection of all salmon habitats -- about 150,000 square miles -- without biological basis. "
I hope you realize, now, what a sleazy anti-wildlife administration this is! Imagine this; they build dams, the dams cause drastic reduction in salmon returns (no doubt about it. Don't even try to argue otherwise) , then they say the dams were pre-existing before efforts to save endangered species were enacted, so they can't be considered as part of the problem.
Kinda like saying a shot thru the heart happened before death, so it wasn't the cause.
