Dams Remain in $900 Million Columbia River Salmon Deal

Critics say the deal does not go far enough because it does nothing to remove four federal dams on the Lower Snake River that block the salmon's passage to and from the sea.

The agreement is intended to end decades of litigation and would specifically resolve Endangered Species Act litigation over the Bush administration's salmon plan now pending before Judge James Redden of the U.S. District Court of Oregon.

Judge Redden has repeatedly ruled that the Bush administration's salmon plan violates the Endangered Species Act.

In 2003, Redden rejected the Clinton administration's plan, which outlined 199 specific measures to be implemented over 10 years to protect salmon and steelhead from the adverse impacts of the federal dam system.

Salmon migrating upstream to spawn (Photo courtesy U.S. EPA)

Now, as the result of two years of extensive negotiations, four tribal groups and three federal agencies have produced the agreements that are presented for public comment.

The proposed Memoranda of Agreements are with the federal agencies that operate and maintain the Federal Columbia River Power System as well as for selling the power from these facilities: the Bonneville Power Administration, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation.

These agencies have agreements with four tribal groups and with the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission.

The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon, the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, and the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation commit themselves to "accomplishing biological objectives with the funds, linked to meeting the agencies' statutory requirements," all parties said in a joint statement today.

"Working for the salmon is sacred work," said Fidelia Andy, chair of the Fish and Wildlife Committee of the Yakama Nation Tribal Council and chairwoman of the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission.

Under the agreements, the federal agencies would make available $900 million over 10 years to continue existing programs and to implement new priority fish projects with the tribes.

"First and foremost, the Columbia River Basin agreements deliver certain and stable resources to do this work for salmon, steelhead and other species throughout the Columbia River Basin," said Andy. "The agreements will get our governments out of the courtroom and back on the firm ground of mutual goals and collaboration."

Ice Harbor Dam on the Lower Snake River features two fish ladders but they cannot replace a free-flowing river. Generating capacity - 603 megawatts of power. (Photo courtesy USACE)

Most of funds would be provided by Bonneville Power Administration, BPA, a federal power broker that markets wholesale electrical power from 31 federal hydro projects in the Columbia River Basin, one nonfederal nuclear plant and several other small nonfederal power plants. About 35 percent of the electric power used in the Northwest comes from BPA.

BPA also owns and operates three-fourths of the high-voltage transmission in its service territory - Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and parts of Montana, California, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming.

The Columbia River Basin agreements presented for public comment build on "biological opinions" for salmon and steelhead populations on the federal Endangered Species List and includes the Northwest Power and Conservation Council's fish and wildlife program, the parties said.

The agreements provide common goals and priorities for hydro system mitigation; additional hydro, habitat and hatchery actions; greater clarity about biological benefits and secure funding for 10 years.

Critics such as the nonprofit law firm Earthjustice says, the agreements are of little benefit to the salmon because the four dams that block their access from stream to ocean and back again are still there.

"This new deal would roll back recent victories improving dam operations for salmon," said Earthjustice attorney Todd True. "The opportunity to restore these fish is rapidly slipping away. BPA and the other federal agencies under this administration have consistently been more interested in protecting the status quo than in restoring wild salmon. Today's deal is a good example of that failed approach."

"This deal defies decades of salmon science that say salmon recovery in the Columbia and Snake River Basin is not possible with habitat and hatchery programs alone," said Bill Shake, former assistant regional director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Instead, he says, any scientifically sound plan must include increased spill and flow for juvenile salmon survival and removal of four outdated dams on the Lower Snake River.

The tribes and many others have said this in comments filed in January with the federal government opposing the plan that is the basis for today's deal.

Annual gathering organized by the River Network 2007. (Photo courtesy Save Our Wild Salmon)

Dam removal proponents point out that the four dams create still water and impair the natural river flows young salmon need to migrate to sea. The dams hinder the migration of adult salmon trying to return to spawn in cold, high elevation tributaries, raising the risk that climate change will prevent these salmon from ever reaching the cold water they need to survive.

To agree to these proposals the tribes must "disavow their prior biological recommendations, which are steeply at odds with the federal approach. The tribes also must refrain from advocating for measures they have long said were scientifically necessary for salmon survival such as removing the four dams, Earthjustice says.

But Chairman Ron Suppah, Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon, is pleased with the agreement, saying, "We came to the table with the federal agencies as courtroom adversaries. We leave that table now as partners."

"We have built an aggressive plan that fixes problems wherever the fish encounter them," Suppah said. "Our plan gets the focus and energy where it must be now - on recovering fish, providing opportunity for our tribal fishers and on finding real solutions rather than blame."

Chairman Mike Marchand, Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation, said, "These agreements reflect our strongly held belief that it takes partnerships and hard work among many stakeholders using an array of strategies if we are to succeed with fish recovery."

"Each one of us brings something special and unique to this agreement," said Chairman Antone Minthorn, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. "It's this diversity of resources and knowledge that will be instrumental to our success."

Chairman Ralph Sampson, Jr., Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation is pleased to be out of the courtroom, although the judge repeatedly has upheld the tribe's position.

"Yakama truly believes that such a cooperative effort will provide benefits far beyond those available through the continuation of litigation," he said, "in which the Yakama Nation has been highly successful, but which has resulted in few if any true benefits to the resource."

In the struggle between salmon and dams, some dams are just too large to remove, such as the giant Grand Coulee Dam on the upper Columbia River, largest in the United States.

Runs of sockeye salmon once as large as three million fish spawned in nursery lakes in the uppermost reaches of the Columbia and Snake River basins. But upstream passage was blocked by the construction of several key dams including the Grand Coulee Dam, completed in 1941, and now the sockeye are down to a remnant population in one or two lakes.

The announcement today begins a BPA-led public process that seeks input on the proposal to enter into these agreements as negotiated and potential environmental effects of these proposed agreements. The comment period will close April 23, 2008.

A decision on whether to proceed with the agreements will follow the public comment period. For more information on the public process, please visit www.bpa.gov/comment.

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2008. All rights reserved.