Posted on 09/20/2009 8:41:57 AM PDT by IbJensen
Portland, Ore. - Calling it an "insurance policy" for Pacific Northwest salmon, the Obama administration on Tuesday offered up a tougher conservation plan for the fish that includes climate-change monitoring and the "last-resort" possibility of removing dams.
The plan submitted to a federal judge for approval was a revised version of a Bush administration plan that had been in the works for years, but which was rejected.
Reaction to the new plan was sharply divided, echoing a debate that stretches back decades over balancing Columbia River Basin fish survival and hydroelectric dams: It either goes too far or not far enough.
Environmentalists say it does little to enhance the Bush administration plan the judge has already called inadequate, while business groups worry it could lead to drastic measures such as dam removal on the lower Snake River in southeastern Washington state.
"We appreciate that President Obama took the time to look at this, but we see little more than a veiled attempt to pass off the old Bush plan as a new one," said Greg Stahl, assistant policy director for Idaho Rivers United.
Another environmentalist was even more critical, calling the new plan "illegal and scientifically unsound."
Nicole Cordan, legal and policy director of the Save Our Wild Salmon coalition, said the Obama administration acknowledged the analysis in the Bush plan was uncertain and potentially overly optimistic but stuck with much of it.
"Again, we've had eight years of these same actions and same kind of work, and what we're seeing is a whole lot of money spent and not a whole lot of impact happening on the ground," Cordan said.
Most of the $750 million spent each year on salmon conservation comes from Bonneville Power Administration ratepayers. The Portland-based BPA is the federal power marketing agency that shares salmon recovery management with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
The plan submitted by NOAA to U.S. District Judge James Redden on Tuesday is called a "biological opinion" that sets the requirements for ensuring salmon survival under the Endangered Species Act.
The chief of NOAA, former Oregon State University professor Jane Lubchenco, said the additional measures recommended by the Obama administration take into account the uncertainties mentioned by critics and tries to adjust for them.
She noted the new plan would immediately expand research and monitoring, and set specific biological "triggers" for strong conservation measures if numbers of endangered or threatened fish fail to reach certain benchmarks.
"It's definitely not business as usual," Lubchenco told The Associated Press in an interview. Lubchenco, widely considered a top expert in marine ecology, defended the scientific models used to draft the plan but said more research would be required to make sure it works and to adapt it to variable conditions, including climate change.
She called for an end to litigation over the plan in order to move forward with conservation measures that may not enjoy unanimous support but resulted from a regional consensus, including many American Indian tribes.
"We believe the time has come to get out of the courtroom," Lubchenco said.
The biological opinion has been a work in progress since 2000, and has twice been rejected by Redden who, at one point, threatened to take over management of Columbia River Basin hydroelectric dams.
But some elements of the plan, including a recommendation that the Corps of Engineers study the possible removal of the four lower Snake River dams, raised serious concerns with U.S. Rep. Doc Hastings, the top Republican on the House Natural Resources Committee.
"The Obama administration has put dam removal back on the table and delivered just what dam removal extremists have been demanding," said Hastings, whose committee has jurisdiction over fish recovery and federal hydropower dams.
Lubchenco, however, emphasized the possibility of breaching any dams was considered only "an option of last resort."
Steve Wright, Bonneville Power Administration chief, repeated Lubchenco's cautionary note, adding that hydroelectricity produced by the dams is not only relatively cheap, it does not cause any carbon dioxide pollution, considered the main cause of global warming.
"Climate change is always lurking in the background" of any environmental policy decisions, Wright said.
Reaction among other members of the Northwest congressional delegation was mixed. Sen. Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat, said the Obama administration made a number of improvements over the previous proposal but he worries about more litigation stalling salmon recovery efforts.
His spokeswoman, Julie Edwards, said Merkley agrees with Republican Sens. Mike Crapo and Jim Risch of Idaho "that a regional dialogue among all the stakeholders will be necessary to forge a lasting solution."
They are choking this country to death by using fish lying dead on a river bank in a phony attempt to save all the fish. People are the important part of the equation. The destruction these groups cause is the reason environmentalism should be illegal and banned! Let the people have Freedom.
A good way to start a civil war, you POS marxist.
When are states going to take matter in their own hands over this crap? You got Arnold in the fetal position over the feds withholding water from the Valley farmers.
more greeniecommie crap to de-energize America.....Salmon and Steelhead are smart enough to use fish ladders....build some more ladders if they are needed!
In addition to socialism/communism, they want to leave us all shivering in the dark (or sweating in the dark) by FURTHER REDUCING THE SUPPLY OF ENERGY IN OUR COUNTRY. These are hydroelectric dams, they produce electricity. More proof the “green” movement is the “red” movement with different advertising.
Racist dams...
Removing Dams, so Terrorists don’t have to!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI3I0UTCUqg
Recognise it for what it is.
Actually I agree. There is no need to remove the dams, but the Snake River Sockeye has been reduced to almost nothing. The easier solution, and one needed up and down the Columbia River Basin is fish ladders. These would help all the Salmon runs.
Provided the Native Americans actually take their gill nets out of the rivers.
BTW, it's time for "push back" and that should happen in Chicago. At one time the waterfront from what is now the Wisconsin state line all the way around to Burns Ditch, Indiana was a swampy woodland with numerous small streams that provided breeding grounds for various native fish such as Lake Trout.
As Chicago grew these species expired and almost all native species have been exterminated by invasive species and the absence of the desirable breeding grounds now occupied by Chicago.
It is time to REMOVE THE BUILDINGS and bring back the small streams.
This can be done quickly with dynamite and backhoes within Obama's FIRST YEAR in office!
More proof that Environmentalists are Fascists
The environmental extremists oppose all forms of energy generation that release CO2, because of “global warming”. They also oppose solar power in the Mojave Desert. (If it’s not okay there, where is it okay with them?). They oppose hydroelectric upstream of other dams. (Again, if it’s not okay there, where is it okay with them?). I think what they oppose is human civilization.
Just so you can know, I have personally cut the binding on 5 bales of straw which went immediately into 2 rivers emptying into the Sound.....this was mid-70’s, prior to Judge Bolt’s ruling.
The key statement in the article...
The largest lake in California which is drying up.
How about removing this administration to save America?
The fricking fish don’t “need help”!
Human Beings NEED HELP!
Lessee
Fish go up the river, spawn and die. Little fish grow up, go down the river tothe sea and get bittger, returning to spawn and die. OK, risnse, repeat.
A veeeeeeerrrryyyyyy long time ago, Indians (Amerinds, Natives, First Nation, etc, whatever the current trendy name is for those folk) caught and ate the fish to survive. NOw they catch the fish to sell. No fish, less dough gor - whatever.
The dams make a lot of electicity used over a very wide area. Used in everything from hospital incubators keeping timy babies alive to keeping you ice cream frozen. Oh, ya, and a lot f businesses use the juce as well.
So - what’s the choice? A few Indians can’t pick up some dough by selling fish or letting babies die?
(No, I won’t run for office, but thanks for the offer)
First and foremost, this is a political problem.
The fish don’t care and if they were that important, put in some hatcheries. THey would cost les than the money spend by the BPA, and might give jobs to the Indians.
Last word to the Indians (having lived in WA state until fleeing to AK) NO representation without taxation.
This is an attempt to cultivate Californians, because he knows perfectly well that Congress won’t let this happen. My son is a fisherman there and hates Bush because he believes Bush was anti-fisherman; the truth is that Bush tried to pass numerous initiatives (such as this one, which is directly from Bush) but once the Dems were in charge, he couldn’t get them through. So now Bambi, knowing that the Dems are in charge and these things have no chance of passing and making him look bad with the enviros, can support this Bush iniative.
Thanks to all the jerks who voted for Bambi...and all the jerks who voted for Dems or didn’t vote at all and gave us a Congress that made it impossible for Bush to do the positive things he wanted to do.
Usually dams are put in for reasons of flooding. I guess now fish are more important than people’s lives and property are?
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