Judge blasts latest federal salmon recovery plan

Friday, December 07, 2007
By ERIK ROBINSON, Columbian Staff Writer

The federal judge who has twice rejected federal plans to balance imperiled salmon against dams in the Columbia River basin signaled Friday that dam managers are doing no better with their latest plan — and consequences could be severe.

U.S. District Judge James Redden raised the possibility that, without substantial changes in favor of salmon, federal dam operators could even be held criminally or civilly liable.

Redden, in a letter sent Friday in advance of a status conference scheduled for next week in his Portland courtroom, wrote that he is unlikely to send the latest plan — called a biological opinion, or bi-op – back for federal agencies to try again.

“If I decide not to remand the Bi-Op, but decide to simply vacate the opinion instead, would this not result in wrongful ‘taking’ by the Corps of Engineers, the Bonneville Power Administration, and the Bureau of Reclamation?” Redden wrote. “What are the consequences of such ‘takings?’”

A “take” under the Endangered Species Act means to harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect a threatened or endangered species.

The law provides for both civil and criminal penalties for killing species listed by the law, with criminal fines up to $50,000 and/or a year in prison. Civil fines of as much as $25,000 per violation are also possible.

Thirteen stocks of Columbia basin salmon and steelhead have dwindled nearly to the point of extinction, and Redden has made it clear he expects federal authorities to ensure dams do not jeopardize their survival. He’s ruled two federal dam management plans illegal so far, one submitted by the Clinton administration in 2000 and one by the Bush administration in 2004.

Federal officials say they will offset harming salmon in the dams by taking a variety of expensive measures to improve salmon survival.

But Redden has repeatedly raised concern that many of these mitigation measures — including habitat restoration, hatchery improvements and new fish slides to reduce the number of young salmon that pass the dams en route to the Pacific Ocean — are not reasonably certain to occur. In Friday’s letter, Redden said the latest plan appears to share many of the flaws as the plan he rejected in 2004.

“I instructed Federal Defendants to consider all mitigation measures necessary to avoid jeopardy, including removal of the four lower Snake River Dams, if all else failed,” the judge wrote. “Despite those instructions, the (biological opinions) again appear to rely heavily on mitigation actions that are neither reasonably certain to occur, nor certain to benefit listed species within a reasonable time.

“Moreover, Federal Defendants seem unwilling to seriously consider any significant changes to the status quo dam operations.”

Scott Simms, a BPA spokesman in Portland , said the agency had no immediate response to the missive from Redden.

“We just received the letter and we are reviewing it,” he said late Friday.

www.columbian.com/news...y-plan.cfm




This might prove interesting. Your thoughts?

Interesting indeed. Redden is a tough customer. I back his sentiments, but I'm afraid his hard-ball approach may backfire--I hope not. I believe that drastic measures are necessary, but it's obviously tough to get through to those that are writing the proposed mitigation plans. I think what is needed is the public and then political backing to put pressure on BPA/feds to consider more drastic measures in their BioOps, but if Redden keeps beating on 'em, it may sway public/political sympathy away from fish and toward "the poor feds" and then the scales will tip against Redden and the fish. Maybe the feds are just stalling with unacceptable plans until Redden moves on, or heavan forbid, croaks. If that is the case, this threat to apply civil penalties for Endangered Species act violations may get some attention. Imagine, $50K for every violation and it's been how many thousands of fish for how many years? That's a hefty fine.

The other piece of the puzzle that worries me is that maybe Redden finally gets the plan he wants, and BPA finally comes around and takes out the Snake dams, and does everything humanly possible but the fish runs still decline--then what? We'll get a resounding "I told you so" from all of the power interests and it would be a huge loss for the fish. To avoid this possibility, we need to address the harvest at sea at the same time as hydro and habitat so that the fish get assistance through out their ENTIRE lifecycle, otherwise attempts to address one stage of their lifecycle may be met with limited success because the fish are taking a beating at the next turn.

If the dams are gone and runs don't improve, the next target will be the commercial fishing industry. Or hatcheries. One or the other. The folks suing on ehlaf of the ESA listed stocks are not likely to quit unitl the conditions needed for recovery exisit.

Good for them. I could do with higer power bills and no safeway salmon if it meant the rivers would be full again.

AND its just money. The budget spent on one year of combat action in the middle east could cover the costs of tearing the dams out and rebuilding them again. I can't believe it when politicians try to tell us there worry about costs. Who are they kidding? A trillion here, a trillion there...whats a billion or so on fish recovery?

Call me crazy, but I think the commercial industry should be targeted first, and then see what happens to the runs. If they dont make it back to the river from the ocean or the columbia then they stand zero chance of survival. I do not think that just removing the dams is the answer.

dev88t wrote:

Call me crazy, but I think the commercial industry should be targeted first, and then see what happens to the runs. If they dont make it back to the river from the ocean or the columbia then they stand zero chance of survival. I do not think that just removing the dams is the answer.

I think that we gotta work the whole picture rather than choose. Remember Loomis preaching the four "H's" Hydro, Habitat, Harvest, and Hatcheries. If one piece is totally lacking, none of the other three will ever fully compensate. When they put the dams in, they thought that Hatcheries would make up the difference, but that failed miserabley. After Loomis' presentation, I agree with Travis that ocean harvest is way bigger than we realized before, but working that problem without the others isn't going to get us where we need to be. Take the 2008 springer forecast for the Willy and Columbia; they're predicting the third highest return ever for the Columbia and a dismal return for the Willy. If the issue were ONLY Harvest at sea, the two returns should track with each other--but the fact that they're not indicates that something bad is happening on the Willy that didn't happen on the Columbia. Folks are saying that efforts to increase flow on the Columbia were made during the adult return year that's responsible for the good forecast on the Columbia, while the same year on the Willy the upriver resevoirs where held at full pool for recreation--plus, the high spill on the Columbia tends to back up the Willy. The guess is that spill had a profound positive impact on the Columbia and lack of spill hurt the Willy. Hard to know for sure if these "guesses" are on target, but something other than ocean harvest ALONE was at play.

Anyway--I agree that Commercial ocean harvest is hugely impactful, but all of the H's have to be worked for long term recovery.

Glock--could you move this thread to the new forum?

Very true. I would have love to seen the rivers before the dams, but I do not think the dams (snake) will ever come out. There are things they can do to help habitat and lessen the impact of the hydros, but getting the power administration to consistantly do it is one of the problems.

On a side note if anyone is interested go the fish first's website www.fishfirst.org and check out their video (there is a link at the bottom of the page). It is pretty cool and gives some decent historical background on the lower columbia fishery and the project fish first did on cedar creek.

Anyways, I am just glad that it seems like we are getting more people backing the restoration of fish runs. Now if we could just get everyone to concentrate their efforts on one thing at a time (yeah right)! Mark, have you heard anymore rumblings of a CCA chapter starting up in the Tri-cities other than we would like to see one?

Spot on about the 4 H's. One of them being deeply out of whack cannot be offset by fixing the other three.

I've been meaning to follow up on the CCA movement here in the Tri-Cities. I'll make a few calls and post what I find.

Thanks. I know I dont have the time to be an officer or anything, but it is something that I would like to participate in.

Thanks E-mann