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Portland, Oregon
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Leaders of the Columbia River treaty-fishing tribes today roundly
condemned a decision by the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA)
to vanquish a long-serving science center. The twenty-year-old Fish
Passage Center (FPC) had provided critical technical data to the
state and federal agencies and Indian tribes that protect and manage
Columbia River salmon runs and fisheries. BPA announced its plan
to transfer the functions of the FPC to new entities at a briefing
to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council whose own fish and
wildlife program requires the FPC be funded by BPA. The loss of
the FPC strips the Columbia Basin treaty tribes as well as the fish
and wildlife agencies of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana,
of their ability to fully participate in regional salmon recovery
efforts.
"Today's decision is the result of a terribly flawed
process that started from a false, predetermined conclusion -- that
the Fish Passage Center needed to be replaced," said Rebecca
Miles, chair of the Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee. "Yesterday
a White House official spoke to the region about sharing responsibility
in rebuilding salmon runs and argued that hydroelectric impacts
had been addressed. Today a federal agency, BPA, shuts down an established,
efficient science center and shifts the work to an assemblage of
less experienced and unproven entities virtually guaranteeing that
the regional collaborative effort will suffer, perhaps flat out
fail. Actions speak louder than words."
In November 2005, Senator Larry Craig (R-ID) inserted language
into the Energy & Water appropriations report, to direct the
BPA and the Northwest Power and Conservation Council to halt funding
the FPC and transfer its functions to another entity in the region
within 120 days. Despite numerous requests by tribes, states, business
leaders and members of the Northwest Congressional delegation to
keep the FPC intact, Craig's language was included in the
final Energy & Water appropriations report and signed into law
on November 19, 2005. Today's announcement comes just days
after salmon-based businesses and conservation groups filed a lawsuit
asserting that BPA's decision to shutter the FPC unlawfully
circumvents the Northwest Power Act because the report language
does not have the force of law.
"This raises huge questions about the authorities of states
and tribes to access the best scientific data and manage a regional
resource", added Miles. "Congress was clear 26 years ago
when it passed the Northwest Power Act laying out the roles and
responsibilities of tribes and federal and state fishery agencies.
If this stands it says that any member of Congress, behind closed
doors, can undo a decades-long effort with words hidden in a legislative
report."
Authorized by the Northwest Power Act, and operating for the past
20 years, the FPC collected, analyzed, and made public vital information
about salmon and steelhead numbers on the Columbia and Snake Rivers.
State and tribal decision makers rely heavily on the information
provided by the FPC to analyze the impact of hydro operations on
salmon. The loss of the independent science it provides comes at
a crucial time for the region. This information will be especially
critical during the next year of court-ordered salmon recovery negotiations
between the states, tribes, BPA and the Bush Administration.
"We have just begun to identify the substantive, dense, technical
questions that would lead to a long-awaited court-approved federal
salmon plan", said Olney Patt, Jr. chairman of the Columbia
River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission. "The Fish Passage Center
is, hands down, the science agency best suited to take on that work.
Hopefully the legal challenge can clarify this and bring common
sense back to the matter."
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About CRITFC
The Portland-based Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission is
the technical support and coordinating agency for fishery management
policies of the Columbia River Basin's four treaty tribes: 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 Nez Perce Tribe.
CRITFC, formed in 1977, employs biologists, other scientists, public
information specialists, policy analysts and administrators who work
in fisheries research and analyses, advocacy, planning and coordination,
harvest control and law enforcement. |
