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Another Handout to Industry
Stop the removal of critical salmon & trout habitat
The Bush administration has proposed drastic reductions in designated habitat for endangered Pacific salmon and steelhead trout. This proposal amounts to an 80% decrease in Pacific Northwest habitat and as much as a 90% reduction in California habitat once designated for the fish. The policy could lead recovering fish populations to collapse, as they did in the Klamath basin in 2001. Restoring salmon and steelhead trout runs in West Coast rivers is already a monumental challenge. Dams, farming, logging and population growth all contribute to declining levels that border on extinction.
West Coast salmon and steelhead are listed under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, which requires that the government identify “critical habitat areas”—the places where listed species can recover. By definition, these areas can be subject to restrictions on development, logging and grazing. These activities lead to runoff, which increases silt levels in rivers, as well as other serious pollution that impacts fish populations. The plan put forth by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) will drastically impact salmon runs in rivers throughout California, and steelhead trout as far south as San Diego.
The Bush Administration’s salmon policies ignore science and are fiscally irresponsible:
- Restoration of the riverway—fish habitat—has considerable value in the form of cleaner water for drinking and recreation. Also, healthy rivers minimize washouts and siltation
- Along the entire Pacific Coast, salmon mean business—more than 35,000 jobs and more than $3 billion annually. Salmon are good for jobs, tourism, and our overall economy
- Biological and economic benefits of salmon habitat restoration were excluded from the NMFS proposal that led to the policy
- The rivers that will be exempt from protection are essential for sustained fish population recovery since they serve as vital nurseries where the fish spawn and grow before heading out to sea
- The policy proposes counting millions of hatchery-raised fish that are released into the wild as wild fish. This action undercuts the listing of wild-born fish as endangered and threatens the health of true wild fish populations.
This plan accepts salmon population levels where they are today—severely depressed and declining—and abandons the idea of protecting and restoring them. It also ignores the connection between rivers and lands and their influence on each other. Removing habitat protections means further habitat degradations and additional population declines.
What You Can Do
The agency is expected to make a final decision on the matter by June 2005. A public comment period ends on March 14, 2005 at 5 p.m. Please submit your comments, identified by Docket Number [030716175-4327-03] and RIN Number [0648-AQ77], to the following:
Mail: Area Regional Administrator Donna Darm
National Marine Fisheries Service, Protected Resources Division
525 NE Oregon Street, Suite 500
Portland, OR, 97232-2737
Fax: 503-230-5435; address fax to Administrator Darm, NMFS, Protected Resources Division
Email: critical.habitat.nwr@noaa.gov; include docket and RIN numbers in the subject line
