After three Columbia
River tribes decided to stop pushing for the breaching of four
federal dams on the Snake River, many critics spoke the ugly word
“sellout.” The tribes will receive $900 million in new
salmon projects in exchange for halting their court battle for the
next decade.
However, the Warm Springs, Yakama and
Umatilla tribes – joined later in the day on April 7 by the
Colville tribe — are following in the footsteps of the
region’s leaders, even though many scientists say that the
dam breaching is necessary to save 13 stocks of endangered salmon.
The tribes gave up their fight to breach the dams because they read
the current political tea leaves: Not one political leader in the
Pacific Northwest in either party supports breaching dams.
Both of Washington’s Democratic senators, Patty
Murray and Maria Cantwell, campaigned to keep the four dams, and
not one of the three presidential candidates is in favor of
breaching dams. There is no surprise in any of this.
And
the deal the tribes negotiated with federal dam regulators is
better than their critics charge. They got federal dam managers to
agree not to challenge a tribal agreement with Oregon and
Washington that will let the tribes catch more salmon in years when
hatchery fish are more abundant. For the Columbia River tribes,
protecting treaty rights is a top priority. In the 1970s and
‘80s, the tribes won battles in Washington and Oregon that
recognize their right to half of the fish harvested in the Columbia
and its tributaries. Ever since then, they have resolutely defended
those rights.
Meanwhile, those still in favor of
restoring salmon runs through dam-breaching — including the Nez
Perce Tribe, which shares its treaty rights with the other tribes
— continue to fight. The dam-breaching strategy is to convince
U.S. District Judge James Redden that the Bush
administration’s current salmon and dam plan remains
inadequate both scientifically and legally. If Redden is so
convinced, he has promised to consider ordering harsh and costly
measures, such as spilling more water around hydroelectric
turbines, drawing down reservoirs behind dams, or requiring the
draining of upstream reservoirs for water to help salmon migration.
Many advocates believe these measures would prove even
more costly than breaching the four dams. This will force the
region’s political leaders — and the next president — to
take the painful steps necessary to resolve the issue. The
tribe’s recent deal could sidestep this outcome only if Judge
Redden is convinced that the promised 200 hatchery and habitat
projects to the tribes, along with projects offered in a separate
$65 million deal with Idaho, help the Bush administration’s
plan meet the law and enable salmon to survive.
The Bush
plan might have a chance before Redden if the Bonneville Power
Administration, the agency that markets hydroelectricity from the
dams, can get Oregon on board with a separate deal. But Oregon is
currently aligned with environmentalists, fishermen and sporting
businesses in challenging the Bush administration plan. Oregon has
made it clear that it wants a truly aggressive non-breach option on
the table.
The 200 hatchery and harvest restoration
projects are mostly to help fish in the Columbia River and not in
the Snake River. With the Nez Perce tribe unwilling to back off
from breaching, the projects in Idaho that BPA offered the tribe
weren’t a part of the deal. Instead, the Bonneville Power
Administration went to the state of Idaho offering $65 million for
similar projects. Like Oregon, the Nez Perce could still make a
deal that would help dam managers convince Redden they have done
enough for now.
So unless the things change dramatically
in the next two years, dam breaching isn’t going to Congress
for approval anytime soon. Under this new deal, the tribes will get
some money, get even tougher measures through further negotiations,
and still have another shot at the dams in 10 years.
That’s assuming, of course, that there’s still time to
save the salmon.
Rocky Barker is a contributor
to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News
(hcn.org). He is the author of Scorched Earth: How the
Fires of Yellowstone Changed America, and environmental writer for
the Idaho Statesman in Boise, Idaho.
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