297 



ess. I am aware of some of the concerns you have had with your 

 constituents in having to deal with it. 



Mr. LaRocco. Yes, and this is a double-edged sword. People 

 want us to reduce government, but they want us to increase the 

 responsiveness of the agency. So this is going to be a tough sell. 



Mr. Smith. I think as we work toward this watershed analysis 

 and these concepts that are now evolving — ^it is separate on the 

 western side, we understand that — but there are some important 

 concepts there in dealing with this in a larger imit, that should fa- 

 cilitate breaking it down smaller from 10,000. From something that 

 was originally some 10,000 consultation projects with the Forest 

 Service, we are down now to 81; we have consolidated them down. 

 So if we can bring in these efficiencies, we can reduce the gridlock. 



Mr. LaRocco. Well I can just say you are going to be blamed for 

 everything in this region, I hope you know that. 



Mr. Smith. That is why we have said ESA is not the answer. 



Mr. LaRocco. Yes, the owner of that lumber mill in Elk City re- 

 cently blamed you for not moving forward on a salvage sale. Then 

 when I went to Mr. Schinitten, and he speeded it up and released 

 the timber sale, then he did not bid on it, if you can imagine that. 



Mr. Smith. We are aware of that, yes. 



Mr. LaRocco. The timber went to Oregon, if you can imagine 

 that. And then I am getting blamed for the demise of the mill in 

 Elk City of all things, if you can imagine. But you were the bad 

 guys and I was the bad guy, and he had his hands in his pocket 

 while timber went to Oregon, but you know, this keeps going on 

 and on. 



Mr. DeFazio. A lot of timber going to Oregon. 



Mr. LaRocco. It did not go to his District. [Laughter.] 



I thought we cut a lot of timber in the First District, but they 

 cut a lot of timber in Douglas Coimty, or they used to anyway. 



You say, "In NMFS' opinion, the most critical need for the Coun- 

 cil to consider is an evaluation of new institutional arrangements 

 that will provide improved coordination betv/een the federal, state 

 and tribal entities and greater accountability for implementing 

 Council program tasks." That sounds good. I am concerned about 

 further evaluations, further monitoring and a speeded-up mode 

 here. 



Mr. Smith. The most immediate process that that could be avail- 

 able is the Systems Operation Review and the broad range of alter- 

 natives that do exist there for management of the operations as 

 well as the institutional arrangement, the structure for managing 

 it. That is a bit behind schedule, but if those processes already 

 available can be used — or there may be others similar. The point 

 is, as we have heard earlier, there is fragmentation in implementa- 

 tion of some of the procedures; there is a need for some account- 

 abihty. There is no consequence if you do not meet one of the tasks 

 that the Council has agreed to assign and so they slip. And it does 

 impact the other partners in this who are relying on that piece of 

 work to be done before they can start theirs. And it may not be 

 BPA ftmding. It could be other state and federal funding that we 

 are awaiting or in line to do this. So there is a need to coordinate 

 that kind of activity, so we are getting efficiency out of the limited 

 resources that are presently available to do that. So there is an in- 



