365 



When Congress authorized constniction of the federal dams on the main-stem Columbia and Snake 

 Rivers, it explicidy required they be built and operated to protect what then were the world's largest 

 populations of chinook salmon and steelhead and other large, diverse populations of anadromous 

 fish which colleaively comprised one of the world's most extraordinary, valuable, perpetually 

 renewable natural resources. That didn't happen. 



The Corps of Engineers, in short, screwed up. It dutifully built fish ladders to pass adult fish 

 upstream. It belatedly built fish hatcheries to partially mitigate for the loss of fish habitat drowned 

 behind the dams. All at the cost of hundreds of millions of public dollars. But the Corps failed to 

 provide for getting the resulting juvenile fish downstream. 



For decades the Bonneville Power Administration and its pork barrel constituents - amply 

 represented here today [hereinafter collectively referred to as BPNUCC to reflect their ideological 

 fusing] - successfully fought operational changes in the hydrosystem that could ameliorate the fish- 

 killing effects of the Coips' design error. 



The result, was the economic extinction and threatened biological extinction of most salmon 

 jjopulations originating in the upper 95% of the Columbia River Basin; and, of course, devastation 

 of salmon dependent economies throughout the Northwest and concomitant loss of billions of 

 dollars to the region and Nation. 



In 1980, an exasperated Congress responded with the strong fish protection/restoration language in 

 the Northwest Power Act. Congress declared an "emergency," created the Council and gave it 90 

 days to develop a plan to mitigate the effeas of the Federal Columbia River Power System and 

 restore salmon and related economies. 



Among other things. Congress required that fish be treated as coequal parmers with other uses of the 

 hydropower system of the region. It included specific statutory language that fish were to be 

 accorded "equitable treatment" with other uses of the hydrosystem. Fish were to be provided 

 streamflows of adequate quality and quantity at and between the federal dams. The time for study 

 was over, the Council was to rely on the best available information, and when faced with uncertainty 

 was to rely heavily on the recommendations of the region's fishery agencies and tribes. The Council 

 was to develop a fish restoration plan, then develop a regional energy plan to fit. Fish restoration 

 v^ould not be subject to a cost-benefit test, but restoration measures must be the "least-cost" way to 

 achieve the same sound biological objective. Fish restoration efforts were to be consistent with the 

 treaty-reserved rights of the region's Indian tribes. 



None of the above happened. 



Consequently, 13 years into the Act, things are far worse than they were at its passage. Snake River 

 salmon, which provided the impetus for fish proteaion provisions of the Act, are threatened with 

 extinction; all have been listed under the Endangered Species Aa. 



