370 



drawdown. This also would be a good way for the Secretary to practice what he preaches about his 

 trust resp)onsibiUties to tribes who've had their treaty-reserved fishing rights rendered virtuaUy 

 worthless to pay Bonneville's nuclear power plant gambling debts and keep its pork barrel 

 customers' rates below the cost of providing them energy from the FCRPS. In the longer term, 

 renegotiation of the Canadian entitlement should have explicit fish-protection strings attached. 



57 Are existing institutions and institutional arrangements at the state and federal level adequate to 

 implement salmon recovery plans? What improvements should be made to ensure better regional 

 coordination among the many federal, state, tribal and private entities that must work together to 

 achieve salmon restoration? In particular, the following alternatives have been suggested for better 

 implementing salmon restoration plans. Please comment on each: 



a] Providing additional public involvement in existing federal processes, including review of 

 annual operations; 



Annual negotiations under the Pacific Northwest Coordination Agreement are closed to the public 

 and to state, federal and tribal fisheries agencies. The President and/or the Congress should put a 

 stop to this immediately. The National Marine Fisheries Service's consultations under the 

 Endangered Species Act are closed to the public and to state, federal and tribal fisheries agencies. 

 Ditto. '.' 



Bonneville has a general tendency to provide for expansive but pro forma public involvement in its 

 decision making, but is notorious for cutting the real deals with its customers and ideological fellow 

 travelers outside of public view. The President and/or the Congress should put a stop to this 

 practice. 



b] Changing the membership, structure, or authorities of the Council: 



The Council suffers most from a lack of accountability to the intent and standards of the Northwest 

 Power Aa. Consequendy, it failed to meet the former, and for the most pan ignored the latter. It is 

 inexcusable that the Council was allowed to dither away for more than a decade before developing a 

 pusillanimous fish restoration plan that Bonneville, the Corps and National Marine Fisheries Service 

 ignore. Given the transfer of large sums of money to the states, the prospect of continuing 

 congressional oversight, directly and through the Government Accounting Office, would spur NW 

 governors to appoint and hold accountable council members who take the law and its standards more 

 seriously than the understandable desire to be buddies with BPNUCC. 



Bonneville and the Corps will never fuUy and timely implement the Council's program so long as 

 they can get away with treating it as discretionary and can therefore count on their pork barrel 

 constituents for political cover. If Congress is serious about bringing these agencies into line with 

 original project authorizations and the Northwest Power A«, it will have to give the Council 



