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COLUMBIA RIVER INTER-TRIBAL FISH COMMISSION 



Responses to questions posed in the 



House Natural Resource Committee's BPA Task Force Letter 



Dated August II, 1993 



1. Is the NPPC's Strategy for Salmon an appropriate and sufficieru framework for salmon 

 recovery efforts in the Columbia Basin? What are the strengths and -weaknesses of the 

 Strategy for Salmon ? 



Unfortunately, the Strategy for Salmon is neither an appropriate nor sufficient framework 

 for salmon recovery efforts. Fundamentally, salmon recovery depends on the cooperation of 

 state, federal and tribal fishery managers. However, the relationship between the fishery 

 managers and the Council and its staff is largely dysfunctional. At the state level, significant 

 disagreements between the state fish and game agency, that state's Council members, and the 

 Council as a whole are often associated with seemingly minor fish management decisions. 

 Although the condition varies from state to state, as a practical matter, state fish and game 

 agencies have become disenfranchised from the Council and its staff 



With regard to the tribes, the Council has yet to come to grips with the treaty 

 commitments the United States made to the tribes. It has been extremely awkward, expensive, 

 and time consuming for the tribes to be forced to seek the consent of the Council before 

 proceeding with each incremental phase of a salmon mitigation project funded under the 

 Northwest Power Act. 



When Congress enacted the Northwest Power Act, it expected that the Council would 

 defer to the expertise of the fish and wildlife agencies and tribes and not become a super fish 

 and wildlife agency.' In fact, the Act explicitly requires that the Council give "due weight to 

 the recommendations, expertise, and legal rights and responsibilities of the federal and the 

 regions state fish and wildlife agencies and appropriate Indian tribes." 16 U.S.C. §839b(h)(7). 

 However, absent meaningful dialogue between the Council and the governmental agencies 

 charged with managing the salmon resource, the deferential relationship Congress envisioned in 

 the Northwest Power Act has broken down. 



The Council attempted to realign itself with the fish and wildlife managers in the Strategy 

 for Salmon by limiting its involvement in project-by-project administrative decision making. 

 Thus, the Council called for expansion of the Implementation Planning Process (IPP), which is 

 an agreement between BPA and the fish and wildlife managers (through CBFWA) allowing 

 limited tribal and agency involvement in BPA's processes for prioritizing and selecting fish and 

 wildlife projects for funding under the Act. Yet, as several witnesses testified at the Boise field 

 hearing, the IPP is broken and BPA's commitment to effectively fund and implement the 



' See 126 Cong. Rec. H10683 (daily ed. Nov. 17, 1980) (remarks of Rep. Dingell). 



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