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Ms. Cantwell. Thank you, Madam Chair, for recognizing me 

 and for holding this hearing today. I applaud your leadership in 

 this issue and working here with my colleagues to really try to re- 

 solve some of the very tough issues relating to this issue. 



It is interesting because some of our same panelists appeared out 

 in Portland almost a year ago when Congresswoman Furse and 

 Congresswoman Unsoeld encouraged the chairman to hold a hear- 

 ing on this very same issue, and while I think that we have made 

 some progress in dialog and coordination, I think that the problem 

 has grown much more complicated and larger as we have gotten 

 more organized. 



Anyway I would like to direct my questions to Dr. Bevan and 

 perhaps get Mr. Bottiger to continue to elaborate on his testimony. 

 Really my questions come as your recommendations from the Re- 

 covery Team on this salmon oversight committee that would be 

 within NMFS. 



As I read it, you are making several recommendations but the 

 Team would be an independent five-member oversight committee 

 and be formed to fill critical decisionmaking void that we are all 

 talking about here. 



As I read your recommendations they would be working with all 

 interested parties to ensure conformance with goals and objectives 

 of the recovery plan to make certain that relevant permits and bio- 

 logical opinions issued by NMFS are consistent and to resolve juris- 

 dictional disputes, provide oversight for recovery plan implementa- 

 tion and advise the National Marine Services when changes are re- 

 quired in the recovery plan and then coordinate the scientific 

 subgroups. 



Dr. Bevan, is this oversight committee making this recommenda- 

 tion with real teeth, i.e., are we making a recommendation that 

 this committee in coordination with NMFS have the real power-- 

 I mean when you start talking about relevant permits and biologi- 

 cal opinions and conformance with goals and objectives I guess I 

 am coming from my State experience of two and a half years in de- 

 signing the Growth Management Act and the hearings board proc- 

 ess and exactly how you put teeth into a planning process. 



Are we describing this with real intent for this committee to have 

 teeth or are we talking about just a coordinated advisory role and 

 new leg or arm within NMFS? 



Mr. Bevan. I think my answer to that is that we think the teeth 

 and the power of these decisions ought to rest with the Federal 

 agency, the National Marine Fisheries Service. And I don't know 

 a kinder way to say this, the Team views that National Marine 

 Fisheries Service needs some independent advice in making those 

 decisions. 



This would be an advisory committee, not a committee making 

 decisions. It would try to use some of the existing committees that 

 are in existence. As an example of how things might work, I think 

 I can use the recent what I might call ruckus on the river as to 

 what is the importance of gas bubble disease, nitrogen super-satu- 

 ration. 



There is vast disagreement on that question from a number of 

 different agencies, both Federal, State and tribal and the National 



