136 





The Act also repeatedly emphasizes the need for broad public participation in 

 Council activities. For example, Section 4.(h)(2), which deals with the Council's 

 process in developing the fish and wildlife program, calls on the Council to request, in 

 writing, from the federal and state fish and wildlife agencies, and from relevant Indian 

 tribes, recommendations for measures to protect, mitigate and enhance fish and wildlife 

 and related spawning grounds and habitat. The Act also calls on us to involve the 

 public in our decision-making. Section 2.(3) stipulates participation by both specific 

 groups (states, local governments, consumers, federal and state fish and wildlife 

 agencies, Indian tribes) and the general public. Section 4.(g)(l) directs us to establish a 

 "comprehensive" public involvement program to both inform the public and obtain 

 public views on Council activities. 



The Council oversees implementation of the fish and wildlife program. 

 Implementation largely is the responsibility of the Bonneville Power Administration, 

 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Reclamation and the Federal Energy 

 Regulatory Commission. We also depend on the federal and state fish and wildlife 

 agencies and Indian tribes. Funding for this work comes from Bonneville Power 

 Administration rates and, to a lesser extent, United States taxpayers. 



Coordination of restoration efforts 



Following directives in the Act, the Council prepared its first Columbia River 

 Basin Fish and Wildlife Program in 1982. The program was revised in 1984, 1987 and 

 1991-93. The Council completed amending the salmon and steelhead chapters of the 

 1987 program in September 1991. That part of the program is known as our Strategy 

 for Salmon. 



The Strategy for Salmon followed work that began in the Salmon Summit. The 

 Salmon Summit was convened in 1990 at the direction of U.S. Senator Mark Hatfield 

 (R-Oregon) to produce a management plan for Columbia River salmon in response to 

 Endangered Species Act petitions on five salmon runs. The Salmon Summit, which 

 included representatives of federal, state and tribal governments, and utilities, 

 disbanded in April 1991 without a regional salmon recovery plan, but with agreement 

 on certain short-term measures to aid salmon. The chief problem with the Salmon 

 Summit was that no one was in a position to make decisions. It is very difficult to get 

 30-plus organizations to agree on anything under those circumstances. 



In May 1991. at hearings of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator 

 Hatfield and the governors of Idaho, Montana. Oregon and Washington asked the 

 Council to take up where the Salmon Summit left off and pull together key regional 

 representatives from the fishery, power, irrigation and navigation communities to begin 

 the dialog necessary to address the status of these runs. At about the same time, the 



