APPENDIX 2 -- REVISED ALTERNATIVES AND COMMENTARY 



Revised Approach No. 1: 

 No Legislative Change; Interagency Agreement 



Summary : The Northwest Power Planning Council would convene a forum of all the 

 sovereign entities in the Basin to reconcile conflicts in existing fish and wildlife plans and 

 programs, provide for dispute resolution of differences, and coordinate implementation of a 

 reconciled plan. 



Analysis: The Council can act immediately to identify disagreements among the various 

 regional fish and wildlife plans and convene a dispute resolution process. To begin, the Council 

 should sponsor an analysis of the existing plans to clearly identify points of agreement and 

 points of disagreement. For points of agreement, the Council should convene the sovereigns 

 (meaning single representatives of each involved state, tribe and federal agency) to agree on an 

 implementation plan with funding allocations. 



A dispute resolution mechanism is possible if the federal operating agencies agree to 

 participate. An executive order could provide the authority and mandate for participation. 

 Similarly, involved tribes and state agencies can agree on terms for participation through a 

 memorandum of agreement. The dispute resolution process would be triggered by disagreement 

 about implementation of the plans. This process would incorporate review and consultation at 

 both the technical and the policy levels. All appropriate sovereign parties could be represented if 

 they wish to be. Disputes that continue beyond the convened representatives of the parties 

 would face some "decision-forcing" mechanism, as yet to be determined. 



The role of the Council's planning process should be to reconcile differing goals and 

 objectives among the sovereign authorities. A regional plan should provide the structure to 

 balance competing local fish and wildlife objectives. The plan should be general, however, 

 leaving the details of local management to subbasin-based watershed planning. 



Commentary : Group members felt that this alternative should focus on implementation, 

 that developing an alternative planning process isn't necessary. Much of the discussion about 

 the current problem focused on the lack of implementation of the Council's plan and the sense 

 that federal agencies do not feel accountable for implementing the Council's plan. Yet federal 

 officials feel caught by conflicts between the Council plan, the Biological Opinion and other 

 plans, and even by conflicts within the Council plan itself 



At the same time, several group members pointed out the significant degree of common 

 approaches among the Council's program, the draft recovery plan and the tribal restoration plan. 

 The disagreements are chiefly confined to a few -- but very significant -- issues in hydro 

 operations. Group members discussed alternatives for resolving these disputes, including: 



• the FERC model (such as that used on the mid-Columbia). While the group saw appeal 

 in having a judge as the last alternative for resolving a dispute, there was general concern 



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