Dams Ruin Salmon...

Another year of poor returns of fall Chinook to the Columbia and Snake River Basin threatens to shorten fishing seasons for Washington and northern Oregon fishermen in 2007, increasing economic hardship for Pacific Northwest communities still reeling from last year's fisheries disaster on the Klamath River.

Without healthy fish runs in the Columbia and Snake Rivers locals will lose thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in economic activity. Local tribal leaders claimed that failed federal policies keep leading to fisheries disasters along the entire West Coast, causing widespread economic hardship and social problems. Shortened seasons have already cost fishing families a lot.

The NOAA Fisheries plan for the Columbia River Basin largely ignored the detrimental impacts of the federal hydro system on wild salmon and steelhead and failed to ensure healthy populations of wild fish as required under the Endangered Species Act. This flawed federal plan has been widely criticized by scientists, fishermen, businesses and conservation groups in the affected areas. There are solutions that would recover Columbia and Snake River salmon population and runs, including removing the four dams on the lower Snake River and operating all other dams to allow safe passage of up and down stream migrating salmon and steelhead, claimed local fishermen.

During public sessions schedule in Mid April commercial fishermen hope to send a message to regional leaders and elected officials that continually declining fishing seasons are not an option for the thousands of families, tribal members, and fishing communities on the West Coast who depend on salmon for their livelihoods.