Lawmakers Ask for Stronger Salmon Recovery Measures

The National Marine Fisheries Service issued a draft biological opinion last month stating that hydropower dams on the river will not threaten endangered salmon and steelhead populations, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Now 102 lawmakers have sent a letter to President Bush requesting that the draft be rewritten. Led by Reps. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), Thomas Petri (R-Wis.) and Christopher Shays (R-Conn.), the letter asserts that the current draft "does not ensure self-sustaining, harvestable populations, by relying on legal technicalities to justify not having to fully mitigate for the operation of the hydropower system." The lawmakers ask that the draft be rewritten in a way that is "biologically, legally, and fiscally defensible" and that recognizes "the Federal Government's numerous legal and tribal treaty obligations to recover salmon and take adequate action to leave the river and fish in better shape than before."
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