Editorial Archive

• May 6, 2008: A new federal plan, the same old failure. 
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• May 2, 2008: Connect the dots to save orcas, salmon. Recent reports of the dramatic declines in West Coast salmon populations make this connection between the mighty Columbia and Snake rivers and our endangered orcas all the more crucial to examine.
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• April 15, 2008: The Trouble With Salmon. The federal government’s decision to shut down commercial salmon fishing from the California coast to north-central Oregon is a blow to local fishermen and the coastal economy.
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• April 13, 2008: Save the salmon. Whether you like your chinook grilled or poached, or even if you have no taste for salmon, last week's vote to ban salmon fishing off the California and Oregon coasts is the exclamation point on an unmitigated disaster.
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• April 12, 2008: Salmon numbers wane as dollar numbers grow. 
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• April 10, 2008: Our View: Feds' plans won't help save Idaho's struggling salmon. 
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• April 10, 2008: Wild Salmon: Let science rule. 
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• February 7, 2008: THE OREGONIAN: Salmon issues impact Northwest presidential race. 
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• February 6, 2008: SEATTLE TIMES: Killing sea lions will not save Columbia River salmon. 
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• January 11, 2008: DAILY ASTORIAN: Salmon can't live on shallow symbolism . 
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• December 19, 2007: THE OREGONIAN: Time's running out on the Columbia. 
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• December 16, 2007: SEATTLE P-I - Salmon: Faster Learners. 
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• November 5, 2007: DAILY ASTORIAN: Salmon fight will grow more difficult. 
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• November 3, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: White House continues to put dams ahead of salmon recovery. 
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• September 23, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: One powerful voice can reshape the salmon debate. 
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• September 17, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: Science, not prejudice, should be basis of policy for four Lower Snake River dams. 
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• September 12, 2007: SEATTLE P-I: Craig's parting shot hurts NW salmon. 
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• September 8, 2007: EUGENE REGISTER-GUARD: Another flawed fish plan: Latest version fails to consider major dam changes. 
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• September 4, 2007: SEATTLE TIMES: Our lawmakers can help hatch a vibrant future for salmon . 
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• August 31, 2007: SEATTLE PI: Sen. Craig no friend to 'greens' in NW . 
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• July 22, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: The case for breaching is stronger than ever. 
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• June 24, 2007: THE OREGONIAN: Left in the dark on salmon. The people of the Northwest need to see and understand every tough choice pitting fish against Bonneville power
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• June 24, 2007: EUGENE REGISTER-GUARD: Heed Redden's warning. 
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• June 15, 2007: SEATTLE P-I: Salmon And Owls - It's about habitat. 
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• June 7, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: To extol the value of dams is to disregard credible information. 
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• May 27, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: Dams still block sensible salmon policy. 
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• May 25, 2007: EUGENE REGISTER-GUARD: Another flawed plan. 
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• May 20, 2007: IDAHO FALLS POST-REGISTER: One view from Lewiston. 
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• May 16, 2007: SPOKANE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW: Facts over furor. 
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• May 2, 2007: LEWISTON MORNING TRIBUNE - How long will Congress keep rivers in view?. 
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• April 19, 2007: SALT LAKE TRIBUNE: Attack on Endangered Species Act outrageous. 
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• April 15, 2007: SEATTLE P-I: Soon we'll have more salmon in our wallets than in our rivers. 
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• April 14, 2007: NEW YORK TIMES: Courts and Greens. 
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• April 13, 2007: EUGENE REGISTER-GUARD: The breaching option. 
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• April 12, 2007: DAILY ASTORIAN: Truth Wins. 
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• April 11, 2007: THE OREGONIAN: Feds can't wriggle off the hook on salmon. 
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• April 11, 2007: SEATTLE P-I: Dam Science. 
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• April 11, 2007: VANCOUVER COLUMBIAN: Saving Salmon. 
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• April 10, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: We Need More Answers to Help Salmon. 
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• April 10, 2007: IDAHO MOUNTAIN EXPRESS: Big win for salmon. 
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• April 2, 2007: DAILY ASTORIAN: Even in discredited retreat, Bush is eager to shred Endangered Species Act. 
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• March 21, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: No need to fear salmon studies. 
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• March 9, 2007: NEWPORT NEWS-TIMES: Salmon Stability. 
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• March 8, 2007: THE OREGONIAN: Echoes of Celilo speak volumes today. 
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• February 7, 2007: LEWISTON MORNING TRIBUNE: Seek expertise on Snake River dams and fish. 
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• February 6, 2007: DAILY ASTORIAN: Redden is courage; Craig is ignorance. 
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• January 30, 2007: SEATTLE PI: Snake River Dams: Invest in science . P-I Editorial: Science, economics and the environment could come together in healthier ways along the lower Snake River. As officials try to plot healthier futures for salmon, new federal studies could provide valuable guidance.
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• January 26, 2007: SEATTLE TIMES: Good Science Counts. 
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• January 12, 2007: IDAHO STATESMAN: Breaching debate moves to mainstream. 
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• January 10, 2007: EUGENE REGISTER-GUARD: Help Fishing Industry. 
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• December 19, 2006: SPOKANE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW: Salmon solution needed. 
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• November 27, 2006: SEATTLE PI: Beyond breaching. 
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• November 26, 2006: IDAHO STATESMAN: Congress needs to rethink salmon recovery. 
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• November 26, 2006: LEWISTON TRIBUNE: Ask nation's science arbiter to settle fish debate. 
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• November 25, 2006: LEWISTON TRIBUNE: Appealing to a mythical Idaho unanimity on fish. 
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• November 22, 2006: IDAHO FALLS POST-REGISTER: Dams Don't Add Up. 
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• November 20, 2006: EUGENE REGISTER-GUARD: The dam question. 
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• October 31, 2006: CHARLESTON (WV) GAZETTE: Just follow the law. 
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• October 16, 2006: DAILY ASTORIAN: It's Time to Remove the Snake's Dams. Future generations won’t judge us on the price of our electricity
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• October 12, 2006: VICTORIA (TX) ADVOCATE: Upholding Law is Judges' Job. 
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• October 9, 2006: LAS VEGAS SUN: Nature Under Siege. Rulings show federal judges oppose Bush administration's environmental policies
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• October 9, 2006: DAILY ASTORIAN: Courts balance a radical presidency. Bush administration ignores constitutional obligation to enforce all laws
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• September 8, 2006: IDAHO STATESMAN: Salmon Returns Show Need for Breaching. 
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• August 29, 2006: IDAHO STATESMAN: Act Now to Save the Sockeye of Redfish Lake. 
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• July 18, 2006: TWIN FALLS TIMES-NEWS: Idaho can have fish, farms and water. By Matt Yost, ISSU
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• June 23, 2006: Idaho Statesman: Pacific Coast, Idaho Groups United in Fight for Salmon Recovery. By Glen Spain (PCFFA) and Matt Yost (ISSU)
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• June 23, 2006: Idaho Mountain Express: Lifeline for Sockeye. The big red namesake salmon of Idaho's popular Redfish Lake, the sockeye, is alive today largely because of the persistence of devoted conservationists who refuse to allow others in the human species to kill the fish. Now the Idaho sockeye's tenuous hold on life is hanging in the balance again.
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• June 23, 2006: Idaho Statesman: Time is Running Out to Muster the Will to Save Idaho’s Wild Salmon. By Don Chapman
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• June 6, 2006: Idaho Statesman: Official Dishonesty Has Subverted Salmon Recovery. by Roy Heberger, retired Idaho Fish & Wildlife biologist.
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• June 3, 2006: Washington Post: A fishy policy. You'd think the Bush administration would have learned its lesson with James Hansen and global warming. Apparently not. Mr. Hansen, you may recall, is the NASA scientist who was muzzled -- by a 24-year-old résumé falsifier, no less -- in his efforts to warn about the dangers of climate change. Mr. Hansen, it turned out, wasn't alone: Other employees working on that issue at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have been chastised for speaking out and answering media questions.
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• May 26, 2006: Idaho Mountain Express: Salmon got short shrift - again. In the continuing struggle to rescue salmon from the fate of other abused species, U.S. District Judge James Redden has shown a remarkable and commendable tenacity in the face of political and bureaucratic smokescreens.
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• May 19, 2006: Seattle Post Intelligencer: Don't take the bait on Northwest salmon. When it came to hot-button topics such as global warming or vanishing Northwest salmon, candidate George Bush in 2000 pledged to heed "sound science" instead of environmental alarmism.
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• May 16, 2006: The Daily Astorian: What's behind the late salmon run?. We don’t know This year’s odd spring Chinook salmon run is finally on its way to a probable happy ending, with the count at Bonneville climbing well above 60,000 last week. With daily counts sometimes surging past 7,000 recently, it’s beginning to seem the pre-season forecast of 88,000 may not be out of reach.
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• April 30, 2006: The Idaho Statesman: Saving Salmon Requires Bold Leadership. On Thursday, the chinook salmon run finally made its first appearance at Lower Granite Dam outside Lewiston. The day's total: one fish. One. Remember that number when politicians or federal officials try to argue that the Northwest's salmon are rebounding. Salmon face a grim 2006 and an uncertain future. Saving the salmon will require bold leadership and regional cooperation — and a willingness to face the facts that these remarkable, iconic fish remain in jeopardy.
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• April 5, 2006: SEATTLE P-I: Ocean salmon recovery is all about habitat. By Billy Frank, chairman of the NW Indian Fisheries Commission
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• March 23, 2006: The Daily Astorian: It's High Time That We Raise a Ruckus. Fishermen's Rally 3/06
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• March 7, 2006: The Daily Astorian: Klamath Provides Example for Snake. Mismanagement of the Klamath River has been big news since 2002, when low flows caused 70,000 adult Chinook salmon to rot on the river's banks. Now, with regulators considering a fishing ban for 700 miles of the Oregon and California coast, it will be fishing boats and local economies that rot.
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• February 3, 2006: Idaho Falls Post Register: Dams or fish? Idahoans choose fish. Idaho’s political leadership just got new instructions. A new poll shows voters would support removing four lower Snake River dams to save salmon, provided people and communities are protected, writes Bill Sedivy, Executive Director of Idaho Rivers United.
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• February 2, 2006: Seattle Post Intelligencer: Salmon Plan: Phony as a Lure. The Bush administration's latest plan for saving salmon looks good. Beneath the surface, it's as dangerously phony as a fishing lure.
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• December 15, 2005: The Oregonian: Spill more water for Columbia salmon . Judge Redden should order more controversial, costly releases of water, and press for stronger salmon recovery
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• November 30, 2005: Washington Post: Zeroing Out the Messenger. Portland, OR. -- In a surgical strike from Capitol Hill, Sen. Larry E. Craig (R-Idaho) has eliminated a little-known agency that counts endangered fish in the Columbia River.
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• October 12, 2005: The Oregonian: It's Do or Die for Salmon. A U.S. district judge lays out the choices: Either the federal government produces a true recovery plan, or wild salmon could be lost.
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• October 5, 2005: The Seatle Times: Judge Right to Demand New Salmon Plan. Last spring, a federal judge in Portland grumpily told the agencies that run the Columbia River hydro system to rethink their plan for salmon restoration. Monday, he lost patience and told them to rewrite it.
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• September 29, 2005: The Oregonian: Snake River Dam Spills. An Op-Ed by Board members of NSIA supporting the FPC and the Spills that occured the summer of 2005.
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• August 21, 2005: The Seattle Times: Put Science Over Fishy Politics. Washington Sen. Patty Murray needs to rescue the Fish Passage Center, which provides independent analysis of salmon migration and survival on the Columbia and Snake rivers.
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• August 17, 2005: HIGH COUNTRY NEWS: Dam breaching gets surprise endorsement. When Don Chapman, a biologist and longtime consultant for the hydro industry in the Pacific Northwest, suddenly said four dams in Washington needed to be breached to save Idaho's salmon, it shook the region.
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• July 12, 2005: The Idaho Statesman: Our View: Let's keep limited salmon season in perspective. Salmon fishing returned, quietly, to the upper Salmon River last weekend, after a 27-year absence.
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• July 12, 2005: The Idaho Statesman: Our View: Let's keep limited salmon season in perspective. Salmon fishing returned, quietly, to the upper Salmon River last weekend, after a 27-year absence.
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• June 29, 2005: Seattle Post Intelligencer: Salmon: Protect the Evidence. 
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• June 23, 2005: Seattle Post Intelligencer: Salmon Policy: Fish or cut Dams. For the Seattle area as well as the rest of the Northwest, a federal ruling on salmon issues serves as another reminder that we have to get our acts together on genuinely protecting fish.
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• June 16, 2005: Seattle Post Intelligencer: Judge Right to Spill Water. It's good that a federal judge is willing to make tough calls about the operation of Columbia River system dams. Somebody has to. U.S. District Judge James Redden has ordered summer water spills to help salmon pass safely through dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers. He said the dams' normal operations "strongly contribute to the endangerment" of protected fish runs.
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• May 31, 2005: Eugene Register Guard:A win for salmon: Judge rejects government's recovery plan . A federal judge in Oregon has rightly rejected the Bush administration's pricey pretense of a plan for protecting endangered salmon species in the Pacific Northwest. The ruling marks the third time that the courts have swatted plans back to the National Marine Fisheries Service. Now, the administration should summon the science and common sense necessary to develop a plan that meets its obligations under the Endangered Species Act.
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• May 28, 2005: The Idaho Statesman: Our View: Judge Made the Right Call in Rejecting Feds' Fish Plan. The feds didn't just lose in court Thursday. Their faulty plan for saving Idaho salmon was hammered.
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• April 24, 2005: Seattle Post Intelligencer: Salmon Tell Us Good Times Are Over. 
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• April 22, 2005: The Oregonian: The Missing Salmon. On this Earth Day, the most pressing environmental question in the Northwest is whether Columbia River spring salmon are just running late, or whether tens of thousands of fish are coming back at all.
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• December 30, 2004: Los Angeles Times: Shred the Roadmap to Salmon Extinction . Wild salmon are drifting toward extinction in the northern Rocky Mountains. Last month, the Bush administration delivered a decision that will be the death blow, if it stands: four obsolete dams on the Snake River in eastern Washington state will not be dismantled.
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• December 9, 2004: New federal salmon plan abandons recovery By Phil Jensen. Most Americans are familiar with Black Tuesday, the infamous day the stock market crashed in 1929. It was a day of incredible sadness, when many lives and businesses were ruined. For salmon advocates, we now have its rival: Extinction Tuesday, the day the federal government took an about-face on Pacific salmon and steelhead and the thousands of businesses and lives that depend upon them.
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• December 6, 2004: New York Times: New Risks For Salmon. The Bush administration has dropped any pretense of providing serious long-term protection for endangered salmon species in the Pacific Northwest. Last Tuesday, the administration proposed to roll back restrictions on commercial development across millions of acres in California north to the Canadian border that had been designated four years ago as "critical habitat" essential to salmon recovery. The next day, the administration ruled out demolishing four dams on the lower Snake River - even as a last resort to save the fish.
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• December 2, 2004: Eugene Register Guard: Bush vs. salmon: Two new moves undermine salmon recovery. A Register-Guard Editorial:  Tuesday was a lousy day for wild salmon - and for those who treasure the iconic fish that are integral to the identity of the Northwest. Two separate actions by the Bush administration severely weakened federal protections for salmon species whose populations have been depleted for decades by development, logging, fishing, farming, pollution and dam construction.
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• December 2, 2004: San Francisco Chronicle: Slow-fading Salmon. RESTORING SALMON and steelhead trout runs in West Coast rivers is a monumental challenge. Dams, farming, logging and population growth all contribute to declines that border on extinction. What will it take to fill streams again with these silvery fish, symbols of nature and a clean, thriving environment? There are lots of answers, but don't expect any good ones from the Bush administration. Salmon and steelhead are no match for the White House's political calculations.
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• December 2, 2004: Idaho States Journal: Plan to remove critical habitat from protective lists is a bad idea. Journal Views: The status quo is apparently good enough for the Bush administration, at least when salmon restoration is at issue. This week, the administration announced a plan to abandon critical habitat designation for salmon in about 80 percent of the Northwest's potential salmon-bearing streams and half of prospective habitat in northern California in favor of focusing protection on waters salmon already inhabit.
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• December 2, 2004: Idaho Statesman: Flip-flop on salmon habitat raises lots of questions. Our View: The federal government is recommending a huge change in how it would protect rivers for salmon and steelhead. That means the feds have some explaining to do — a job made more difficult considering their recent, poor record on salmon issues. With a single rule proposed Tuesday, the government now asserts that tens of thousands of miles of Western rivers are no longer critical for scarce salmon and steelhead. The turnabout is stunning.
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• December 2, 2004: Seattle Post-Intelligencer Editorial: It's the public's turn now. The federal government ought to revive salmon runs in the Northwest. But the Bush administration has taken two giant steps toward a very different goal: keeping enough threatened fish to avoid extinction. At the same time, federal officials promised that a whole range of laws, treaties and other commitments bind them to promote salmon recovery.
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• October 9, 2004: New York Times: Salmon and Science. More than a dozen species of salmon in the Columbia and Snake River basins are at risk of extinction. One would think that these fish - culturally significant to Indian tribes and commercially valuable to a large regional fishing industry - could get a break. But they can't. A recovery plan devised by the Clinton administration was tossed out in 2003 by a federal judge who found its recommendations too speculative and ordered the Bush administration to draw up a better one. The Bush plan may be worse.
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• September 18, 2004: The Oregonian: Preserving Dams, Restoring Salmon. In their new salmon recovery plan, federal fisheries officials conclude that the Columbia and Snake river dams are an immutable part of the Northwest landscape. At least for the near future, that's true.
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• September 13, 2004: Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Word Games Over Salmon. It's not nice to try to fool a judge about Mother Nature. It may not be smart, either. Federal authorities have updated a portion of their plans for salmon recovery. They make a reasonable case that a new draft document, known as a biological opinion, might be part of a solution for threatened and endangered fish in the Columbia and Snake rivers. The proposals include promising steps, especially installing advanced bypasses to help salmon avoid dam turbines.
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• September 12, 2004: Idaho Statesman: Feds place Idaho fish and water in jeopardy. The federal government on Thursday released a 10-year salmon recovery plan that does plenty to preserve dams and not enough to save Idaho salmon from them. The feds say dams will not wipe out salmon or steelhead populations. The plan makes the wild assertion that man-made dams are part of the natural environment fish must navigate on their way to and from the Pacific Ocean. The feds reject, prematurely, the idea of breaching four dams on the lower Snake River: Ice Harbor, Lower Granite, Lower Monumental and Little Goose.
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• September 2, 2004: Vancouver Columbian - In Our View: Dams Harm Fish ... even if mitigation efforts, good ocean conditions are helping salmon, steelhead. Federal salmon managers declared Tuesday that the operation of dams on the Columbia and Snake Rivers does not jeopardize fish. And they said that because these dams were in place before the Endangered Species Act was passed, the dams are essentially permanent fixtures of the landscape that must (and can) be worked around. Officials aren't asking the right question, from our perspective. The right question is, does the existence of dams on these rivers harm fish and play a detrimental role in their ultimate survival?
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• August 18, 2004: Vancouver Columbian: Court Helps Fish Vancouver Columbian In Our View: Court Helps Fish. Because salmon often turn into river-kill when pushed through turbines, spill water is thought to be one of our greatest countermeasures against endangered and threatened fish runs on dammed rivers. That is why Friday's decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals is so encouraging. It backed a lower court decision that requires continued water release at dams on the Columbia and Snake Rivers to aid migrating salmon.
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• March 27, 2004: Fish Kill or Spill? Beware of Sunny March Madness. The Vancouver Columbian: "Someone must have done a rain dance. Whoever that was, thanks. But who can complain about the recent sunny weather you ask? Fish....Spillways are an excellent dam mitigator and therefore should have constant support of Northwesterners..."
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• November 8, 2003: James Norton Op-Ed in the Idaho Statesman.  Removal of Snake River dams makes ecological and economic sense
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• October 30, 2003: Idaho Falls Post-Register. Guest opinion by Idaho Rivers United board member Tom Stuart.
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• October 29, 2003: Idaho Falls Post-Register Editorial: A Warning For Irrigators. Recently, this page questioned the timing of environmental organizations contemplating lawsuits to take water from the upper Snake River's drought-stricken farms to help salmon and steelhead migrate to the Pacific. Fortunately, those groups have put their suits on hold and are negotiating with Idaho irrigators under the auspices of Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho. But irrigators got a warning of sorts themselves. Recently, 118 members of Congress signed a letter to President Bush calling for a salmon-recovery program that includes removal of the lower Snake River dams along with other habitat- and dam-modification measures.
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• October 14, 2003: New York Times Editorial: Saving Salmon. A coalition of environmental groups, an Indian tribe, government agencies and a power company recently announced an agreement that could help save wild Atlantic salmon, which are now on the endangered species list. Two dams on Maine's Penobscot River will be torn down and a third decommissioned, opening up more than 500 miles of river for fish returning to spawn. In exchange, PPL, the power company, will receive cash and the right to increase power generation at other dams that pose less threat to fish migration.
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• October 3, 2003: New York Times Editorial.  Saving Salmon
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• September 9, 2003: Pocatello Idaho State Journal Editorial: Environmentalists, water users need to confer peacefully over river flows. Idaho's environmental lobby and its water users have a chance to tackle a tough problem diplomatically. Unfortunately, the most recent debate over water flows for downstream salmon and steelhead migration is off to a tough start. And this time, the environmentalists are proving to be most reasonable.
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• August 22, 2003: Philadelphia Inquirer Editorial - Trick photography: Bush's outdoorsy photo-ops can't hide a sorry truth.. Like other vacationers, President Bush spends August collecting snapshots of himself in America's scenic wilds. In the last two weeks, he's traveled to Arizona, California, Oregon and Washington, touting environmental policy. He deplored the devastation of wildfire in Arizona and Oregon. He encountered a rattlesnake while restoring roads at the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area (familiar as setting for the television show M*A*S*H). Today, he'll extol the comeback of wild salmon in Washington.
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• August 20, 2003: The Bellingham Herald: ANOTHER VIEW: Bush is no friend to salmon. By Michael Mcrory, Guest Columnist. In 2000, George W. Bush made a promise to the region that, if elected, he would protect and restore our region's valuable salmon runs. Nevertheless, over the past 2 1/2 years, the president has consistently failed to honor these commitments. Even worse, this month his spokespeople have begun to suggest that the administration's policies, rather than improved ocean conditions, are somehow responsible for the increased salmon returns in the last several years.
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• June 9, 2003: Boston Globe Editorial: Re-evaluating Dams. [Bush's] decision should also give a boost to a bill in Congress that would give that body's approval to Snake River dam breachings if that is the course decided upon by the US Army Corps of Engineers. The bill calls for studies on alternatives to the power produced by the Snake dams (about 4 percent of the region's total, versus the 25 percent provided by the Columbia River dams), and to the barge access the dams provide for inland grain producers. Congress should pass the legislation in spite of President Bush's opposition to removing the Snake dams.
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