Opinion

Sat., Nov. 8, 2025

By Tanya Riordan and Tom Soeldner

In a recent column for this paper, utility leaders Scott Simms and Chris Robinson highlighted the importance of the U.S.-Canada Columbia River Treaty for the entire Northwest. As advocates for imperiled salmon and steelhead, we agree the treaty is critical – but not for the same reasons they highlighted.

The Columbia-Snake River Basin was once among the world’s great salmon watersheds with annual adult returns of 16 million fish. Over the past several decades, however, we’ve lost four populations to extinction and 13 remain officially at-risk. Our river today is sick and getting sicker with water too hot for fish and toxic algae dangerous for fish, pets, and people alike. Dams and their reservoirs built in the basin over the past century are largely to blame.

A properly updated Columbia River Treaty can play a critical role in rebalancing how we manage the river for fish, energy and minimizing flood risk. Unfortunately, the Treaty “Agreement-In-Principle” announced by the U.S. and Canada in 2024 and the subsequent “Interim Agreements” have failed to achieve a sustainable balance. A truly modernized Treaty must help, not hurt, the health of this great river we all share.

While only 15% of the Columbia Basin is located in Canada, more than one third of the Columbia’s total water originates in snowy mountains north of the border. River flows are coordinated through a series of releases from Canadian dams built under the original 1964 Treaty. The timing of these releases is governed by this 60-plus-year-old agreement and has major impacts downstream in the U.S.

Two core principals must be included in a modernized Treaty to meet the challenges we face in the 21st century.

First, Ecosystem Function (the health of the river) must be added as a new Treaty purpose co-equal to power production and flood risk management. This would mean releasing enough water from Canadian Treaty dams beginning in early spring and coordinating these flows with U.S. dam operations to help speed juvenile salmon to the ocean and keep the river cool.

In December 2024 webinars, the Army Corps of Engineers explained that the recently adopted interim agreements may result in deeper, more harmful drawdowns in the Lake Roosevelt Reservoir behind Grand Coulee Dam. They also stated our nation’s ability to re-regulate flows coming out of Canada to serve downstream needs including for fish may be more limited than before.

As a next step while the U.S. and Canada continue Treaty negotiations, the Army Corps needs to undertake the review of flood risk management called for more than a decade ago in the Northwest’s official recommendation on the future of the Treaty. This review can identify when and where beneficial fish flows can be optimized by relaxing flood control when it isn’t needed in low and average water years. The review can also identify what infrastructure is vulnerable to flooding and where floodplains can be restored to help absorb flood waters and rebuild vital habitat for fish and wildlife. This can be a win-win for fish and people, especially given higher costs for Canadian flood control today than under the original Treaty. Our Northwest Congressional Delegation can make this happen by including funding for this essential study in the 2026 edition of the Water Resource Development Act.

The second core principle of a modernized Treaty must be improved governance. Treaty decision-making is currently done by Bonneville Power Administration and the Army Corps (in coordination with their Canadian counterparts). But there is no voice at this time for the ecosystem, which means the needs of fish and a healthy Columbia River always take a back seat. This omission can easily be corrected through a Presidential Executive Order that adds NOAA Fisheries to the “U.S. Entity.”

Since January 2025, Treaty negotiations with Canada have been paused. This gives the Northwest an opportunity to work with our congressional delegation to take steps to ensure a new modernized Columbia River Treaty supports not just power and flood control needs but also the river itself. As we move into a complex 21st century, it can’t be energy or fish: It must be both.

Tanya Riordan, of Spokane, is Policy and Advocacy Director for the Save Our wild Salmon Coalition (SOS). Tom Soeldner, of Spokane, is a retired clergyman and educator who helps to coordinate the One River, Ethics Matter project and volunteers with the Sierra Club’s Columbia River Team.

Spokesman-Review Opinion: Tanya Riordan and Tom Soeldner: The importance of the Columbia River Treaty for our communities, economy and environment

I was deeply troubled to see lobby groups attempting to mislead us about the impact dams are having on our wild salmon and steelhead populations. Thank you Josh Mills and Mike Leahy for setting the record straight in your recent letter (“Clean power and abundant salmon: Both are possible,” Nov. 13).

The last thing we need is a well-funded advertising campaign attempting to convince us that salmon are rebounding in the Snake River, when the experts– our region’s state and tribal fishery managers – say just the opposite is true. Wild salmon returns to the Snake River basin are at 0.1 to 2% of their historic abundance, and many runs are near extinction. Each summer, scientists log higher, harmful temperatures and more toxic algae blooms in the Snake River’s dam-created reservoirs – trends that are lethal to salmon.

Solving the salmon crisis in the Columbia Basin will take hard work. It will require thoughtful policies, focused attention and our community’s shared understanding about what’s at stake – not false narratives meant to mislead and obfuscate. Let’s get to work addressing the real issues at hand, based on solid data and good science. Only then can we make progress in ensuring that salmon and steelhead – iconic fish at the heart of our region’s identity – survive into the future.

Amy G. Mazur
Moscow

Spokesman-Review: Impact of dams on the salmon (Nov 17)

I want to thank Josh Mills and Mike Leahy for their thoughtful and accurate letter discussing the importance of keeping salmon recovery front and center while we scale up to meet our growing energy demands. (“Clean power and abundant salmon: Both are possible,” Nov. 13.)

So many of our public discussions these days are cast as an either-or – pitting one side (or issue) against another. That way of thinking is deeply harmful, keeping us from making real progress on our shared goals and values as a community. As the authors point out, we can advance both energy resiliency and salmon recovery if we’re honest, clear-eyed and thoughtful.

The Resilient Columbia Basin Agreement did just that, and the Trump administration’s decision to dismantle it is unfortunate. But we must continue to fight for the concepts embedded in that accord – a path forward that both protects and recovers our beloved wild salmon and steelhead while working to meet the growing energy demands of our region. I urge our regional leaders to continue to press for such an outcome.

Scott Putnam
Lewiston

Spokesman-Review: Keep fighting to protect our beloved salmon (Nov 15)

Thu., Nov. 13, 2025
By Josh Mills and Mike Leahy

Last June, the federal government turned its back on the Northwest when it unilaterally withdrew from the Resilient Columbia Basin Agreement, forged by the states of Washington and Oregon, four Columbia Basin Tribes, and community stakeholders – after extensive regional input. This agreement was an alternative to decades long lawsuits, and an important pathway forward to protect and recover wildlife, while meeting all the needs of impacted people and communities. After years of hard work, negotiation, and the collaborative agreements set forth in the RCBA were recklessly terminated, State, Tribal and NGO plaintiffs returned to court as the only remaining option to protect the fish that define this region – and request emergency measures to support their migration and survival.

Wild salmon and steelhead are woven into the region’s way of life, from opening day and the traditional family fishing trips to tribal traditions and the riverside communities that are home to small, successful guiding businesses. These spectacular fish connect Eastern Washington to the entire Northwest region, and they are recognized across the country as a national treasure. Yet they are in trouble. And we are running out of time to recover these endangered populations.

Meanwhile, we have another looming challenge on the horizon. The demand for clean, affordable and reliable energy is skyrocketing. The Northwest must have dramatically more power to propel the economy and ensure a prosperous future, as well as meet the energy needs that extreme and uncertain weather events will bring.

It may seem that those two goals – abundant salmon and steelhead runs and affordable, clean energy – are in conflict. They are not. Fisheries and energy experts agree: We can protect and recover our keystone species while also scaling up to meet our rapidly increasing energy demand.

To do so, we need a comprehensive solution that puts a fine focus on the Snake River, the largest tributary of the Columbia River, where four aging and costly dams are blocking 5,500 miles of pristine, cold, freshwater habitat and driving salmon and steelhead to extinction.

Let’s start with the dams. A heavily funded lobbying effort would have us believe that we are witnessing a rebound in fish returns. Snake River fishermen know this isn’t true for most salmon runs, and it’s best to rely on the federal, state and Tribal fishery experts, who are sounding the alarm. They concur that the four Snake River dams and their hot, stagnant, toxic reservoirs have cut off and degraded thousands of miles of once highly productive spawning, rearing and migratory habitat and are disastrous for cold-water fish–the largest source of human-caused fish mortality. In a 2022 report, NOAA Fisheries experts recommended recovery strategies including restoring and connecting habitat, improving hatcheries, and reintroducing fish to blocked areas – but acknowledged none can succeed if the dams aren’t addressed. We are losing these fish runs, and with them a robust recreational fishing economy bringing millions of dollars into Eastern Washington and rural communities throughout the entire Columbia/Snake River Basin.

Meeting future energy needs is also vitally important. Seismic shifts are underway as data centers proliferate and the electrification of our economy expands. From 2023 to 2028, the Pacific Northwest will see a load increase of 20%, and then 30% in the next decade. This is triple the prediction just a few years ago. How will we meet it? Certainly not with aging, costly infrastructure and run-of-river dams impacted by climate change. The Snake River dams produce less than 4% of the region’s energy. Less than 4%. You might as well set out for the channel in your dingy when the weather man is predicting hurricane force winds. The diminishing snowpack and ongoing drought spell on-going trouble for these aging run-of-river dams that produce only a marginal amount of power. This costly and limited power generation that is decreasing rapidly each year can be replaced and modernized with clean, affordable options as part of our region’s energy development.

We need to be cleareyed about how we’ll meet the region’s energy needs, the imperative to save its salmon and the comprehensive solution required to achieve both of these goals.

When it was announced in 2023, the RCBA provided that framework and a historic turning point. After decades of litigation and mediation to reach a collaborative solution, the region was finally on course toward restoring salmon and steelhead runs, investing in truly clean energy, honoring our nation’s promises to Northwest Tribes, and effectively planning and replacing important agricultural transportation and irrigation services. Considering the complexity of recovering an endangered species, the Agreement was the result of a truly exceptional effort, locally and regionally led, addressing everyone’s needs (fish, tribes, farmers, fisherman, rural businesses, communities) – and actually improving public services and regional economic opportunities.

But then the federal government threw it out.

It’s been disappointing to see this administration overrule all the progress made in the region in favor of returning to court. But we have no alternative but to ask the court to intervene if we want to meet the immediate survival needs of these fish. They need more than emergency measures. Now it’s up to us to support – and press – our leaders to keep working together to build new clean energy resources and rebuild abundant salmon.

Salmon and steelhead need a healthy, resilient river. And we need them. They are a national treasure, and we can’t let them disappear.

Josh Mills is a local fisherman and Mike Leahy is Senior Director of Wildlife, Hunting and Fishing Policy, with the National Wildlife Federation.

Spokesman-Review: Josh Mills and Mike Leahy: Clean power and abundant salmon – both are possible

Without one, they will keep getting sued.

October 31, 2025
By Marc Sullivan

Some of us have been fighting for salmon for more than three decades.

To understand the resolve of salmon advocates — and the frustration so many of us felt when the federal government recently reneged on a historic agreement, reigniting litigation — it’s helpful to review the legal history associated with protecting Columbia Basin salmon.

In a recent story about plaintiffs returning to court to protect Columbia Basin salmon, the Washington State Standard described the court battle as “long-running.” So true.

The initial shot was fired in 1991 after Snake River sockeye salmon became the first Columbia Basin salmonid to be listed as an endangered species under the Endangered Species Act. That listing requires federal agencies to ensure the protection and recovery of the fish.

Federal agencies involved with the federal dams in the Columbia Basin include the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (which operates dams on the lower Snake and lower Columbia rivers), the Bonneville Power Administration (which markets power from the dams), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (which issues rulings on whether fish protection and recovery plans comply with the Endangered Species Act).

Since 1992, they’ve put forth no fewer than eight plans for operating the hydropower system while ostensibly protecting threatened and endangered salmon and steelhead in the Columbia Basin. (By 1999, 12 more salmon and steelhead stocks had been listed under the Endangered Species Act.)

Over three decades of litigation, three different federal district judges have declared six different federal dam management plans illegal for their failure to protect salmon and steelhead. That includes every plan since 2000. The very first plan was invalidated in 1994 by U.S. District Judge Malcolm Marsh, who proclaimed that the “situation literally cries out for a major overhaul,” but found that the federal plan failed to deliver any such fundamental change.

Fast forward to 2005, when District Court Judge James Redden struck down a 2004 federal plan, a plan he later called a “cynical and transparent attempt to avoid responsibility for the decline of listed Columbia and Snake River salmon and steelhead.”

In the following years, new plans were issued by the federal agencies in 2008, 2010, and 2014. Each was promptly struck down. After Redden’s retirement, Judge Michael Simon struck down the 2014 plan. Twice, the federal agencies tried appealing the district court rulings to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Twice, the circuit court upheld the district court.

The most recent plan, issued in the waning days of the first Trump administration, was promptly challenged, and was headed for the same fate as the prior plans, when the Biden administration decided not to defend the indefensible and entered into settlement talks with plaintiffs and Northwest states and tribes, with input from other stakeholders as well.

Those talks led to the adoption in 2023 of the Resilient Columbia Basin Agreement, a package of investments, changes in dam operations, and studies on replacing the services of four especially lethal dams on the lower Snake River (so that the dams could be breached and 140 miles of free-flowing river restored). Litigation was stayed while that agreement was in place.

In June of this year, the second Trump administration unilaterally renounced the agreement, leaving nothing to replace it save the illegal 2020 Trump salmon plan. So, it’s back to court.

In various rulings over the years, the courts have ordered modest changes in dam operations, but the federal agencies have repeatedly refused to produce the “major overhaul” Judge Marsh called for 31 years ago.

As a result, not one of the 13 listed populations is on a path to recovery. Despite misleading claims from federal agencies, public utilities, and other river user groups, most of those stocks are on a path to extinction.

It’s past time for the court to find a way to end more than three decades of stubborn evasion of the law by the federal agencies and direct them to, finally, produce a plan that will lead to restoration of abundant, harvestable populations of these iconic creatures.

Marc Sullivan is western Washington coordinator for the Save Our Wild Salmon Coalition, an alliance of more than 50 Northwest and national fishing and conservation groups. He lives near Sequim, on the Olympic Peninsula.

Washington State Standard Opinion: Federal agencies need a workable plan to protect salmon in the Columbia Basin

A quarter of the spring/summer Chinook populations in the Snake River Basin had fewer than 50 fish in 2024, a level so low it indicates functional extinction. Pictured are Young Chinook swimming at the Tucannon Hatchery near Pomeroy in Garfield County. (Erika Schultz / The Seattle Times)

Oct. 27, 2025
By Amanda Goodin / Special to The Seattle Times

Wild salmon and steelhead define our region. They’re woven into our way of life, our economy, our culture and our commitments to our region’s tribes. They feed our orcas and support our ecosystems. And they’re in trouble.

The Columbia Basin was once one of the largest producers of salmon in the world, with 10 million to 16 million wild salmon returning annually to spawn. Today, many of the basin’s salmon populations are hovering on the brink of extinction.

That’s why we’re returning to court — to fight for the survival of these fish.

Two years ago, we were on a path full of promise. The federal government, the states of Oregon and Washington, four lower Columbia Basin tribes, and conservation, fishing and renewable energy groups represented by Earthjustice signed a historic agreement to restore the Columbia Basin.

The 2023 Resilient Columbia Basin Agreement provided an unprecedented opportunity to invest in the intertwined needs of salmon recovery and regional energy resiliency. Because this agreement included real commitments to work together to recover salmon, we agreed to a multiyear pause in our long-standing litigation to protect salmon.

Unfortunately, this June, the Trump administration abruptly abandoned this win-win agreement.

Now, we’re back in court fighting to protect salmon while we also battle a misinformation campaign waged by industrial associations that benefit from the status quo. Case in point: On Oct. 2, five industry groups ran a full-page ad in The Seattle Times, followed by a digital advertising blitz, claiming salmon are on the rebound and decrying our return to court.

We’re going back to court because it’s our best path to prevent extinction and protect salmon now that the Trump administration has reneged on the agreement. These industry associations claim they want to talk now, but that time has passed; they had years to participate in the conversation about meaningful changes to help our imperiled native fisheries, but refused to do so.

Their claims that a court ruling protecting salmon would lead to blackouts and enormous rate increases are also alarmist. Federal analysis of the rate impacts of similar changes showed the impact would be quite low.

Their claims that salmon and steelhead are recovering are backed by data that conflates different species and runs that return to different regions in the basin, and by using historic lows as a reference point.

Here are the facts from federal, state and tribal fishery managers: Four of the 16 interior Columbia Basin stocks have already gone extinct. Of those that remain, seven salmon stocks are listed under the Endangered Species Act. The numbers are even more alarming for the Snake River Basin, where a quarter of the spring/summer Chinook populations had fewer than 50 fish in 2024, a level so low it indicates functional extinction.

Overall fish returns in the basin remain far below established recovery goals. Furthermore, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, a multistate agency responsible for ensuring affordable and reliable energy and healthy fish and wildlife in the Columbia Basin, determined that the biggest driver of this precipitous decline is hydropower — the dozens of federal dams and their reservoirs that have cut off and degraded thousands of miles of once highly productive habitat.

These dams hinder migration, kill and harm salmon and steelhead as they pass through turbines and turn cold, fast-flowing rivers into lethal warm-water reservoirs. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s fisheries recently reached a similar conclusion, stating in a 2022 report that breaching the four Lower Snake River Dams is a “centerpiece” to meaningful recovery for Snake River salmon.

We applaud the work of the Six Sovereigns — the governors of Washington and Oregon and the four Lower Columbia Basin tribes — who are helping our region find a new path forward with the development of a critical recovery plan, the Columbia Basin Restoration Initiative. Like them, we know our region’s economy, culture and identity are intertwined with salmon and that a healthy region is a region where wild salmon thrive. That’s why we continue to fight for their survival.

Amanda Goodin: is an attorney with Earthjustice, representing conservation, fishing and renewable energy groups in the battle to protect Columbia Basin salmon.

Seattle Times Opinion: We’re back in court for Columbia Basin salmon’s survival