Salmon Advocates Win One in Court

Yesterday, a US district judge in Portland struck down a Bush administration-backed plan to barge and truck salmon downriver.  Instead, he ordered US agencies to comply with salmon advocate calls for heavier releases of water over dams this summer. 

But the sharp ruling on summer "spill" is the first of what could be more pronounced changes in dam operations. It was issued U.S. District Judge James Redden and derives from his court's sweeping rejection last month of the Bush administration's hydropower policy. The federal dams provide relatively low-cost electricity, irrigation water, and barge transportation across Oregon, Washington and Idaho....

Redden had deemed the latest attempt "contrary to law" because he said it systematically underestimated harm to salmon. This, he wrote, had the effect of "substantially lowering" the bar required for offsetting the effects on migrating salmon.

In his packed Portland courtroom Friday, Redden called the government's 2004 plan an exercise "more in cynicism than in sincerity." He said the salmon most affected by summer dam operations -- threatened Snake River fall chinook -- remain in serious trouble. Lamenting the polarized climate made "sick" by the warring interests of power companies, farmers and federal dam operators versus fishing groups, Native American tribes and conservation groups, the judge called for a fresh start.

The Oregonian has a good report on the story here.

June 11, 2005 Posted in in the news 2005.