Sushihunter
Active Member
http://www.theolympian.com/southsound/story/821431.html
Published April 16, 2009
Salmon conference kicks off
John Dodge
Ten years of state funding directed at salmon recovery has netted a lot of improved salmon habitat, but most salmon populations still lag well beyond targeted recovery levels.
"I'm not tempted to declare victory," said Bill Ruckelshaus, the former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency director and the original chairman of the state Salmon Recovery Funding Board, which was created by the state Legislature in 1999. "But it is important to step back and see how far we've come."
Ruckelshaus kicked off a two-day salmon-habitat conference at the Little Creek Casino near Shelton on Wednesday that drew about 450 people engaged in salmon recovery statewide.
Since the board was created, the state has awarded $358 million in state and federal money for salmon-restoration projects. Matching funds from the grant applicants bring the total spent to more than $518 million on 1,116 projects.
"Today, we're seeing better projects and more of them tied to salmon-recovery plans," Ruckelshaus said.
Accomplishments to date identified by the Salmon Recovery Funding Board include:
• 1,000 miles of new stream habitat opened to salmon through the removal of 220 fish barriers, such as road culverts.
• Permanent protection of more than 28,400 acres of quality habitat.
• Repair of more than 9,000 acres of wetlands, estuaries and streamside riparian areas.
• Construction of 456 fish screens to keep salmon the rivers and out of irrigation ditches.
"We've gone from the easy, obvious projects like replacing road culverts to the more complex projects like estuary restoration," said Jim Kramer, an environmental planning consultant who helped shape the state's Puget Sound chinook salmon recovery plan completed in 2005.
But the challenge of salmon recovery remains a formidable one, according to key indicators tracked by the Governor's Salmon Recovery Office. For example:
• Two-thirds of the chinook salmon stocks in the state were considered to be in depressed, critical or unknown condition in 2008.
• More than 50 percent of the 43 wild juvenile salmon stocks sampled in 2008 were either in decline or not changing.
• The number of water-quality monitoring stations meeting water-quality standards in 39 watersheds across the state was at a 10-year low — 29 percent — in 2007.
"We need to all work together, or we're never going to make it," Ruckelshaus said, adding that he expects significant improvements in overall salmon population numbers in the next 10 years.
He also predicted that the system the state has in place for salmon recovery should give it a leg up on other states competing for federal economic-stimulus funding earmarked for salmon recovery and marine habitat repairs.
Earlier this month, the state submitted 52 projects costing a total of $101 million to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA received $170 million for marine restoration projects nationwide.
John Dodge covers the environment and energy for The Olympian. He can be reached at 360-754-5444 or jdodge@theolympian.com.
Jim's Fishing Charters
www.JimsFishing.com
http://ca.youtube.com/user/Sushihunter250
Published April 16, 2009
Salmon conference kicks off
John Dodge
Ten years of state funding directed at salmon recovery has netted a lot of improved salmon habitat, but most salmon populations still lag well beyond targeted recovery levels.
"I'm not tempted to declare victory," said Bill Ruckelshaus, the former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency director and the original chairman of the state Salmon Recovery Funding Board, which was created by the state Legislature in 1999. "But it is important to step back and see how far we've come."
Ruckelshaus kicked off a two-day salmon-habitat conference at the Little Creek Casino near Shelton on Wednesday that drew about 450 people engaged in salmon recovery statewide.
Since the board was created, the state has awarded $358 million in state and federal money for salmon-restoration projects. Matching funds from the grant applicants bring the total spent to more than $518 million on 1,116 projects.
"Today, we're seeing better projects and more of them tied to salmon-recovery plans," Ruckelshaus said.
Accomplishments to date identified by the Salmon Recovery Funding Board include:
• 1,000 miles of new stream habitat opened to salmon through the removal of 220 fish barriers, such as road culverts.
• Permanent protection of more than 28,400 acres of quality habitat.
• Repair of more than 9,000 acres of wetlands, estuaries and streamside riparian areas.
• Construction of 456 fish screens to keep salmon the rivers and out of irrigation ditches.
"We've gone from the easy, obvious projects like replacing road culverts to the more complex projects like estuary restoration," said Jim Kramer, an environmental planning consultant who helped shape the state's Puget Sound chinook salmon recovery plan completed in 2005.
But the challenge of salmon recovery remains a formidable one, according to key indicators tracked by the Governor's Salmon Recovery Office. For example:
• Two-thirds of the chinook salmon stocks in the state were considered to be in depressed, critical or unknown condition in 2008.
• More than 50 percent of the 43 wild juvenile salmon stocks sampled in 2008 were either in decline or not changing.
• The number of water-quality monitoring stations meeting water-quality standards in 39 watersheds across the state was at a 10-year low — 29 percent — in 2007.
"We need to all work together, or we're never going to make it," Ruckelshaus said, adding that he expects significant improvements in overall salmon population numbers in the next 10 years.
He also predicted that the system the state has in place for salmon recovery should give it a leg up on other states competing for federal economic-stimulus funding earmarked for salmon recovery and marine habitat repairs.
Earlier this month, the state submitted 52 projects costing a total of $101 million to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA received $170 million for marine restoration projects nationwide.
John Dodge covers the environment and energy for The Olympian. He can be reached at 360-754-5444 or jdodge@theolympian.com.
Jim's Fishing Charters
www.JimsFishing.com
http://ca.youtube.com/user/Sushihunter250
