Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski this week awarded eight Oregon Governor’s Fund for the Environment grants during a ceremony at the Capitol. These grants will aid farmers, vintners, students, educators, and landowners in being stewards of our natural resources.
The gist of federal "action" agencies' plan to push Columbia/Snake river basin salmon and steelhead stocks toward recovery, and thus away from extinction, was filed in federal court this week, nearly 20 months after the reigning plan was declared invalid under the Endangered Species Act.
Policy analyst and subbasin planning lead Tony Grover moves south of the border June 1, leaving his post with the Washington state office of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council to become director of the Council’s Fish and Wildlife Division.
Reserving water behind Libby Dam, and releasing it in "pulses" to prompt Kootenai white sturgeon spawning runs, may not be as vital if a developing plan to sculpture the river's "braided reach" above Bonners Ferry proves viable.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council on Tuesday recommended $2.745 million in spending for fee-title acquisitions and easements and other work through the Southern Idaho Wildlife Mitigation project.
A major step toward getting Columbia River basin salmon researchers all on the same page was taken this month with the publication of the first work ever to collect, standardize, and recommend a scientifically rigorous set of field protocols for monitoring and assessing salmon and trout populations.
Plans to address many of the same Endangered Species Act issues faced in the Columbia/Snake river system, including the threat of lawsuits, are being developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for its projects in the Willamette River basin.
Ten projects all in or near the Columbia River Estuary, were selected by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to receive the second round of grants from the Columbia River Estuarine Coastal Fund.
The University of Montana’s Flathead Lake Biological Station has been awarded a three-year $4.6 million grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to continue studying pristine salmon and trout watersheds along the Pacific Rim.
The Bonneville Environmental Foundation announced this week that it signed an agreement with the Entiat Watershed Planning Unit (EWPU) to support an intensive, 10-year Model Watershed restoration and monitoring program in central Washington's Entiat River valley.
A cooperative fish-enhancement and wildlife-viewing project in Chelan County is moving forward with new state funding, as well as volunteer efforts that were recently recognized by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council in a letter this week expressed "serious concerns about the FY 2007-09 (project funding) decision process, the number of changes Bonneville (Power Administration) made to Council funding recommendations, and several policy issues."
Following a meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Montana U.S. Sen. Max Baucus this week said that Rice committed to continue working with Montana officials to stop from moving forward the proposed Canadian coal mine near Glacier National Park in the Flathead River basin.
Conservation groups hope a successful, though untimely, legal challenge to federal cattle grazing allocations in Oregon's John Day River basin will help bring better protections in the future for Mid-Columbia steelhead and bull trout.
Time, perhaps as little as a month, will tell the fate of a controversial proposal from the state of Oregon to drop the John Day Dam reservoir level to "minimum operating pool" as a strategy to potentially improve survival of yearling spring/summer chinook salmon.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council agreed Wednesday to reconstitute the oversight board for the Fish Passage Center, a data collection and analysis entity that has drawn both fire and praise over the years regarding the veracity of its analyses.
The status of the Oregon coast coho salmon under the Endangered Species Act started a legal and political firestorm years ago that eventually forced the NOAA Fisheries Service to take another look at 27 West Coast salmon and steelhead listings.
Putting hard numbers to the phenomenon called "latent mortality" – the delayed effect of downstream fish passage through the Columbia/Snake hydro system -- will continue to be in the near term anyone's guess, according to a report released this week by the Independent Scientific Advisory Board.
The overall sport and commercial harvest of chinook salmon off the Washington and northern Oregon coasts this spring and summer will be held to slightly more that half what was allowed last year in order to protect what is expected to be a meager lower Columbia River "tule" run.
A 2005 lower court order that struck down the federal government's plan for protecting salmon and steelhead that migrate through the federal Columbia/Snake River hydrosystem was upheld this week by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
The Canadian federal government intends to pursue an environmental review of a controversial coal mine in southeastern British Columbia, an intervention that could delay development by 3 years, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., announced last week.
The Washington State Department of Ecology has released a final environmental report related to the proposed removal of Condit Dam on the White Salmon River in Klickitat County.
In order to better prepare for future tasks, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council and staff need a "clearer understanding" of recent fish and wildlife project funding decisions, according to a letter forwarded Monday (March 19) to the Bonneville Power Administration.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council has asked for input on how it might update the guidance document it has used since 1997 in considering ocean conditions when making fish and wildlife project funding recommendations.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week decided to seek further clarification on fiscal year 2007-2009 funding shifts that represent both contractual fine-tuning and the imposition of policy choices that are, from its standpoint, yet unresolved.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
