Idaho River Reflections

By Phil Lansing, IRU member

The innocuous sounding Pebble Partnership is a mining operation getting its knickers in a twist over the motion picture Avatar. One can easily see why. Pebble seeks to dig a vast mine complex in the best part of wild Alaska. Avatar is a make-believe story about the depredations of a soulless mining company on a really nifty far away planet. Pebble’s problem is that if you substitute normal Alaskan Aleut and Yup’ik people for Avatar’s 10-foot blue aliens, the movie pretty much tells the Pebble Mine story. Take out the love interest and gun violence, and you practically have a documentary.

The place Pebble plans to stomp is Alaska’s Bristol Bay region, at the base of the Alaska Peninsula. You’ve heard of the area: Katmai National Park, Brooks Camp (source of photos of bears fishing in a waterfall) Lake Iliamna (Alaska’s biggest – complete with freshwater seals) and Bristol Bay itself. The area’s sockeye salmon run is the world’s largest and best managed: 40 million fish in 2009, 50 million expected in 2010. The sport fishing is world-class. The region lacks spiritually cool blue aliens but really does include good-natured Yup’ik and Aleut communities, still living subsistence-based lives by choice. It also supports a $320 million per year commercial salmon industry that is a world model for sustainability. Alaska natives own a fair chunk of that industry, making subsistence a little more comfortable.

Enter the Pebble Partnership, with controlling interest split between a Canadian outfit and Anglo American of Great Britain. Anglo’s Chairman is Sir John Parker, a Cecil Rhodes wannabe who appears typecast for the villain role. Pebble seeks to mine an estimated $350 billion — not a typo, billion — in gold, copper and other minerals right smack on top of Bristol Bay’s Iliamna and Nushagak watersheds, the most important for salmon, bears, people, caribou and other users. It’s not Avatar’s Sacred Tree House, but it’s close enough. The proposed complex may include North America’s largest open pit and largest tailings lakes, with earthen dams totaling more than 9 miles in length. And all of this is in the earthquake prone Pacific Ring of Fire. The region’s soils carry a high natural content of mercury, arsenic and other nasties. When the soils are undisturbed all is well. When the soils are disturbed (by giant Star Wars-ish mining machines, for example) wind and waterborne grit can contaminate the water and whack the salmon. Salmon sustain the region and are sacred to most area inhabitants.

With such a huge project and a $1.5 billion investment, Pebble is soulless but canny. At the outset it hired most of the expert environmental consultants in Alaska to gather and sort data. As Pebble owns the data it can junk what it dislikes. Now scientific criticism can only come from outside companies that don’t know the territory. In other words, Pebble bought “good science.” Next, the company poured money into the area, hiring community leaders as consultants for obscene fees and renting housing at exorbitant rates, anything to buy support and divide opinion. It even set up a foundation to buy thoughtful gifts for villages: ambulances and soccer uniforms are two examples. Fortunately, Bristol Bay natives have known about white guys with gifts for generations. The City Council of Dillingham, Bristol Bay’s largest community, recently voted to reject all gifts from Pebble. Debate centered not on whether they might want the mine — all were opposed — but on whether they should still take the bribes.

Sounds more and more like the movie, doesn’t it? It’s the part where the annoyed aliens reject the mine company gifts.

Pebble has been busy with this project for 10 years, drilling holes and massaging data. The company did a dance with its seismic scoping to show that an area with earthquakes doesn’t really have earthquakes. Miles of earth dams will contain toxic tailings in perpetuity, thank you, and the prophets of Salmon Armageddon are denounced as luddites. The company’s cleverest move, however, is how it copes with criticism. Pebble is shocked, shocked that anyone might criticize it without reviewing its permit application. Since the actual application is years down the road, the company is asserting it should not be criticized for years. This is ludicrous. Avatar meets Catch 22.

Meanwhile, repeating the mantra that it’s too early to critique Pebble is a great diversion from the reality of the company’s proposal. It gets people off substance and on to process. From there it’s a short step to criticizing the critics, a topic even more diversionary and one where Pebble’s public relations spinners are most comfortable. In the movie version, the company muzzles exo-biologist Sigourney Weaver by locking her up.

Pebble is happy, however, to tell a made up story about the jobs and benefits the mine will bring. It seems Sir John is just aching to help those poor Alaska natives. No need to wait on permits to tell that fairy tale.

Thus there’s a certain irony in Pebble’s upset with Avatar. Their two key constructs: diversionary criticism of their critics and a fictive narrative about area economic benefits, just can’t compete with the far more imaginative and entertaining Hollywood version. Pebble’s own failure to participate in responsible dialogue on how it actually plans to mine has left it vulnerable to a fiction-based assault. The company is getting negative publicity, and executives don’t have a response. What can they say, that the stories aren’t analogous? They are.

Pebble won’t be defeated Hollywood style, with a big shoot ’em up launched from the backs of simpatico flying reptiles. But the movie version might set in motion national scrutiny of the real Pebble Mine. If that happens the peaceful villagers may yet triumph over the soulless corporation – just like the movie.

Phil Lansing lives in Boise. He and his family run a seasonal commercial fishing boat on Bristol Bay. Lansing is a member of Idaho Rivers United, where we are continuing to scrutinize mining proposals in the headwaters of the Boise River. Mosquito Consolidated Gold is proposing a massive open-pit molybdenum mine at the headwaters of Grimes Creek, and Atlanta Gold is proposing a large gold mine on the Middle Fork Boise River, near Atlanta.

Tom Stuart casts for trout on the South Fork of the Snake River.

By Tom Stuart, IRU Board Member

PORTLAND — For 40 years I’ve watched salmon and steelhead return to their ancestral spawning beds near my part-time home in Stanley, Idaho, and since the 1970s, I’ve witnessed the precipitous decline of these precious anadromous fish. That decline accompanied construction of four dams on the lower Snake River in eastern Washington. As the dams went up, fish populations went down.

My love of Idaho’s salmon and steelhead has translated into work with Idaho Rivers United, and a significant part of that effort has been to challenge failed federal salmon recovery plans in court.

Today was a milestone in this long-running litigation. U.S. District Court Judge James Redden clearly expressed that he wants to settle the longstanding legal battle that centers on recovering these precious endangered species. We agree with Redden that it is time to end the cycle of inadequate salmon recovery plans and lawsuits. We called for inclusive settlement talks to finally commence. Federal attorneys resisted.

Nevertheless, Judge Redden appeared ready to work toward conclusion of the federal judicial proceedings, proceedings that have now spanned 15 years, four failed federal recovery plans and four accompanying lawsuits. I have attended several of Redden’s hearings, and this one was different. This time he was very impatient. In letters prior to the hearing, he asked federal attorneys and our lawyers to be prepared to discuss how to resolve the legal and scientific disputes rather than treading old ground. Several times during the morning, when federal lawyers drifted into old arguments, Redden interrupted and redirected the discussion. The Judge is clearly eager to move the case toward resolution, and he didn’t allow distractions.

Salmon advocates want resolution, too, but we want to make sure the biological opinion that comes out of this is legal, and, from an Idaho perspective, recovers Idaho salmon. It’s got to have some significant enhancements, and the enhancements have to be in hydro. The enhancements have got to address the four lower Snake River dams.

In September, the Obama administration endorsed the 2008 salmon plan created by Bush administration officials, adding only a few new features. Dr. Jane Lubchenco, Obama’s new National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief, attended the hearing, too, along with representatives of every relevant federal agency, Northwest states, tribes and our allies in the suit (the state of Oregon; Idaho’s Nez Perce Tribe; and our coalition of fishing, conservation, and taxpayer groups).

As the day progressed, Redden repeatedly showed how much he wants to end this lawsuit. He is looking at all legal methods to do it, and he often questioned parties directly about options, approaches and compromises that might be found. The federal government didn’t budge — at all — and, surprisingly, told the judge “no” on several measures he proposed that would improve conditions for salmon, or improve the atmosphere for negotiation. Our attorneys made multiple offers to sit down and try to resolve flaws in the 2008 Biological Opinion, but the federal attorneys continued to tell the judge that collaboration had already occurred and that they weren’t interested in discussing the issue further. By the end of the day, the judge appeared frustrated and remarked that he didn’t think a settlement was possible.

On the upside, Redden appeared poised to rule that the federal government has improperly included the Obama administration’s supplement to the 2008 Biological Opinion as an after-the-fact addition. This would be a win for us, highlighting a flawed federal procedure, and offering a window in which the federal government could work to strengthen the Biological Opinion. Separately, following several arguments from federal attorneys against enhanced flow and spill for salmon migrating through the eight dams and reservoirs on the lower Snake and Columbia rivers, the judge’s remarks and body language indicated that he favors these measures. As Idahoans know, court-ordered spill in recent years has helped all Idaho salmon runs, so we will press to expand spill in the Biological Opinion permanently, as a key element. The judge also asked federal officials repeatedly why “emergency response” actions proposed in their supplement could not be implemented now, rather than later. To this request, federal attorneys again said no, but we might have some leverage in pressing the point further.

The legal process will likely continue for a few more months. Redden has asked federal agencies to submit a proposal in early December about how the Obama administration’s supplement and the existing 2008 BiOp might be combined — and the BiOp strengthened — and we will respond shortly thereafter. We anticipate a follow-up hearing in January.

Idaho’s wild salmon are not yet safe. We don’t yet know how Redden will rule, but we ought to be prepared for a mixed bag. IRU will continue working on this case alongside our excellent allies, and we will continue to work to achieve real benefits for Idaho’s wild salmon and steelhead, toward a final salmon plan that’s strong enough to chart a course that’s good for salmon and good for Idaho’s people and communities.

By Greg Stahl, Assistant Policy Director

Stanley, Idaho, and Washington, D.C., don’t have much in common. The former is a rural hamlet of 100 that sits beneath the breathtaking scarp of the Sawtooth Mountains, where chinook and sockeye salmon once returned by the tens of thousands every year to spawn. The latter has a daytime population of millions, and its wilderness characteristics have more to do with the wild and frenetic pace that seems to define life in the nation’s capital.

But these two places that are thousands of miles and a world apart collided this week when Stanley Mayor Hannah Stauts walked the halls of Congress to drum up support for the Salmon Solutions and Planning Act, a bill that would help break the gridlock on efforts to recover endangered stocks of Northwest salmon and steelhead.

Stauts, 26, was the youngest female mayor in U.S. history at the time of her election in November 2005, and she is nearing the end of her first and final term. She is smart, articulate and passionate, but she said she traveled to Washington not to espouse her own opinions. She did so to relay the very real sentiments shared by the vast majority of the residents of her town.

Salmon, she said, are a central piece of Stanley’s heritage and one of the potential keystones to its economic well-being in the future. Though founded as a mining outpost in the late-1800s, Stanley has become a recreation destination for those seeking wild country, wild rivers and wild fish. As an inherent municipality to the Sawtooth National Recreation Area, one of the crown jewels of the United States’ publically-owned assets, Stanley is also at the epicenter of many of the West’s natural resources, wildlife and public lands debates .

Salmon once returned to Stanley from the Pacific Ocean so thick it seemed a person could walk across a stream on their backs, but they have steadily declined since dams were erected on the lower Snake River in eastern Washington in the 1960s and 1970s. Stauts was quick to point out that the city of Stanley has stopped short of calling for those dams to be removed, but through adoption of a half-dozen resolutions by varying city councils and mayors the city has resoundingly and definitively called for recovery of its native fish.

Stauts recalled a public hearing in 2007 when the council considered adoption of its most recent resolution. Stauts said a raft guide quieted the room when he summarized the issues associated with the decline of these once-abundant fish.

“He concluded that it’s the right thing to do. I think the city and people of Stanley believe we have a moral obligation to recover these species,” Stauts said. “Salmon and steelhead are culturally and historically important, not only to Idaho but also to the Sawtooth Valley and to Stanley. What’s being well received by the people we’re talking with on Capitol Hill are the economic benefits that Stanley would realize if salmon recovery is accomplished.”

Every spring, steelhead anglers descend on the Sawtooth Valley. It’s a time of year when the small town’s tourism economy is usually soft. The summers of 2008 and 2009 were the first fishing seasons that anglers were offered chinook fishing seasons in 30 years, and the banks of the upper Salmon River bustled with anglers from throughout the Pacific Northwest. These are small indications of the potential economic benefits if self-sustaining runs of wild, harvestable salmon and steelhead can be returned to Central Idaho, Stauts said.

In fact, a 2005 study by Boise economist Don Reading estimated that restored salmon and steelhead runs could generate $544 million annually for Idaho, much of it in small communities where such economic growth would be a welcomed reprieve following decades of declines in timber, mining and ranching.

Moreover, Central Idaho’s salmon and steelhead are unique on a global scale.

“A good friend of mine calls the upper Salmon River’s salmon the Olympic champs of fish,” Stauts said. “They swim farther and higher, 900 miles and 6,000 vertical feet, than any other migratory fish. It’s difficult to believe until you see it.”

The region’s sockeye salmon were listed as endangered in 1991, followed by chinook salmon the following year. Steelhead, an ocean-going breed of trout, were listed as threatened in 1997. Sockeye salmon populations in particular have suffered, some years returning in the single digits.

Stauts said the years she’s spent as mayor have been rewarding and have been spent in a wonderful, close-knit community that sits in one of the most spectacular mountain valleys on the planet.

“Stanley’s one of the most unique places you’ll find,” she said. “It’s situated at the base of an amazing, awe-inspiring mountain range. The town itself is encircled by federally-protected lands. The view is protected, and it’s right on the banks of the Salmon River. It’s the headwaters of the Salmon River.”

Stauts’ work as mayor covered much more than salmon and included an array of tasks typical to running city government and Stanley’s proximity to public lands and varying wildlife issues.

But this week, three months before she leaves office, it was all about salmon, and Stauts said she hopes she has left members of congress with at least part of that story. It’s a story of recognizing Stanley’s heritage. It’s a story of realizing the town’s economic potential and certainty. And it’s a story of working to do the right thing for current and future generations.

Visitors to the 10th annual Sawtooth Salmon Festival watch chinook salmon spawning in the Salmon River near Stanley. (photo by Greg Stahl)

By Bill Sedivy, Executive Director

IRU’s Sawtooth Salmon Festival this past August, our 10th annual, was incredible.

From an organizational perspective, Outreach Coordinator Jeff Cole did an outstanding job organizing the event in cooperation with the Stanley-Sawtooth Chamber of Commerce. The turnout was great, I saw many old friends, and the weather was near perfect — at least on Saturday.

But salmon provided the highlights.

As part of this festival’s educational focus we conduct tours to the Salmon River, where, luckily, we always seem to find at least a couple of wild, spring chinook doing their spawning work in the stream of their birth.

This year, dozens of fish mesmerized tour attendees.

On the spawning redds at Buckhorn Bar, female chinook used their tails and long, slender bodies to dig nesting depressions in river’s gravel bed. Occasionally, in an explosion of activity, I’d see large, four-year-old males chase a juvenile male away from the redds.

During a tour to Redfish Lake Creek I stood with 40 other people, hoping to see my first glimpse of an Idaho sockeye where they belong — in a stream, heading to their spawning grounds in Redfish Lake.

We weren’t disappointed. As if on queue, in the middle of a Fish and Game biologist’s talk, four scarlet sockeye swam tentatively up the creek. Perhaps they were hoping to escape the notice of the resident osprey overhead.

I know similar scenes have played out annually in the Sawtooth Basin for millennia. Still, every year at festival time the spawning chinook — and this year the sockeye — move me and inspire me to continue working to put our government on a path toward restoring wild salmon to self-sustaining levels.

In mid-September the Obama administration dealt our campaign a tough-to-swallow procedural blow when it announced the government will continue to embrace a Bush-era roadmap for salmon recovery. By accepting that plan, which actually calls for reductions in some sockeye and chinook recovery measures, our fish are threatened anew, and prospects for restoration are weakened.

That decision was disappointing. However, like the salmon I saw near Stanley this summer, IRU salmon advocates and our allies are a determined bunch. We won’t give up until we reach our goal — the implementation of a scientifically credible salmon recovery plan. And we don’t think such a plan can be created without calling for removal of four obsolete dams on the lower Snake River.

Getting there won’t be easy. We’ll need a favorable ruling in the coming months from federal Judge James Redden. We’ll need to convince members of Congress to engage in the issue. The effort will take time, money and energy.

But seeing spawning salmon again this summer reminded me that Idaho’s fish will bounce back if we give them half a chance. And seeing them again in that incredible natural setting reminded me why IRU’s salmon work is so important.

I’m not giving up on the fight to save Idaho’s wild chinook and our sockeye from extinction. Neither is IRU. I hope you won’t, either.