THE NATIONAL MARINE FISHERIES SERVICE BOWS TO OREGON


OVER COHO RECOVERY





As required by federal court, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS)


ended its long delay and made a decision about coho salmon listing under the


Endangered Species Act.





On April 25th after an eleventh hour effort of epic political proportions,


the NMFS regional director, Will Stelle, and Oregon's Governor, John


Kitzhaber, signed a memorandum of agreement allowing Oregon to replace


federal protection of a species proposed for listing as a threatened species


with its own plan to recover the coho salmon.





However, the NMFS did list the coho salmon in California and southern


Oregon, south of Cape Blanco in Oregon as a threatened species.  





Historical estimate of coho salmon abundance is about 1.4 million fish but


these salmon have declined to a low of 20,000 in 1995 and 80,000 in 1996 in


the area from Cape Blanco north to the mouth of the Columbia River.  This


area is called the Oregon coastal evolutionary significant unit or Oregon ESU. 





There have been other federal attempts to pass off responsibility for


species protection to local control prior to the much praised Oregon


solution.  The Sacramento River winter chinook and the bull trout are


examples. In the case of the winter chinook a federal court forced the NMFS


to list the fish


when the salmon  continued to decline.  As for bull trout, a recent federal


court


decision requires the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to do its job and list


the fish after having given the responsibility over to state governments.





According to Ken Rait of the Oregon Natural Resources Council, an


environmental group, "The Clinton-Gore administration has made a political


deal to accommodate the timber industry.  They ignored the best available


science and denied protection of coho based on a promise that the state


might change stream protection rules several years from now."  The ONRC


says, " a court challenge of this decision is likely."  





Another conservation group, Oregon Trout, sided with Governor Kitzhaber and


supported the state plan over federal listing even though they had filed one


of the petitions to list the coho as an endangered species.  





But most environmental groups believe both a  federal listing and the


Oregon Plan


are needed to restore coho salmon.  They believe that a federal listing is


necessary to make sure Oregon follows through on its promises.  A federal


listing also allows citizens to play a key role in species conservation that


the Oregon Plan does not provide.  Under federal listing citizens can appeal


to the federal courts to enforce the law when a federal agency falters in


its  conviction.  Citizens have no legal remedy if the state of Oregon


drags its feet on salmon recovery.  However, the Oregon Plan does allow


citizens to participate as volunteers in one or more watershed councils to


develop local solutions for salmon recovery.  





The Oregon Plan is a series of proposals to recover the coho salmon.  The


memorandum of agreement mentions sixteen actions that are planned but as yet


are not being implemented.  These actions include selecting the independent


scientific team to provide oversight on the plan, develop baseline data on


the status of coho and their habitat conditions, reforming Oregons forest


practices rules, developing agricultural practices to protect coho habitat,


harvest measures to secure adequate spawners in streams, develop new


instream water rights for fish among many others.  





A recent court  case in Texas set aside a similar state plan to protect the


Barton


Springs salamander.  The judge said: "Multiple places in the Conservation


Agreement make reference to possible future actions of the State of Texas to


protect the species.  The Secretary (of Interior) cannot use promises of


proposed future actions as an excuse for not making a determination based on


the existing record."





This ruling may cancel the Oregon experiment because it also is based on


proposed future promises to recover the coho salmon.  Since the NMFS record


supports the proposal to list the coho salmon as a threatened species, the


court may not allow the this federal agency to give up its authority to


protect the coho as a species under the Endangered Species Act.





The weight of scientific opinion may also work against the survival of the


Oregon Plan.  The Governor of Oregon submitted the Oregon Plan to a hand


picked group of scientists for scientific peer review.  The result was a


strong reservation about the capability for the Oregon Plan to do what is


needed to recover the species.  The NMFS's own Biological Review Team also


came away split over whether the Oregon Plan would work.  Taken together,


these two scientific reviews suggest  listing coho salmon as a federal


protected species.





But for now, at least, Governor Kitzhaber has been credited with achieving a


political victory by beating back a federal listing for the Oregon ESU.  The


Governor also received praise from the timber industry  for his work and


promised to pay part of the salmon recovery bill as long as the Governor


prevented a listing of the fish under the Endangered Species Act.





Governor Kitzhaber has also made history by getting most state agencies to


cooperate in coho salmon recovery.  This is the first time a governor has


made such a request and was taken seriously.





However, some believe handing a threatened species over to state control


based on a memorandum of promises undermines the Endangered Species Act,


changing the federal law substantially so that this federal law is in


jeopardy as well as the species it is designed to protect.





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