[Stewart]

Dear Friends,

I just wanted to let you know that I introduced a bill today to support Eastern Washington's hydropower consumers and increase government transparency: The Endangered Species Compliance and Protection Act. This bill would require Power Marketing Administrations, including the Bonneville Power Administration, to separate out and report the costs associated with the Endangered Species Act to each customer.

In our region - and throughout America - the benefits of hydropower aren't being fully tapped because of billions of dollars in excessive regulatory costs to mitigate unproven environmental effects. In the Pacific Northwest, for example, 30 percent of wholesale power rates go to compliance programs for endangered salmon. Despite the growing costs, many consumers don't know how much they're paying for salmon protection, or whether they're paying at all. They have a right to know how their money is being spent. That's where my bill comes in. By empowering consumers with critical information, my bill will contribute to better decision-making about the use of hydropower and make hydropower move available to meet our economy's growing energy needs.

As the founder of the Congressional Hydropower Caucus, I will strongly advocate for this bill and I will continue to be a champion for this clean, renewable, low-cost energy resource.

Best Wishes,

Cathy McMorris Rodgers

Member of Congress

Thanks for making the problems worse Cathy. When the salmon are extinct we won't have to get rid of the dams. Spending more money is not adding to transparency, it is pushing your agenda. Can't wait to vote for whoever the hell is the other candidate.

 

[Poopy McButtfart]

"unproven environmental effects"

Gotta love when they use language like this. It's like anything scientific: it's about evidence, not proof.

 

[Alex MacDonald]

Like I always say; snakes and politicians; the only good one's a dead one.

 

[Stewart]

LOL! Good one ya bastige. :rofl:

 

[shastaski]

Thanks for making the problems worse Cathy. When the salmon are extinct we won't have to get rid of the dams. Spending more money is not adding to transparency, it is pushing your agenda. Can't wait to vote for whoever the hell is the other candidate.

Hmm, I wonder which party she is?? Maybe the same as George W Bush, who appointed Mark Rutzick, a lawyer for the timber industry who was widely known as anti wildlife

Google Mark Rutzick timber lawyer. He was appointed by Bush as special advisor for the NOAA, the NOAA is charged with protecting wildlife. Rutzick is attributed with the policy of treating hatchery fish the same as wildfish (google it). Shortly after he was appointed to in his position with the NOAA, guess what they did? Propose that hatchery salmon would be counted the same as wild salmon.

Are you a avid sportsment?? You should join "republican sportsmen"!

Six leading ecologists who were appointed to a scientific advisory panel by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) claim that they were asked to remove science-based recommendations from an official report.1 Scientists contend that the Bush administration's new policy on endangered fish stocks put forth by the NMFS distorts the scientific evidence regarding the role of hatchery fish in maintaining viable populations of salmon in the Northwest. The new policy refers to old or discredited information that contradicts current scientific information provided by the scientific advisory panel.

According to the advisory panel's lead scientist, Robert Paine, a world-renowned ecologist at the University of Washington,2 the panel's science-based recommendations were suppressed by the NMFS. As Paine explains, "The members of the panel were told to either strip out our recommendations or see our report end up in a drawer."3

 

[John Dude]

It's been well established for years that McMorris-Rodgers is just a stooge for big industry. The best rule of thumb is if she's in favor of it, then everyone should oppose it.
Best way to ensure human survival for any time after 2012.

 

[Jerry White]

It staggers the imagination... Rep. CMR is waging a kind of war on our rivers, our steelhead and salmon and the ESA.

This is laying the ground work for real unpleasantry... I have no doubt that that the reps agenda is, among many other horrible actions, to end programs like spring spill over the dams for out-migrating smolts (ESA listed and other) by positioning public opinion to see normal, seasonal salmon migration and their very existence in our rivers as a COST to ratepayers and society at large.

So the pressure is to reduce the value of the salmon bearing rivers to being only valuable in so far as they can turn turbines... salmonids that have migrated since before the last ice age are now an effing burden to society... finned deadbeats that cost rate & tax payers money and return little to our communities. There you go folks... you are all in love with a bunch of slimey"welfare" wards of the state!

This is an absolutely sickening distortion of reality.:rofl:

I think rep CMR should add language to this bill that requires an accounting of the federal expenditures for maintenance and upkeep on each project as well. THis would include maintenance of the locks, dredging, levees and other reservoir related infrastructure. Then the public could see what a [email protected]#*Y investment certain projects are and what a poor return on the taxpayer/rate payer dollar they are (IE: 4 LSR dams) when balanced against the damage they wreak... expressed in the crappy Smolt to Adult Ratios in places like the Snake Basin (And yes, Cathy the effects are pretty much proven for anyone who wants to cut the crap, look at the Scientific literature and join the consensus).

Another idea... Maybe the language of the bill should include the value of every fish in terms of the economies that they support from AK to Stanley Id.

Man! Now I just feel like Mel Gibson... All icky inside.

 

[Annie Rutherford]

Mom said the scum always rises to the top.

 

[Richard Olmstead]

I had occasion to have an airplane seat next to Congresswoman McMorris (before she became hyphenated) on a flight from DC to Seattle on her first return to WA after being sworn into Congress. We had a pretty extensive conversation covering many topics. As with most politicians, she certainly is willing to talk, even if she doesn't know what she's talking about. Among other topics, we discussed the Snake River dams. She comes from an agricultural family background (fruit-growing, I believe), and was particularly strong in her opinion about the subject, even while knowing next to nothing about the fish or the environmental effects of the dams. I was aghast at the total lack of understanding of, or basic knowledge of, many issues confronting our country and the world. Her understanding of international issues was particularly appalling.

I learned quite a bit about her back story, too (education, how she got into politics at so early an age), and was astonished by how clearly she was groomed to become a conservative politician from a very early age. She attended a conservative evangelical christian college that makes no pretense of offering a broad general education, became an aide to a conservative Republican state representative essentially right out of college, then was appointed to fill his seat when he died in office. The rest is the story of incumbency in any region where one party dominates and partisan extremists have an edge over moderates. Unfortunately, that's the case in much of eastern Washington (just as it is for Democrats in much of King Co.).
D

 

[Salmo_g]

Thanks for the background report Richard. No wonder ignorance is such a powerful tool for Rep. CMR.

Stewart, if you get the chance, you might let Rep. CMR office know that mitigation costs are a legitimate part of the cost of doing business. If someone harms farmer McMorris' fruit orchard in the course of doing their business, he has to pay for it. Same goes with public resources like fish. Further, as expensive as the multi-million dollar fisheries mitigation programs are, they are a drop in the bucket, and no way amount to 30% of the cost of wholesale power from the FCRPS. Only an idiot politician would make such an erroneous statement. The Columbia River hydro system is an unbelievable cash cow, more profitable than any in the world, and the cost of fish mitigation is an incredibly small fraction of total costs.

Sg

 

[Stewart]

I basically told her the same thing I posted as a comment, and included a link http://www.workingsnakeriver.org/

So far, no response. If I get one, I will post it here.

 

[Reel Happy]

Hmm, I wonder which party she is?? Maybe the same as George W Bush, who appointed Mark Rutzick, a lawyer for the timber industry who was widely known as anti wildlife

Google Mark Rutzick timber lawyer. He was appointed by Bush as special advisor for the NOAA, the NOAA is charged with protecting wildlife. Rutzick is attributed with the policy of treating hatchery fish the same as wildfish (google it). Shortly after he was appointed to in his position with the NOAA, guess what they did? Propose that hatchery salmon would be counted the same as wild salmon.

Are you a avid sportsment?? You should join "republican sportsmen"!

Six leading ecologists who were appointed to a scientific advisory panel by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) claim that they were asked to remove science-based recommendations from an official report.1 Scientists contend that the Bush administration's new policy on endangered fish stocks put forth by the NMFS distorts the scientific evidence regarding the role of hatchery fish in maintaining viable populations of salmon in the Northwest. The new policy refers to old or discredited information that contradicts current scientific information provided by the scientific advisory panel.

According to the advisory panel's lead scientist, Robert Paine, a world-renowned ecologist at the University of Washington,2 the panel's science-based recommendations were suppressed by the NMFS. As Paine explains, "The members of the panel were told to either strip out our recommendations or see our report end up in a drawer."3

OMG Shast, get over the Bush bashing, thats so yesterday. Can you tell me that the "scientific" evidence is not biased according to the political or philosophical views of the report creators?

HEY! I have a great idea, lets all of us that subscribe to environmentalism get congress to create a law to protect endangered species! Now lets define species differentiation as those that have the hairsbreadth genetic deviation from the mainstream species. Now lets demand that an EIS be performed any time some kind of land use change happens, and that they will have to hire us "scientists" to perform them. We will have jobs for decades! We can go on all kinds of government funded excursions to determine if snail darters are impacted, or 6 toed salamanders or whatever.

Start looking at the bigger picture my friend. Stop the Bush bashing.

 

[Trout Master]

Whoa, someone got their panties all bunched up!

 

[Salmo_g]

Reel Happy writes as though Bush were good for something besides bashing. True, it is very yesterday; got that part right.

Apparently we shouldn't have an ESA or require EISs because people have biases? I'm not saying that either the EPA or the ESA are perfect, but as Congressional legislation goes, those are a couple of the better ones. And if scientists didn't do the ESA consultations or write the EISs, who would you suggest do it, political hacks?

Sg

 

[Tsar Bulba]

from Congresswoman McMorris

"I just wanted to let you know that I introduced a bill today to support Eastern Washington's hydropower consumers and increase government transparency: The Endangered Species Compliance and Protection Act. This bill would require Power Marketing Administrations, including the Bonneville Power Administration, to separate out and report the costs associated with the Endangered Species Act to each customer.



In our region – and throughout America – the benefits of hydropower aren't being fully tapped because of billions of dollars in excessive regulatory costs to mitigate unproven environmental effects. In the Pacific Northwest, for example, 30 percent of wholesale power rates go to compliance programs for endangered salmon. Despite the growing costs, many consumers don't know how much they're paying for salmon protection, or whether they're paying at all. They have a right to know how their money is being spent. That's where my bill comes in. By empowering consumers with critical information, my bill will contribute to better decision-making about the use of hydropower and make hydropower move available to meet our economy's growing energy needs. "

Just a comment that even my left wing liberal friends support this bill.

Lots of people in eastern Washington are fed up with the free ride the Tribes and Commercial interests get with regard to recovery of endangered species. It would be fairly cheap to buy up their fishing permits and rights to recover the the runs with BPA revenues. Catching and killing 25-40% of endangered fish really pisses off a lot of people on this side of the hill.

Now, before you get all your panties in a bunch. The Wenatchee World has supported removing Hetch Hetchy Dam in Yosemite National Park. And I am sure they will probably support removing the high dam on the Skagit within North Cascades National Recreational Area. Now dams in eastern Washington.....well, they are special.

 

[Stewart]

Start looking at the bigger picture my friend.

Which big picture? There are competing view points to be sure. What is interesting to me is that Idaho representatives are now in favor of removing Snake River dams. That is quite a change from the days of Helen Chenoweth. McMorris-Rodgers is trying to fill her shoes. It's time to change that, and I do get to vote in that race. She has just made sure that at least on this subject I will be very active and by the time the elections are rolling I'll be doing everything I can to point out the fallacies of her position. Maybe it won't change anything, but that won't stop me.

 

[Jerry White]

So here is a paragraph I found in here news release that should make every one who cares about steelhead or salmon in the Snake basin cringe...

"A court-mandated spill in 2004 helped make BPA the federal agency with the highest ESA compliance costs in the nation. BPA estimates that they have spent approximately $500 million annually on ESA-related compliance costs in recent years. By law, the agency passes on all of these costs to its wholesale customers. A 2005 poll found that 70 percent of customers either didn't know how much they paid for salmon recovery or believe that recovery accounted for less than 5 percent of their monthly bills."

http://mcmorris.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=96&sectiontree=25,26,96&itemid=1676

Rep CMR is going after spring and summer spill (over the dams) for juvinile salmon... that is what this is really all about (besides dismantling the ESA). Rep M-R is in the pocket of the BPA. The BPA is loath to spill water in the spring for salmon/steel and when mandated to do so, cooks the books so that water spilling over the dams for smolts instead of turning turbines, is called a "forgone revenue" and tabulated/presented as a cost to the rate/tax payer. They also inflate these costs to be at 30% but are closer to 11- 15 % (based on Independent sources like the Northwest Energy Coalition). Please remember spill is one of the primary reasons we have good returns of steelhead and sockeye. Spill is the river functioning normally. Ocean conditions have helped. Clearly, Rep M Rodgers wants to kill the spring and summer spill over the dams for fish.
A vote for the Rep is a vote for barging fish down river which is a vote for extinction... and that is the big picture.

Also, Vladimir, in my opinion, no one is getting a free ride when it comes to depending on salmon... not the tribes, not the hand trollers, the sport fishers, and certainly not even the BPA. Well ok... maybe a bunch of hatchery admin and staff at the state level are doing pretty good with this salmon crisis and the BPA $$$ spicket.:clown:

To be a bit critical, I would like to know who, besides the Federal Columbia River Power System is killing "25 to 40% of Endangered fish"? Where are you getting these numbers? To my knowledge, these are not the numbers NOAA Fisheries is using for fishing related mortality in any of the four ESA listed stocks in the Snake River Basin. Maybe I'm missing something.

 

[Chris Johnson]

Amen Brother, an intelligent and informed response, it's post like your's jerry , that keep me coming back to this site

 

[fredaevans]

This is a long read, but a damned interesting one: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/expectmore/detail/10000082.2002.html I'd like to specifically draw your attention to sections 1.1 to 1.4. It's an eye opener. All other things aside, it would appear the Lady has a point. ...... and you're paying for it.

fae

Edit: Another interesting read: http://www.efw.bpa.gov/environmenta...rary/Implementation_Plan/FinalExecSummary.pdf

 

[Salmo_g]

Jerry,

Thanks for pointing out that 80% of what BPA calls salmon costs are really foregone opportunity. BPA is intellectually dishonest to chalk up spill as a cost. BPA doesn't own the water. The water is a public resource, and in WA, leaving the water in the river, or spilling it in this case, is a legal beneficial use for fish, water quality, or any other public resource. BPA lies. And Rep. CMR repeats the lies.

Sg