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Dear Northwest Citizen:
As we enter the 21st Century, the Northwest Power Planning Council marks an important beginning. We are amending our fish and wildlife program and our project review, selection and funding process to make them more accountable and effective. The amended plan will provide a resource that will help stakeholders coordinate all the Columbia River Basin’s fish and wildlife efforts and investments in a way that will improve results significantly.
The Northwest Power Planning Council has a special position and a unique perspective on issues related to fish, wildlife and energy. Created by Congress as an interstate compact, the Council is the region’s public voice in key fish and wildlife decisions. The Council seeks to find the balance that best serves the broad public interest while keeping an eye on how public funds are spent.
The Northwest Power Act requires the Council to develop "a program to protect, mitigate and enhance" fish and wildlife populations harmed by the construction and operation of the federal dams on the Columbia River and its tributaries. The Council last amended its fish and wildlife program five years ago. Based on what the Council has learned since then, it is clear that the time has come to amend it again.
This amendment process offers a great opportunity. By using the results of the Multi-Species Framework Project and other new information, the Council will re-create the Fish and Wildlife Program as a valuable tool to help all of the Columbia Basin’s fish and wildlife recovery efforts become better coordinated and more cohesive.
Attached to this letter you will find the Council’s official notice calling for recommendations to amend the Columbia River Fish and Wildlife Program (Council document 2000-1). You also will find instructions for submitting recommendations for amendments, information about the proposed schedule that the Council will follow, and about the ways you can participate in the Council’s discussions and deliberations.
To assist those interested in learning more about the amendment process, the Council will conduct a public meeting on Tuesday, February 1, 2000, at 10:30 a.m. in its Portland office at 851 S.W. Sixth Avenue, Suite 1100. The meeting will consist of a short presentation explaining the amendment process, schedule and products, and will provide an opportunity for questions and comments. In addition, the Council soon will schedule meetings with tribal governments, opinion leaders and stakeholders, as well as a series of technical workshops throughout the region.
The time for action is now. The Council will be making important decisions in the coming months. We look forward to working with you to ensure those decisions result in accountable and effective fish and wildlife protection, mitigation and recovery.
Sincerely,
F. L. Cassidy, Jr., Chair
Washington | Eric J. Bloch, Vice-Chair
Oregon |
Tom Karier
Washington | John Brogoitti
Oregon |
John N. Etchart
Montana | Todd Maddock
Idaho |
Stan Grace
Montana | Mike Field
Idaho |
NOTICE OF REQUEST FOR RECOMMENDATIONS
to the Northwest Power Planning Council’s
Columbia River Basin
Fish and Wildlife Program
Council document 2000-1
To interested parties:
The Northwest Power Planning Council is requesting recommendations for amendments to the Council’s Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program, as described below. A proposed outline of the Council’s revised fish and wildlife program, as well as other materials relating to the elements of a multi-species framework, are attached. This notice and the accompanying materials can also be found on the Council’s web site.
Legal Background
Under the Pacific Northwest Electric Power Planning and Conservation Act of 1980 (Northwest Power Act) the Council is required to give written notice of this request to the Indian tribes located in the Columbia River Basin, and also to the region’s federal and state fish and wildlife agencies. This letter serves as the required notice.
The Northwest Power Act also allows recommendations to be submitted by federal and state water management agencies, by the region’s electric power producing agencies and customers, and by the public. Thus, this letter is an invitation for members of the public and other interested parties to submit their recommendations.
The Northwest Power Act directs the Council to review, and amend if necessary, its power plan and fish and wildlife program at least every five years. The Council last amended its fish and wildlife program in 1995 with a series of amendments pertaining to resident fish. In section 4(h)(5) of the Northwest Power Act, Congress charged the Council with developing a fish and wildlife program for the Columbia River Basin “…to protect, mitigate, and enhance fish and wildlife …. while assuring the Pacific Northwest an adequate, efficient, economical, and reliable power supply.” The Council is the only government agency charged with balancing the needs of fish and wildlife with energy production in the Columbia River Basin.
A different approach to amending the Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program
A number of recent reviews of the Council’s fish and wildlife program, especially the Independent Science Group’s 1996 Return to the River review, criticized it for lacking an explicit scientific foundation and, especially, for being a collection of measures not tied to a comprehensive framework of goals and objectives.
In the amendment proceeding initiated by this letter, the Council intends to restructure its fish and wildlife program and establish a comprehensive framework for the program. We are therefore seeking recommendations for goals and objectives, recommendations for general scientific and policy principles that will be applied to measures within the program, and recommendations for improvements in program management, coordination and project selection.
The Council intends to organize the program into three levels. The Basin level of the program would include those objectives, principles, and coordination elements that apply generally to all fish and wildlife projects, or to a class of projects, that are implemented throughout the Columbia River Basin under this program. At the Ecological Province level, the Basin would be divided into eleven ecological areas, each representing a particular type of terrain and the corresponding biological community. At the Subbasin level, the Basin would be divided into 53 subbasins, each containing a specific waterway and the surrounding uplands.
The Council is requesting recommendations for program amendments at the basin and province levels. The Council is therefore not requesting recommendations at this time for specific measures to be implemented in a particular subbasin. Following this reorganization of the program, the Council intends to call for the region’s Indian tribes and fish and wildlife agencies, and other interested parties, to recommend specific fish and wildlife plans for each of the subbasins for adoption into the fish and wildlife program. The Council anticipates that these plans will be prepared and adopted over a period of several years. In the current amendment proceedings, the Council will establish the general criteria for these plans. Any recommendations for measures or subbasin objectives received as part of the current amendment process will be held over until the appropriate subbasin plan is considered for adoption into the fish and wildlife program, and will be taken up at that time.
Relationship to the Project Selection Process
Projects proposed for funding to implement the Council’s fish and wildlife program have been reviewed in an annual process that includes independent scientific review and recommendations from the region’s Indian tribes and fish and wildlife agencies. The Council is now working with these fish and wildlife managers and the Independent Scientific Review Panel (ISRP) to establish a rolling, three-year review cycle. The review would be based in part upon subbasin plans prepared by the fish and wildlife managers and other interested parties in each subbasin. This rolling review cycle is beginning in early 2000.
The Council is working with the Columbia Basin Fish and Wildlife Authority, which includes all of the regional fish and wildlife managers, and the ISRP, to establish a prototype for subbasin plans, and to prepare interim plans for those subbasins scheduled for review during this year. The prototype and the interim subbasin plans will be developed before the Council has concluded the present rulemaking. Although it is possible that the criteria for subbasin plans established in the Council rulemaking process may differ in some respects from the criteria agreed upon for the interim subbasin plans, the Council believes that they will contain most of what will ultimately be required under the Council program. Thus, it is likely that, with some modifications, these interim plans can be adopted into the program when the initial reorganization is completed and the amendment proceedings are opened for subbasin plans.
The major revision of the Council’s fish and wildlife program initiated by this notice does not mean that projects linked to measures in the current program are no longer valid. Such projects will continue to be considered for funding as part of the rolling review cycle until this revision is completed. After completion of this revision, the objectives and criteria adopted in this revision will apply to all projects as they are reviewed for future funding, including existing projects.
Relationship to the Columbia River Multi-Species Framework Project
Over the last two years the Council and other regional participants have worked together on the Columbia River Multi-Species Framework Project. See Northwest Power Planning Council, An integrated framework for fish and wildlife management in the Columbia River Basin, Document No. 97-2 (1997). The Framework Project has highlighted the need for a comprehensive and coordinated approach to fish and wildlife in the region. The project has also analyzed various options and developed valuable tools and data for gauging the potential of each of the options.
The Framework Project, its alternatives and analysis are not the same as the Council’s fish and wildlife program or its program amendment process. However, the Council believes that the concepts, analytical methods and analytical results from the Multi-Species Framework Project will be useful planning guidance for the Council, for those who might offer program amendment recommendations to the Council, for the subbasin planning process that follows, and for others with fish and wildlife planning and decisionmaking obligations in the basin.
Examples of Topics To Be Included In This Amendment Proceeding
The Council’s focus at this time is at the basin and province levels, with work at the subbasin level to be accomplished later. An outline of some potential elements of the revised program is attached to this letter. What the Council is requesting are recommendations that provide the substantive content for these program elements. In mid-February 2000, the Council intends to issue a staff-developed “strawman” example of possible program amendments to better illustrate these concepts.
The fundamental parts of the Program framework, as envisioned by the Council, are essentially the same at each geographic level (basin, province and subbasin): vision, objectives, and strategies. For the program as a whole, the Council also intends to adopt a scientific foundation, which links the components of the framework in the manner described below. The Council also intends to adopt an accompanying statement of implementation principles.
Vision. The vision will describe a future state for the Columbia River Basin (or for a respective province or subbasin). We are using the word vision rather than goals to stress the need for long-term considerations. The vision might be expressed in terms of fish and wildlife, environmental amenities, socio-economic contributions, and/or natural resource management or development goals. It can include quantifiable goals for fish and wildlife or specifically described ecosystem characteristics, as well as less easily measured qualitative and aesthetic goals. The objectives and strategies should relate to the long-term vision.
As an example, the Council’s current fish and wildlife program has this existing goal statement for salmon and steelhead, which with some adaptation could continue to be an example of a vision statement for the Program at the basin level:
Double salmon and steelhead runs without loss of biological diversity, with four sub-goals: The first goal is to halt declines in the populations and rebuild populations to a biologically sustainable level by the year 2000. The second goal is to further rebuild populations by 2030 to a level that will support commercial and sport harvest and contribute to the Council’s interim goal of doubling the abundance of salmon and steelhead in the basin. The third of these goals is, by 2194, to rebuild populations beyond the level in the previous goals to a level that will protect, mitigate and enhance fish and wildlife affected by the operation and development of the Columbia Basin hydroelectric system. The fourth goal is to accomplish these rebuilding efforts without loss of biological diversity.
Biological objectives. Biological objectives should address attributes of the ecosystem, the biological communities and the populations of specific species and the habitat in which they live. The Multi-Species Framework Project has distinguished between two types of objectives: environmental characteristics that describe the physical and biological habitat, including measures of habitat such as flow, water quality, vegetation, land use, and biological performance objectives, that describe the biological response of a particular species or assemblage to habitat conditions, measured especially in terms of capacity, productivity and life history diversity. Objectives can be general or quite specific, qualitative or quantitative. The Council expects that at the finer geographic levels (especially the subbasins), the objectives will include many that are specific and quantified or otherwise measurable.
Strategies are broad classes of actions designed to change or maintain environmental attributes, thus protecting the existing condition or moving the existing condition to the one described in the objectives. Most strategies and actions are likely to be implemented at the subbasin level. Such a strategy might be, for example, a reduction in road densities in forested lands in a particular subbasin to reduce sediment loads in streams and rivers (an environmental attribute). Actions associated with this strategy would describe exactly when and where this strategy would be used. The Council does intend, where appropriate, to describe broader strategies at the basin level.
Scientific foundation. Linking the functional components of the program framework will be a scientific foundation for the fish and wildlife program, a set of scientific principles and hypotheses. In the development of the framework concept to initiate the Multi-Species Framework Project, the Council described a set of general scientific principles, stating a view of how species, including humans, relate to their environment. These statements are global in nature and are well grounded in the scientific literature.
Further refinement of the general scientific principles, including review by the Independent Scientific Advisory Board, has been part of the work of the Multi-Species Framework Project. As refined, these principles are described in the attachment to this notice. The Council proposes to incorporate these principles into the revised fish and wildlife program, subject to further consideration as part of its review of recommendations pursuant to the requirements of the Northwest Power Act.
Objectives and strategies proposed for inclusion in the Council’s fish and wildlife program, and measures and actions proposed to implement the program, will be evaluated with respect to the principles and hypotheses that constitute the scientific foundation. The scientific foundation is not based in policy concerns, nor does it dictate the course of fish and wildlife mitigation and recovery in the Columbia River Basin. Policy makers set policies and goals, determine the nature of mitigation and recovery programs and how to finance them.
Implementation principles. The Council also intends to adopt for the fish and wildlife program a set of implementation principles to guide the implementation of Program measures. These will help ensure decisions concerning Program measures are consistent with the vision, objectives and scientific foundation. A list of the types of implementation principles that the Council is considering is provided in part 3 of the proposed outline attached to this notice.
One category of implementation principles that the Council is considering is a set of statements about fundamental priorities, such as “efforts to improve conditions for fish and wildlife in the Columbia basin should focus first on protecting, enhancing, expanding and connecting areas of high productivity with areas that have been historically productive or have a high probability of sustaining healthy populations, as opposed to single-species, weak-stock management.” Another category includes principles to guide implementation decisions on types of actions across the basin, such a policy on the use of artificial production derived from the Council’s Artificial Production Review, or general principles relating to tributary habitat investments, or principles to guide juvenile and adult passage decisions from the Council’s review of the Corps of Engineers’ capital program, or principles to guide systemwide water and dissolved gas evaluation, management, coordination and project selection, including principles to guide subbasin planning, project review, research, monitoring and evaluation, and data management
Submittal of Recommendations
Recommendations for amendments must be submitted by 5:00 p.m. Pacific time on April 18, 2000, to Mark Walker, Director of Public Affairs, Northwest Power Planning Council, 851 SW Sixth Avenue, Suite 1100, Portland, Oregon 97204. Please submit recommendations for amendments as follows: Please submit one hard copy. In addition, if possible, please also submit an electronic copy in either Microsoft Word version 97 (or earlier), or Rich Text Format (RTF) on an IBM PC formatted floppy diskette, or via e-mail to recommendations@nwcouncil.org.
Proposed Outline of the revised Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program, organized on a framework basis
Part 1 -- Framework concept
A. Power Act requirements/Fish and Wildlife Program
B. New approach and organization -- Fish and Wildlife Program as a framework of goals and objectives
C. Framework concept and elements -- vision/objectives/strategies & principles/scientific foundation, at the basin, ecological province and subbasin levels
Part 2 -- Framework foundation
A. Scientific foundation
(1) Role and organization of the scientific foundation
(2) General ecosystem science principles
(3) Ecological structure -- ecosystem/basin/ecological provinces/subbasins
(4) Information structure
B. Human effects foundation/social-economic concepts and principles
C. Legal foundation
Part 3 -- Basin/systemwide level
A. Ecological description of Columbia River basin
B. Vision
C. Biological objectives
(1) Ecosystem characteristics
(2) Biological performance
D. Strategies
E. Policies and principles for implementation
(1) Policy foundation/principles
(2) General principles relating to habitat investments
(3) Artificial production policies and implementation procedures, presumably from APR (apply throughout basin, but to be applied at province/subbasin level)
(4) General biological principles to guide passage investment decisions, presumably from Council’s report on Corps’ capital program (apply throughout basin, but to be applied at province/subbasin level)
(5) Systemwide water, dissolved gas and hydrosystem management principles and implementation guidelines/strategies (apply at systemwide level)
(6) General principles concerning relationship of this program to harvest management
(7) Principles/framework guiding research, monitoring and evaluation
(8) Principles/framework guiding data management and analysis
(9) Subbasin planning criteria and procedures
(10) Procedures, criteria and priorities to govern implementation processes, including the project funding review process and associated Independent Scientific Review Panel reviews; also including the description of whatever structure or coordination you have for organizing and reviewing efforts at subbasin and systemwide levels
(11) Principles relating to future hydroelectric development/Protected Areas (directly from Section 12 of current program)
Part 4 -- Ecological Provinces
[for each of the 11 provinces, which are Columbia River Estuary, Lower Columbia, Columbia Gorge, Columbia Plateau, Columbia Cascade, Inter Mountain, Mountain Columbia, Blue Mountain, Mountain Snake, Middle Snake, Upper Snake]
A. Ecological description of province/list of subbasins
B. Vision
C. Biological objectives: Ecosystem characteristics, Biological performance
D. Strategies
[Next step is subbasin planning consistent with basin and province objectives.]
SCHEDULE
January 2000
| January 11-12 | Council meeting, Tacoma
Council opens amendment process |
| January 31 | Council work session, Portland |
February 2000
| Individual meetings with tribal governments, opinion leaders and stakeholders to be scheduled |
| Technical issue workshops to be scheduled |
| February 1 | Public meeting on amendment process at 10:30 a.m., Council office in Portland |
| February 22-23 | Council meeting, Portland
Staff-developed fish and wildlife program "strawman" released |
March 2000
| Individual meetings with tribal governments, opinion leaders and stakeholders to be scheduled |
| Technical issue workshops to be scheduled |
| March 14-15 | Council work session, Tri-Cities |
April 2000
| April 4-5 | Council meeting, Boise |
| April 18 | Program amendment recommendations due |
| April 21 | Recommendations released for public review and comment |
| April 25-26 | Council work session, Portland
Opportunity for oral comment on program amendment recommendations |
May 2000
| May 16-17 | Council meeting, Montana
Opportunity for oral comment on program amendment recommendations |
| May 17 | Close of public comment period on recommendations |
June 2000
| June 6-7 | Work session, Portland |
| June 27-28 | Council meeting, Oregon
Draft program released |
July 2000
| Public hearings and consultations on draft program to be scheduled |
| July 18-19 | Work session, Spokane |
August 2000
| Public hearings and consultations on draft program to be scheduled |
| August 8-9 | Council meeting, Montana |
| August 9 | Public comment closes on draft program |
| August 29-30 | Work session, Portland
Final program adopted |
