The Western Front

“She is a very well-respected fisheries scientist out of Oregon State University,” says Sam Mace, Inland Northwest director of Save Our Wild Salmon. “The one pledge the administration has made is to bring science back to its rightful place in natural resource decision making. That’s been lacking the last eight years.”

Mace is not alone in this observation. Miles of the Nez Perce Tribe concurs.

The Bush administration’s fourth and final Biological Opinion (BiOp) on strategies for saving endangered salmon species from extinction in the Columbia and Snake river systems is in the Portland courtroom of U.S. District Judge James Redden. In a May 18 letter, the judge scolded the government for continuing to espouse that salmon are “trending toward recovery” without identifying specific actions or scientific data to support the statements.

Lubchenco and the Obama administration have asked Redden for extra time — until Aug. 14 — to review the BiOp.

Miles takes this as a good sign that the new administration is interested in applying science instead of the sometimes vague assurances that have exasperated the judge.

Likewise, Terry Flores, director of the farming and industry umbrella group, Northwest River Partners, says, “It is not unusual for a new administration to look at a BiOp from a previous administration. They could pull back the plan if they thought it inadequate, which we think is highly unlikely especially since it was developed collaboratively.”

Mace, Miles and Flores have each met, in separate sessions, with Lubchenco and her staff and other federal officials in the last month. This is a good sign, all say, of Lubchenco’s willingness to hear all sides of the issue.

For Miles, this is quite a change from the Bush years. The Nez Perce Tribe resisted Bush administration overtures to sign memorandums of agreement with other entities in the salmon debate because the money came with the caveat that the tribe could not advocate for breaching the lower four Snake River dams.

The possibility of dam breaching, supported by the state of Oregon and the Nez Perce, is necessary should other efforts to save salmon — such as barging smolts downstream or altering water flow from dams — fall short.

For years, “the state of Oregon and the Nez Perce were portrayed as being unreasonable. I am very excited to hear talk of dam breaching is back on the table. It’s a victory to even be able to talk about it,” Miles says.

This is a fresh start in other ways, too, she says. “Our elders say the Indian wars are now being fought in court, and I look at all the battles in between the BiOps where we were forced to fight and stretch our resources.”

Miles cites the most flagrant example when former Idaho Sen. Larry Craig cut funding for the Fish Passage Center (which counts returning salmon), forcing the tribe and others to fight into the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to restore funding.

Mace, too, says the previous administration resorted to bully tactics. “Fisheries scientists have been silenced over the last eight years.”

Cordan, of Save Our Wild Salmon, cites the case of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service scientist Howard Schaller, who “was well-regarded by every administration except the last one,” she says. Schaller’s method of documenting salmon mortality cast a survival of the runs in a grimmer light than other scientists.

“This administration has freed him and unmuzzled him,” Cordan says.

Indian Country

Perhaps no sector of the federal government better illustrates the difference between the Bush and Obama administrations than Indian affairs.

Bush had trouble keeping any appointee in place for long because his policies were viewed as hostile to tribes. “He had tons of resignations,” says Miles of the Nez Perce.

In fact, prior to EchoHawk’s recent appointment, the BIA top spot was filled for just one of the previous four years.

Obama, by contrast, was adopted into the Whistling Water Clan of the Crow Nation while campaigning in Montana last year. He has since appointed quite a number of Native Americans to posts in the White House and Interior.

Chief Allan, chairman of the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, points to health care and land ownership as two big issues EchoHawk and the new administration must address.

Under the previous administration, funding for the Indian Health Care Reauthorization Act had been neglected for nearly a decade, resulting in funds passed by continuing resolution — the upshot being that health care funds have been stagnant or reduced over this period.

“We are really excited because Obama has given his word that he will put more money into Indian Health Care. The tribes are hoping that Larry EchoHawk, because he is a native himself, will understand the pressing need for health care on reservations,” Allan says.

Another hot issue for EchoHawk is addressing new limits on how the government holds land in trust for Indian tribes. In February, the U.S. Supreme Court published a narrow ruling that denied the Narragansett, widely acknowledged as an Indian nation for centuries, the right to hold land in trust because it was not among the tribes officially recognized by the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934.

The import of this ruling is huge in Indian Country, where many tribes have had to fight the federal government for official recognition.

Takeaways

As excited as people seem to be about the caliber of the president’s appointments, the cautionary tale is to wait and see who Obama’s Westerners select as their heads of regional offices.

Will the trend continue towards science and advocating for the public good?

EPA Region 10 is a good example. The last regional administrator had spent a career in the chemical industry. The one before that was openly hostile to the EPA Superfund presence in North Idaho.

The candidates who may be put forth by Murray, including Hession, are an order of magnitude different.

Similarly, people are watching how Lubchenco fills the NOAA Northwest office. The “energy” interests are said to be promoting Eastern Washington University economics professor Tom Karier, while the “fish” interests are said to back Ed Bowles, fish division administrator for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

All along the Western Front, people are waiting to see if change is going to come.