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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 10, 2018)
A3 THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, DECEMBER 10, 2018 U.S. Senate passes bill making Tiny Micro-Chip Now it easier to kill sea lions In The Ear: Available! A move to protect salmon runs Now You See It... By PHUONG LE Associated Press SEATTLE — A bill that would make it easier to kill sea lions that feast on imper- iled salmon in the Columbia River has cleared the U.S. Senate. State wildlife manag- ers say rebounding numbers of sea lions are eating more salmon than ever and their appetites are undermining billions of dollars of invest- ments to restore endangered fi sh runs. Senate Bill 3119, which passed Thursday by unan- imous consent, would streamline the process for Washington state, Idaho, Oregon and several Pacifi c Northwest Native American tribes to capture and eutha- nize potentially hundreds of sea lions found in the river east of Portland. U.S. Sen. Jim Risch, an Idaho Republican who co-sponsored the bill with senators from all three states, said the legislation would help ensure healthy populations of salmon for years to come. “As endangered salmon face extinction, we must take steps to protect them,” U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, a Washington Democrat, said in a statement. The Senate bill is simi- lar to one passed by the U.S. House in June and spon- sored by Reps. Jaime Her- rera Beutler, a Washington Republican, Kurt Schrader, an Oregon Democrat, and others. The House will have to consider the Senate’s bill, or vice versa, before it heads to President Donald Trump for consideration. “We have reason to believe they will by the end of the year,” said Kaylin Minton, communica- tions director for Risch. Supporters, including the governors of Oregon, Wash- ington state and Idaho, fi sh- AP Photo/Don Ryan Now You Don’t! A California sea lion that was trapped at Willamette Falls in the lower Willamette River waits to be released into the Pacifi c Ocean near Newport. ing groups and tribes, say the bill will give wildlife manag- ers greater fl exibility in con- trolling California sea lions that dramatically increased from about 30,000 in the 1960s to about 300,000 under the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act. Critics called it ill-con- ceived and say it won’t solve the problem of declin- ing salmon, which also face other problems such as habi- tat loss and dams. “This bill changes the core protective nature of the Marine Mammal Protec- tion Act by allowing for the indiscriminate killing of sea lions throughout the Colum- bia River and its tributaries,” Naomi Rose, marine mam- mal scientist for the Animal Welfare Institute, said in a statement. Washington state, Idaho and Oregon wildlife man- agers have federal authori- zation to kill problem sea lions that eat salmon in the Columbia River near Bonne- ville Dam east of Portland. But they must fi rst go through a lengthy process to identify and document specifi c sea lions that cause problems, including observ- ing them eating a salmon and using nonlethal hazing measures on them. Both the House and Sen- ate bills would remove those requirements, so states and several Native Ameri- can tribes could get a fed- eral permit to remove any sea lion east of the Interstate 205 bridge that connects Vancouver with Portland, as well as in tributaries of the Columbia River where there are federally protected fi sh. Several Native American tribes, including the Yakama Nation, Warm Springs, Uma- tilla and Nez Perce tribes, also would be granted author- ity to manage sea lions. Under both bills, the total number of sea lions removed cannot exceed 10 percent of a specifi ed level, called the potential biologi- cal removal. For California sea lions, for example, that limit would be no more than 920 animals. Nate Pamplin, pol- icy director of Washing- ton Department of Fish and Wildlife, said the actual number of animals removed would be much lower because there aren’t that many eligible to be removed. While there are sev- eral thousand California sea lions in the Columbia River estuary, only about 200 to 300 swim more than 100 miles upriver from the Pacifi c Ocean and would be eligible for removal, state wildlife offi cials say. An orca task force con- vened by Washington Gov. Jay Inslee also backed the legislation to boost the fi sh for the struggling popula- tion of southern resident killer whales. 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