Spilyay Tymoo
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cannot be nurchased with
week. A rt medium ranging from photography to pottery, pencil drawings to stained glass are shown.
Above, Vem Rowe and Nancy Garrison put finishing touches on display. The show will be open
through M ay 26 during regular school hours.
Spilyay Tymoo photo by Behrend
How effective was the Columbia River 5-year plan?
This article is printed
courtesy of the Columbia
River In ter T rib al Fish
Commission.
O
In February 1977,' four
Columbia River treaty tribes,
the governors of Oregon and
Washington, and the Depart
ment of Interior signed an
ag reem en t fo r m anaging
salmon and steelhead that
originate above Bonneville
Dam. The fisheries of the four
tribes—Nez Perce, Umatilla,
Warm Springs and Yakima—
are made up of anadromous
stocks that begin their lifecycle
in the upper Columbia and its
trib u ta rie s . Because the
original management agree
ment had a five-year duration,
it became known as the 5-Year
Plan. That original five-year
period ended on February 25.
1982. How the plan came
about, what it did and did not
do, its goals and its deficiencies,
were the subject of question
and conflict throughout the
five years.
The plan's origin goes back
to 1969, when the original court
decision in Sohappy v. Smith
affirmed the treaty fishing
rights of Columbia River
Indians. Because tribal fishers
did not get their fair share of
the harvest in the years
following that decision, Judge
Robert Belloni in 1974 issued a
supplemental order declaring
that the states must assure the
tribes the opportunity to catch
up to 50% of spring Chinook
destined to pass the tribes’
usual and accustomed fishing
places. (Belloni had retained
jurisdiction in the case, which
became U nited S ta tes v.
Oregon after the federal
government intervened on
behalf of the tribes.) When
B elloni m ade th e sam e
determination for fall chinook
the following year, he also
ordered the states and tribes to
negotiate an agreement to
implement United States vs
Oregon and his supplemental
orders. This agreement became
t h e 5 - Y e a r P l a n — th e
culmination of those years of
litigation.
If a few words can describe
the 5-Year Plan, they have to be
“harvest-sharing plan.” Its
stated p u rp o se in clu d ed
m aintenance, perpetuation,
and enhancement of the upper
Columbia’s anadromous fish,
with provisions for restricting
the ocean harvest. But in
practice the plan became
prim arily a form ula for
dividing the inriver harvest
between n on-Indian, both
sport fishers and lower river
gillnetters, and Indians, who
fish upriver, from Bonneville
to McNary Dam.
T h e p la n ’s f ir s t y e a r
coincided with a precipitous
decline in Columbia River
salmon runs—a decline that
continued th ro u g h o u t the
plan’s duration. To Indian
fishers this meant that fewer
fish were caught after the plan
went into effect than prior to it.
A nd d e s p ite th e p la n ’s
conservation provisions, at no
time during those five years
were effective restrictions
placed on harvests of Columbia
River stocks as they matured in
the ocean from California to
Alaska and returned to the
mouth of the Columbia. That
is, no harvest restrictions were
applied until the fish began to
reach their spawning grounds.
At that point fishery agencies
had to acknowledge that record
low numbers of salmon were
returning to the river and to
spawning grounds, and last-
minute conservation measures
were imposed. Because the
tribes fish at the end of the
Columbia River salmon cycle,
they were the ones most
affected by c u tb a c k s in
harvestable salmon and in
fishing days. To tribal fishers,
conservation under the plan
was apparently applied to only
one fishery—their own.
Down on the river, where
salmon are caught, traded,
sold, or taken for home use,
Indians clearly saw that they
had fewer fishing days than
their neighbors downstream,
and that under this 5-Year Plan
they were the ones who came
up short on the harvest. Their
deficit for the five years, under
inriver sharing principles of the
plan, is nearly 10,000 fall
c h in o o k an d as yet an
chinook. According to the
plan, the inriver sharing
formula was to be adjusted
each year so that deficits were
made up the following year.
Instead, the Indian harvest
deficit simply accumulated.
During the plan’s five years,
Indian fishers also saw special
seasons, such as the one in
Young’s Bay, created to give
non-Indians more opportunity
to catch salmon. And they saw
special attention given to
improving runs on tributaries
below Bonneville Dam, such as
those on the Willamette River.
Meanwhile, in the upriver
Indian fishing areas, seasons
not only had fewer days, but
often the days were only for
those fortunate enough to have
fishing sites in Bonneville
pool, one of three pools where
Indians set their nets.
Each year Indian fishers
watched upriver coho runs,
once abundant above the dam,
dwindle further—to so few
that their coho catches did not
exceed the “incidental catch”
category. And each year they
saw lower river and some
upriver hatcheries producing
coho and also chinook, both of
which were reared only to be
released in the lower river, and
only to return there.
At a January 1982 meeting,
the four tribes’ Council of
C o u n c ils c o n c lu d e d by
unanimous motion that the 5-
Year Plan had been a failure.
The motion cited two reasons
for this evaluation: first, the
states did not implement
en h an cem en t fo r u p riv e r
stocks, and second, appropri
ate ocean regulations were not
enacted.
Given the disparities in the
way upriver, lower river and
ocean fisheries were managed,
it is little wonder that Indians
viewed the 5-Year Plan as just
a n o th e r m e c h a n ism fo r
“conserving” salmon from the
nets of Indian fishers; and little
wonder that when they referred
to it as a “conservation plan”
they did so with bitterness.
What was wrong with the plan
was th a t it was not a
conservation plan as carried
out by the agencies. Although
the plan contained provisions
for upriver hatcheries and
re le a se s a n d fo r o c e a n
. regulation, it was only- used to
‘ a l l o c a te a d im in is h in g
resource. Without conserva
tion and enhancement, harvest
■ allocation is not the most
important concern, because as
they say on the river, “50% of
zero is still zero.”
Although the 5-Year Plan
cam e and w ent w ith o u t
improving upriver fisheries,
some segments of it could serve
as a good blueprint for
restoring upriver salmon runs.
It did call for “upriver...hat
chery rearing programs... to
rehabilitate runs to their
maximum potential” and for
sharing of “hatchery salmon
and steelhead released to
restore runs above Bonneville
Dam.” It did include, “The
states agree to enact or
recommend for enactment by
the Pacific Fishery Manage
m ent Council ap p ro p riate
conservation regulations for
th e o c e a n fis h e ry th a t
will...provide for adequate
escapement of mature fish into
the Columbia River.” But, as
reflected in the Council of
C o u n c ils m o tio n , th o se
sections and others were
written without the implemen
tation specifics that would bind
state and federal fish agencies
to a course of action.
The plan needed specifics
about which hatchery stocks,
how many, and where they
would be released; specifics
about when and where ocean
conservation measures should
be applied; and specifics about
new h a tc h e rie s , h a b ita t
re s to ra tio n , and dam
improvements, among others.
N o n eth eless, the p lan ,
through the process of tribal
participation that it engen
dered, crytallized these issues
for Indian fishers and their fish
and wildlife committees, and it
brought these issues to the
forefront of debate among fish
agency m an a g e rs. T he
relationship of these issues to
the future of Columbia River
fisheries is now part of public
discussion on fish and wildlife
programs under the regional
power act and the enhancement
act.
The plan also focused
particular attention on the
c r i t i c a l r o le o f o c e a n
management in conservation.
In 1979, 1980 and 1981 the
tribes were in federal court
c o n te stin g ocean fishing
regulations, in part on the basis
of disregarded provisions in the
5-year plan. Judge Walter
Craig, in his August 1981
décision on the tribes’ suite-
Yakima v. Baldrige—against
the Secretary of Commerce
(Baldrige had approved the
ocean regulations), said “I
would be hopeful that the
parties would agree that the
Columbia 'River plan (5-Year
Plan) would continue. We have
had almost five years of it. You
certainly by ‘this time „have
arrived at some conclusions
with respect to its faulty
features and maybe you can
keep the good ones and amend
the bad ones...” He ordered all
parties (the tribes as plaintiffs
and the states of Oregon and
W a s h in g to n a lo n g w ith
S e c r e t a r y B a ld r ig e a s
defendents) to come up with a
plan for managing Columbia
River stocks th a t would
improve returns to the river
and the tribes.
When the parties appeared
before Craig in February 1982
for co n tin u a tio n for the
Yakima v Baldrige hearings,
the judge recreated his order
that all parties negotiate to
resolve “ the problem of
Columbia River stocks” and
that “the Columbia River plan
should be reexecuted or
renegotiated.”
The 1981 ocean case is still in
court, and still before Judge
Craig. Craig will also oversee
whatever replaces the 5-Year
Plan. He views both Yakima v.
Baldrige and a plan as related
to his overall jurisdiction in
United States v. Oregon, which
he took over in 1979 when
Judge Belloni removed himself
from the case.
Thus 13 years after Sohappy
v. Smith, an effective plan for
C o lu m b ia s a lm o n a n d
steelhead management—a plan
consistent with treaty rights
that all management authori
ties can willingly implement—
is still in limbo. Questions
about the 5-year Plan have
T>een answered, mostly in the
negative, but conflict about
what a plan should be, and
precisely what it should do to
r e s to r e th e C o lu m b ia ’s
anadromous fish resource, goes
on. For how long, no one can
tell. But in the courts, the tribes
seek justice. And on the river,
through the lean years and the
few lead days of fishing, they
wait.