~ Student lessons for the classroom ~
Kiksht ~ Wasq’u
Wasco Chieftainship meeting at Agency
A meeting last week,
called by Agency District
representatives of the Tribal
Council, drew around 75
people to discuss the Wasco
Chieftainship.
Statements and com-
ments from Council mem-
bers and around 20 tribal
members spanned nearly
four hours.
The three Agency District
representatives agreed that a
vote on the Wasco Chief po-
sition is the consensus, and
they believe the next Wasco
chief will be chosen through
an election.
Further discussions and
meetings could determine eli-
gible candidates and voters.
You can read additional
information and hear audio
about the process at kwso.org
Around Indian Country
Pacific Coast Indigenous nations see a
glimmer of hope for the future of salmon
Around Indian Country
Columbia River Treaty renewal won’t just
go with the flow: Salmon, environment,
First Nation interests on the table
Beginning in earnest in
2018, Canada started work
to hammer out a new treaty
with the U.S. that would go
beyond flood management
and hydro-power sharing cov-
ered by the existing deal to
include the environment,
First Nations interests and
salmon.
The U.S. has new de-
mands, including potentially
more water releases to pro-
tect the environment and a
reduction in hydro-power
payments, $140 million a
year on average in the past
decade, that flows to British
Columbia.
The payments come from
a share of additional power
generated in the U.S., most
of which B.C. sells back to
the U.S.
Add in climate change and
the two sides are addressing
much more complex issues
than in the first agreement
created nearly six decades
ago that covers a drainage
area the size of France.
When the treaty was com-
pleted in 1964, its main aim
was simply to provide flood
control and power, with three
new dams in British Colum-
bia providing huge water stor-
age capacity.
The B.C. government an-
nounced this week a 15th
round of talks had been com-
pleted but revealed little of
substance.
While Canadian negotia-
tors say there is no official
deadline to reach a new agree-
ment, measures in the exist-
ing treaty for flood storage
in B.C. expire in September
of 2024. When they expire,
the U.S. would have to re-
quest water storage for flood
control on an ad hoc basis.
“I think it’s common
knowledge that some kind of
agreement will be reached in
2023,’’ said Jon O’Riordon,
an associate fellow at the
University of Victoria’s Cen-
tre for Global Studies and a
former assistant deputy min-
ister in the B.C. government.
O’Riordon, who has de-
cades of experience in water
policy, said the push to have
an agreement reached in
2023 is because of the Sep-
tember 2024 expiration of
the flood storage measures.
He noted time is of the
essence as any agreement also
needs public review and rati-
fication by governments on
both sides of the border that
could, for example, be af-
fected by the U.S. federal elec-
tion in November of 2024.
Barbara Cosens, a profes-
sor emerita at the College of
Law at the University of
Idaho, said if the two coun-
tries don’t reach an agree-
ment by September 2024, it’s
possible that the existing flood
control measures in Canada
and the payments could be
extended while negotiations
continue.
Cosens said there is need
for a more complex agree-
ment, but it is a recognition
of environmental and other
issues ignored 60 years ago.
And she noted that areas
of mutual interest around the
environment and salmon
should help facilitate an
agreement and broker trade-
offs over water flows and
power payments.
The Keenleyside Dam on
the Columbia River, near
Castlegar, in 1989, about 25
years into its life as a crucial
component of the Columbia
River Treaty.
“These things are not im-
possible to work out,” said
Cosens, a long-time observer
of the treaty and Columbia
River basin interests. “I think
you have real opportunities
for a modernized treaty that
accounts for the complexity
going forward.”
Richard Paisley, director
of the global transboundary
international waters gover-
nance research initiative at the
University of B.C., said it still
not clear to him that a new
treaty can be reached.
He said if an agreement is
not reached before the flood
control measures in the treaty
expire, there will be much less
impetus to do so.
He noted that including en-
vironmental and ecological
issues in the treaty add a sig-
nificant level of complexity,
as defining those issues will
be different to the many par-
ties affected, including First
Nations on both sides of the
border.
“There is as many visions
of what ecosystem manage-
ment is as there are people
who have those visions,” ob-
ser ved Paisley, who has
helped to negotiate interna-
tional water agreements
around the world.
Following the latest round
of negotiations, the B.C. gov-
ernment cited some confi-
dence on reaching an agree-
ment.
Said Katrine Conroy, the
B.C. minister responsible for
the treaty: “Although there are
still outstanding issues to be
resolved, there is cause for
optimism as the negotiating
teams move closer to a con-
sensus on some of the main
issues.”
Brook Thompson grew
up along the shores of the
Klamath River in Northern
California, where her family
would spend their summers
camping and catching
salmon. “It’s where I got a
lot of connection about my
culture and my family his-
tory,” Thompson said.
Ms. Thompson, 27, is a
member of the Yurok and
Karuk tribes. The Klamath
River, which flows from
Oregon through Northern
California and is part of the
Yurok and Karuk traditional
territory, once provided a
bountiful supply of salmon
in its cool, clear waters.
However, since 1918
salmon populations along the
river have been declining and
habitats have disappeared as
six hydroelectric dams were
built.
In 2002, when Thompson
was seven, she witnessed the
most devastating fish kill in
the history of her people.
According to a report from
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service, 34,000 salmon died.
The cause of death was a
parasite able to spread
through the warm, stagnant
water, due in large part to the
low flow from a nearby dam.
When the salmon dis-
appear
“I remember specifically
holding my mom’s hand and
walking along the rocky
shore of the Klamath River
by the mouth, and just see-
ing piles and piles of dead
salmon lining the shore,” Th-
ompson said. “I didn’t un-
derstand why all these beings
had to die and how they could
be alive the day before and
dead the next morning.”
Along the Pacific Coast,
many Indigenous nations
carry a deep spiritual con-
nection with salmon they
share territory with. Many
call themselves the salmon
people. But threats like habi-
tat loss, climate change and
human development from
hydroelectric dams and fish
farms have meant salmon
are disappearing from the
waters.
Indigenous nations say
the loss of salmon has led
to the loss of spirit, culture
and overall health of their
people. But as salmon con-
tinue to shimmer through
the routes their ancestors
once swam, the Pacific
salmon people have a glim-
mer of hope.
That’s because efforts are
underway from parts of
British Columbia down to
Northern California, where
Indigenous people are work-
ing to rebuild habitats and
remove human develop-
ment so the salmon might be
saved for future generations
of people and fish alike.
“It’s not only about hav-
ing the salmon, it’s about
teaching the Indigenous val-
ues and what it means to be
a tribal member,” Thompson
said.
Hard-fought victories
There are five species of
Pacific salmon—Chinook,
Chum, Coho, Pink and
Sockeye—and it’s estimated
that Salmon stocks in almost
all areas are at historic lows.
In B.C., former fisheries
minister Bernadette Jordan
said last year that some
stocks are seeing up to 90
per cent declines.
But the shíshálh First Na-
tion along the Sunshine
Coast in B.C. is celebrating
a recent victory for their
people and the salmon.
In November, fish farm
giant Grieg Seafood an-
nounced its two remaining
salmon farms in the shíshálh
territory would be decom-
missioned this winter.
The announcement came
after the First Nation, with
provincial assistance, de-
cided not to renew their op-
erating license.
In 2019, B.C. became the
first province to implement
the United Nations Decla-
ration of the Rights of In-
digenous Peoples, which re-
quires governments to ob-
tain free, prior and informed
consent before taking ac-
tions that affect Indigenous
Peoples and their lands.
“It is actually quite re-
markable for us because
we’ve been saying it all the
way along that we weren’t
consulted,” said hiwus
(Chief) Warren Paull of
shíshálh First Nation.
Fish farms in B.C. waters
have long been linked to the
spread of pathogens among
wild fish, including salmon.
Studies in 2011 and 2017
also found young sockeye
salmon from B.C.’s Fraser
watershed are infected with
higher levels of lice after
swimming past sea farms.
Young salmon infected with
parasitic lice grow more
slowly, which makes them
more vulnerable.
Paull said fish far ms
aren’t all to blame, but the
farms add to the cumulative
effects salmon are facing
from climate change and
oxygen depletion in the
ocean. And he worries about
the orca, eagles, bears, coy-
otes and wolves who also
rely on the salmon to live.
Juvenile wild salmon
sampled this spring by the
Cedar Coast Field Station
on Vargas Island, B.C., have
had sea lice infestations.
The net detrimental ef-
fect is pretty devastating and
affects the whole cycle of
life.
Moving forward with the
removal of the commercial
fish farms from their terri-
tory is one less obstacle for
the salmon, but Paull says
more work will need to be
done to bring back the popu-
lation.
New generation of hydroelectric dams
let the fish 3wim straight through
The American eel is a slip-
pery, mysterious fish. Eels
live out most of their lives
in the freshwater rivers and
estuaries of the United
States, from New Mexico to
South Dakota to Florida to
Maine.
The journey between the
States and the Sargasso Sea
to spawn is complicated not
only by the trawling nets of
fisherman, but the steep con-
crete walls and sharp steel
turbines of hydroelectric
power plants, over 900 of
which are located within the
native range of the Ameri-
can eel.
Such dams provide huge
amounts of emissions-free
energy to the U.S., making
them an essential tool in
fighting climate change. Bal-
ancing this benefit with the
needs of the eels—and many
other aquatic species—is pro-
pelling a movement to align
the dual goals of producing
abundant clean energy while
protecting biodiversity: tur-
bine by turbine, eel by eel.
In a hydroelectric power
plant, water is channeled
through turbines to spin the
blades that power generators.
The sharper these blades are,
the more efficiently they can
cut through the current to
generate power.
“The typical way to design
turbine blades is to have a
leading edge that is as sharp
as possible, which is intu-
itively not going to be very
kind to fish,” says Abe
Schneider, chief technical
officer and co-founder of
hydropower developer Natel
alongside his sister, Gia
Schneider, Natel’s chief ex-
ecutive officer. On average,
hydropower turbines kill 22
percent of the fish that pass
through them. With their
elongated bodies, eels are
especially vulnerable. Sur-
vival rates for eels passing
through traditional turbines
can be as low as 40 percent.
Natel’s mission is to out-
fit dams with blades that
give fish a fighting chance.
The company’s Restoration
Hydro Turbine system is
designed to allow fish safe
passage through the tur-
bine itself. It does so
through blades with lead-
ing edges meticulously
blunted, cur ved, and
slanted to minimize danger
with negligible change in
efficiency.
Moreover, the turbines
minimize the gaps between
the blades and the turbine
walls, vastly reducing the
chance that a fish gets
trapped between moving
and stationary parts.