Momentum grows for bill to study Alaska's waning salmon runs

March 18, 2022

NOAA yesterday endorsed a bill that would create a special task force to investigate a sharp decline in the salmon population in parts of Alaska.

Janet Coit, head of NOAA Fisheries, told a House Natural Resources panel the agency would back the legislation with hopes of helping salmon that are feeling the effects of climate change.

“Climate change is here — it’s accelerating, sea levels are rising, waters are warming, habitats are degrading, marine species are shifting, there’s much at risk,” she said, testifying at a hearing of the Subcommittee on Water, Oceans and Wildlife.

The bill, H.R. 6651, introduced last month by Republican Rep. Don Young of Alaska, would require Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to establish a task force of 13 to 19 members to study Pacific salmon trends and to develop a research strategy to better manage the species.

“We’re losing our salmon. … I want to find out why it’s happening,” Young, the dean of the House, told the panel, adding that his state has experienced “massive declines” in salmon runs.

Coit said Young’s bill, which would give the task force one year to publish a report with its recommendations, could aid the low salmon runs — particularly in western Alaska — and that federal and state research to support the management of Pacific salmon “would benefit from better and increased coordination.”

The bill has gained momentum in Congress with unanimous backing from Alaska’s congressional delegation, coming in response to a series of fishery disasters in the state in recent years.

In January, Raimondo, who oversees NOAA, approved 14 separate fishery disaster requests for Alaska for seasons covering the past four years, including salmon fisheries on the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers.

Young’s bill, called the "Alaska Salmon Research Task Force Act," is a companion to S. 3429, introduced by Alaska Republican Sens. Dan Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski.

When the senators unveiled their bill in December, Sullivan said the task force was needed to study “shocking and unprecedented declines” in parts of Alaska.

Coit told the panel that NOAA would also back a $90 million salmon bill that would require the agency to work with the Fish and Wildlife Service to identify the nation’s “core centers of salmon abundance” and do more to restore and protect the habitats of the fish.

Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), the subcommittee’s chair, introduced that bill, H.R. 6491, the "Salmon Focused Investments in Sustainable Habitats (FISH) Act,” in January. It would seek to ensure that designated habitats “receive the protection, support and funding they need to continue to sustain the healthiest remaining salmon populations” (Greenwire, Jan. 26).

“So many of our salmon runs are on life support,” Huffman told his colleagues, citing his district in Northern California as an example of where salmon survival has been jeopardized due to habitat degradation.

Huffman’s bill would require that federal agencies not take actions to undermine salmon habitats and would authorize $50 million in grants over five years to help restore and conserve salmon. The bill would also authorize $40 million to preserve existing watersheds for salmon and identify other salmon habitats.

Republican Rep. Cliff Bentz of Oregon, the subcommittee’s ranking member, praised Young’s bill as a way to find “scientific answers and recommendations” to boost salmon management, but he questioned the value of creating more grant programs, saying it would use “taxpayer money as a Band-Aid” for species management.

Jill Weitz, director of an organization called Salmon Beyond Borders, told the panel that she supported both salmon bills, calling Alaska “the biggest salmon stronghold we have left” and adding that it’s important for Americans to “better understand and protect the places where wild salmon spawn and rear.”

“Where the U.S. has spent billions of dollars to restore salmon habitat throughout the Lower 48, we still have a chance to get it right in Alaska,” she said.

Resiliency, marine mammal bills

The panel also heard testimony on three other bills:

  • H.R. 3431, the “Increasing Community Access to Resiliency Grants Act of 2021,” sponsored by Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.), would require NOAA to establish a website providing information about grants available for state, local and tribal governments that would help them pay for resiliency projects.
  • H.R. 6987, sponsored by Democratic Rep. Rick Larsen of Washington state, would establish programs to reduce the impacts of vessel traffic and underwater noise on marine mammals.
  • H.R. 6785, the “Right Whale Coexistence Act of 2022," sponsored by Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), would aid the population “by supporting and providing financial resources for North Atlantic right whale conservation programs and projects.”

By:  Rob Hotakainen
Source: E&E Daily