The White House Council on Environmental Quality held listening sessions this spring and is now requesting public discuss dams in the Columbia River basin.
They’re particularly concentrated on 4 dams on the lower Snake River that have actually been significant barriers to the decreasing salmon populations that move upstream to Idaho.
Mitch Cutter is the salmon and steelhead connect with the Idaho Conservation League.
“What we’ve seen so far in both the listening session and in the public comments,” said Cutter, “is an overwhelming majority of people saying they want to breach the lower Snake River dams – because it’s essential for salmon and steelhead, and because there’s other ways of doing the things that the dams provide.”
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Supporters of keeping the dams state they offer important energy, watering and barging functions. But Cutter kept in mind that throughout listening sessions, more than three-quarters of commenters favored breaching the dams.
The Council on Environmental Quality public remark duration is open through August 31.
Separately, the discussions come as federal authorities just recently cut Upper Snake River streams at Jackson Lake Dam in the Mountain West due to heavy snowmelt, highlighting a tussle in between Wyoming eco-friendly requirements and Idaho farmers’ water rights. State authorities and Teton County conservationists revealed issue that the lowered circulations would indicate a loss of environment for fish such as aggressive trout and bluehead suckers – designated a types of biggest preservation requirement in the state. The Bureau of Reclamation and the state concerned an arrangement to permit the minimum water to stream through for the types’ eco-friendly survival.
Cutter said there is interest in eliminating the dams from a range of individuals in the Northwest.
“We’re seeing people from across the region,” said Cutter, “come out of the woodwork and say, ‘This issue matters to me, even if it didn’t two, three, five, ten years ago. We’d like to have this problem solved.’”
During this year’s legal session, Washington state legislators authorized $7.5 million for preparing to change the dam’s services. The 4 Snake River dams remain in southeast Washington.
KHOL staff added to this report.
