the film forum library tutorial contact

Money Won't Save the Fish by Steve Allen The Oregonian, April 10, 2008

On Tuesday, your front-page headline shouted that Northwest Native Americans will receive millions of dollars for their agreement to cease fighting for dam removal on the Snake and Columbia rivers ("Tribes seal $900 million deal").

On Wednesday, the front page proclaimed "Coast salmon all but off-limits." Nowhere is there an agreement to compensate local commercial fishermen.

And nowhere are there any agreements to stop gill-net fishing, water drawdowns on the Sacramento River or Klamath/Trinity River systems, or any agreement to remove dams and/or install fish ladders on the Klamath, or to stop chemical and pesticide pollution on these river systems, including the filthy Willamette.

The rivers with no dams and modest environmental protections in Alaska, the Olympic Peninsula and parts of British Columbia, for example, still have decent salmon/steehead runs even with ever- increasing fishing pressure.

Solutions seem obvious to me. Do we have the will to save this species, this symbol of what the Northwest is about?