Tribal Hatchery Management (Institutional Recommend 7)

Action

Transfer the Klickitat hatchery to the Yakama Indian Nation; the Kooskia, Clearwater, and Dworshak hatcheries to the Nez Perce Tribe; and the Lookingglass and Umatilla hatcheries to the Umatilla Tribes under authority of the Indian Self-Determination Act. Provide operation and maintenance funds for hatchery operation and for the transfer of other hatcheries as needed. Fund and implement Fish and Wildlife measures to construct tribal production facilities. Redirect Mitchell Act propagation facility capacity and implement mitigation for John Day Dam.

For over fifty years, basin hatchery policy has discriminated against tribal fisheries and has resulted in the loss of upriver naturally-spawning populations because of fishery effects and the taking of broodstock. Since 1982, tribes have proposed the use of hatcheries as a tool to recover naturally-spawning populations throughout the basin as a tool for salmon restoration and as a means to implement treaty rights to take fish “at all usual and accustomed fishing places.” Though included in the Fish and Wildlife Program, construction of tribal production facilities has been delayed as the need for protection of declining stocks increased. Because tribes retain the exclusive right to take fish on their reservations and because the hatcheries listed are located within the boundaries of their reservations or ceded areas and serve the purpose of protecting treaty fish resources, tribes are entitled to a transfer of hatchery properties along with the operation and maintenance funding to maintain them. The federal government should also transfer other hatchery facilities that may assist in restoring upper river anadromous fish populations.

However, recovery activities proposed by the tribes in Volume II will require hatchery capacity beyond that proposed for transfer. Therefore, funding of new tribal facilities required under the Fish and Wildlife Program as well as the reprogramming of the Mitchell Act and implementation of John Day mitigation are also necessary measures for restoration.

2013 UPDATE OF THIS RECOMMENDATION»

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