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Methow Valley
News July 15, 1999 Endangered Species Coverage Irrigators shocked at biological opinions by Lee Hicks After months of delays, local irrigators last week received draft biological opinions related to endangered fish species for irrigation diversions on Forest Service land. And the "BOs" or "bi-ops," as they’ve come to be known, received a chilly reception as summer temperatures rose in the Methow Valley. The BOs, issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service, include minimum "target flows" for local streams at a level that cannot be achieved, irrigators responded. The BOs also raise concern among irrigators and the Forest Service in saying that diversions now "jeopardize" fish rather than earlier indications that they "adversely affect" species. The Valley’s top Forest Service manager said the opinions reflect poor knowledge of the area. Some of the irrigators took the opportunity to vent their frustrations at a fact-finding meeting that featured key aides of Sen. Patty Murray Saturday (July 10), at Sun Mountain Lodge. The message to Murray’s staffers was that the Valley can’t meet endangered species requirements without substantial federal and state funding. The senator’s aides also heard the Methow Valley described as one of the most studied places in the country as to water and other environmental issues. The timing of the Sun Mountain meeting and release of the BOs was apparently coincidental. But the meeting served to focus attention on the thicket of federal and state regulations that result from endangered species listings. The biological opinions have been missing pieces of a complex puzzle related to the NMFS listing of spring-run Chinook salmon and steelhead trout as endangered in the Methow Valley under the 1973 Endangered Species Act. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has listed bull trout as threatened in the basin, and a listing of the western slope cutthroat is likely. Opinion | Sports |
Local Interest |