Fish v. Dams

In the Pacific Northwest, which is crying for more cheap electricity, a big bloc of voters believes that only the Government can afford the big dams the region wants. In the 1956 elections, the Republicans took a beating because of their partnership policy and stress on private power. Yet last week the Northwest was up in arms over a Federal Power Commission recommendation for a huge dam that probably only the Government could build. Reason: it would kill the fish Northwesterners love as much as kilowatts.

At issue was the turbulent Snake River along the Idaho-Oregon border, main tributary of the great Columbia and potential source of 3,600,000 kw. of the minimum 6,500,000 needed in the Northwest by 1967. There, unlike its previous decision in favor of three private dams at Hells

Canyon, the FPC last month rejected a bid by the Pacific Northwest Power Co. to build two more private dams--costing $170 million--downstream at Mountain Sheep and Pleasant Valley. FPC said it favors a far bigger $450 million dam farther downstream at Nez Perce, which would produce 1,672,000 kw. and store 3,900,000 acre-feet of water, also curb the flood-prone Salmon River, a wild branch of the Snake. Though FPC left Nez Perce open to private construction by Pacific Northwest Power, a four-company combine, powermen feared that such a dam would almost certainly need heavy federal financing because of its cost.

Conservationist's Nightmare. The unexpected decision shocked the combine, which had spent $2,500,000 planning its smaller dams. And it enraged some 200,-ooo politically potent sports fishermen throughout the Northwest. The dams that industrialized the Northwest have blocked great runs of Chinook salmon and steelhead trout as they swarm in from the sea to spawn far upstream. Since pre-dam 1928, the commercial salmon catch on the Columbia River alone has decreased more than 50%. Millions have been spent on devices to help mature fish climb dams, get tiny fingerlings back safely through turbine blades and out to sea. Nothing has really succeeded. At dams higher than 100 ft., fish have to be trucked by land both ways, and Nez Perce sounded like a conservationist's nightmare. Not only would it be 800 ft. high, but its site below the confluence of the fish-rich Salmon and Imnaha Rivers might eliminate nearly 25% of all fingerlings that eventually swim down the Columbia to the sea.

The fate of the fish split the Northwest. Washington State's Democratic Senator Warren Magnuson gulped hard and said he was all for the big Nez Perce dam. He was joined by some defecting fishermen willing to sacrifice sport for power. Against them, loyal fishermen hotly proposed a ten-year moratorium on all middle Snake River dams while fish-saving technology improves, and Dr. Alfred J. Kreft, president of the Oregon division of the powerful Izaak Walton League, said he will "raise all hell" to press it in Congress. Oregon's Democratic Senator Richard Neuberger, a staunch conservationist, said he could not back the dam ban. But he introduced a Senate bill specifying that FPC dam licenses be approved from now on by the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Democrats' Loss. As FPC replaced the Administration as the center of Northwest controversy, the beneficiary was Interior Secretary Fred Seaton, who has modified the policies of his predecessor, Douglas McKay, and quietly stolen some thunder from Northwest Democrats. Last week all eyes turned to Seaton's suggestion for a $274 million multipurpose dam at Pleasant Valley instead of at Nez Perce. FPC and many powermen have opposed it because it would be above the Salmon and Imnaha Rivers, thus store much less water than Nez Perce. It would also flood out the lowest Hells Canyon dam that Idaho Power Co. is licensed to build. But Pleasant Valley, under hard study by the Interior Department since last year, would certainly save more fish than Nez Perce, be within range of private financing. The Oregon Water Resources Board has endorsed Seaton's idea. Whatever happened to the fish, they had kidnaped the dams from the politicians.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.