If we are going to play the "blame game" let's be honest about it!

Yes the currently tribes do have absolute veto power of how the non-treaty fisheries occur. Until a few years ago following the ESA listing Puget Sound our fisheries operated under a federal "take" permit issued jointly to the co-managers (see various versions of the Puget Sound co-manager Chinook plans). As the Puget Sound Chinook status continued to decline the Feds rightly wanted a lowering of fishing related impacts on key stocks and were discussing that with the co-managers. In that climate at the urging and recommendation of the recreational community (and yes CCA was there) the State opted to attempted get its own permit.

I sure that we all remember the pain that cause and the complete failure in the State's ability to get their separate permit. With the tribes federal nexus via their BIA funding they quickly got their own permit with the result being that any non-treaty fisheries in Puget Sound ESA impacts are being covered under the tribal permit.

The question is the recreational community going to ignore their own role in this mess and continue down the "blame game". Is there any voices of reason out there looking for reasonable united way forward?

Of course all the above ignores the real "elephant" in the room. Since the ESA listing of the Puget Sound Chinook the key population parameters (abundance, productivity, and diversity) for the major of the population have consistently decline. This is result in declining allowable impacts on several key stocks. This has and will continue make allowing mixed stock fisheries more and more difficult (read that to mean fewer opportunities) with a continuing shift to more terminal harvest (away from the more limiting stocks).

Curt