Wow!

It's amazing how some people will stand up in support of Tacoma Power! It would not be a good think for you to be the guest speaker at fishing event in South Lewis County

Sometime Salmo we really disagree about issues, especially when you come to Tacoma's defense! I guess that goes with your job!

It really doesn't matter if you "…don’t buy into the money and greed allegation, as it seems to imply that Tacoma "should" do something different than what it does.

You asked us; "What would you have them do differently, and why?"

You know that they were asked to change their flow regimen but they didn't! Any you know why…it was money and greed and had noting to do with saving the fish! They were asked to maintain the existing lower winter flow agreement that they had in the last license to "protect winter run steelhead sport fishing" on the week ends…but they said no and you guys agreed! And one of the reasons why they said no, was because you guys (yes that means you) went along with there scheme to discontinue the early run stocks of hatchery steelhead!! If they didn't have to worry about fishermen fishing for those fish, they didn't have to change their flows regimen. So that is one thing Tacoma could have done "differently"!

That was all about money and nothing else, and you guys eat it up like it was a steak! Oh yea, I forgot the Cowlitz only has one "pure" run of steelhead according to NMFS….right?

Well, for another thing, they should be running their project quite a bit different then they are right now. And your agency can also take much of the credit for how Tacoma is running there project this year (you agreed to their proposed flows). All one has to do is to go look at what Tacoma is doing right now and compare it the way that they have historically ran it. Obliviously there is a big difference if you review the flow chart on:
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/wa/nwis/uv/?site_no=14238000&PARAmeter_cd=00060,00065
You can spin it all you want, and you can say its been a dry year, or its been a wet year, or say whatever you want, buy the long term graphs show that we are now being screwed by the loop holes that the agencies have approved in that "stinking rotten" agreement that you guys signed on to and helped approve.

You're not right when you said; "They are required to provide minimum stream flows to protect fish migration, spawning, and rearing. Perhaps they "should" provide different flows than they do, but persuasive arguments would have to be made."

To bad you didn't come to the week long appeal hearings on Tacoma's 401 permit because the "arguments" were made, and made well.

The flow agreement only protects fish for some months of the year! From July1 to August 14, Tacoma must maintain 2000 cfs for navigational purposes, and that has noting to do with fish protection. And it only protects fish from August 16 to September 15, "if" Tacoma runs the river at flows greater than 5000 cfs continually for more than 5 consecutive days straight. That's the only time during the summer months that Tacoma has to "protect" fish and in the mean time they can jack the water up and down until your light blink! You know as well as I do, that there was no science used to come up with the minimum flows of 2000 cfs… It was 100% for navigation purposes.

You go on to say;" If Tacoma were required to run the dam "like a natural river", then we would see the lower Cowlitz flowing as little as 600 cfs at times, instead of the usual 2,000 or 2,500 cfs. That would be quite a sport to run your sled in the river at 600 cfs!"

Well, every natural free flowing healthy river in the states also gets down to those kind of flows and look at the amount of wild fish that they can produce. Low water is not always bad for a river; in fact, one of the main reasons why the Cowlitz has such a huge disease problem with C-Shasta is most likely do to Tacoma not allowing the river to reach its natural summer times lows which would help kill most of the those tiny polychaete worms that are the carriers of C-Shasta. Another prime example is the effects that "Low-temperature disease" has on the Cowlitz fish. Both conditions are directly related to Tacoma's storage of large amounts of cold water being drawing from large deep turbine intakes, such as the ones at Riffe Lake.

So low water has its ups and downs and its all part of a natural healthy river system. Your right Salmo, about it being hard to run a sled up and down the river at summertime lows, but it would sure be fun in a drift boat! Not that bad of a tradeoff for some fishermen! So what other great benefits has Tacoma done for us?

I find it extremely hard to believe that you can say;" However, there much more likely than not, are more salmon and steelhead available to catch because of the Cowlitz mitigation hatcheries than there would be today if Tacoma had never built their dams"

How can you support such a statement? And if you can, please be very specific on your facts so that I can verify where you got that information from (sounds like it's right out of Tacoma's mouth!).

Yes Salmo, we really do have different view points about Tacoma Power and that is probably why you think that the Settlement was such a great deal and Tacoma though you did such a great job!

Obviously there is a big difference from the person who just sits at the "table and negotiates the settlement" compared to the person who has to live with the results of what that other person has done.


Cowlitzfisherman