Originally Posted By: rojoband
Originally Posted By: AnglersRental

I think it's pretty well proven that the vast majority of hatchery production is paid for by sport fishers by both direct sales of angleing licenses and indirectly from money that originates from federal excise taxes on sporting goods and gear.


Where has this been proven? If you are talking about trout.....then maybe. For salmon (or steelhead) on the Columbia River everything is paid for by power generation. Is this turning into the twilight zone...



Not true. There are 208 hatchery programs in the Columbia River Basin. BPA provides financial support to only 83 of them (40%) and that's only partial support (not full) for those programs. The majority of the funding (even in the Columbia River) comes from sport fishermen and women. The select ares are the exception, of the $2.6M spent on select area production annually, ~$800K comes from sports.

If Kitzhaber's plan happens, it sounds like they are looking to double production. Without additional BPA funding (or some other source), sports would very likely end up paying about 2/3rds ($3.2M) of the total $4.8M program cost.