Tribal charters would require changing laws
Bob Mottram; News Tribune outdoors writer
It's taken 27 years since the Boldt Indian fishing-rights ruling in federal court for this idea to surface, but it's on the table now:
Two treaty Indian tribes - the Tulalip and the Quileute - have told the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife they'd like to establish charterboat fisheries in which the catch of the non-Indian recreational fishermen who fish aboard tribal boats would count against the tribal share of the salmon harvest.
U.S. District Judge George Boldt of Tacoma ruled in 1974 that Washington treaty tribes were entitled to more than half the harvestable salmon and steelhead. The amount was modified on appeal, to half. Boldt also ruled that the tribes may co-manage fisheries with the state.
The tribal proposals conceivably could mean that non-Indians fishing aboard tribal boats might have different seasons, perhaps longer ones, than those fishing aboard other boats, and might operate under different bag and possession limits.
But here's one problem. State law prohibits non-Indians from participating in a treaty-Indian fishery. The law is consistent with a portion of the Boldt ruling which addressed who may assist a tribal member in the exercise of the treaty-Indian fishing right.
So, the department tentatively plans to seek a change in that law during the next legislative session. Josh Weiss, the department's legislative and legal coordinator, says the federal court ruling also would need to be modified.
Alternatively, the tribes say they'd like to operate charter boats that share in the non-Indian portion of the harvest, but without the department-issued charterboat licenses whose availability is blocked right now by a license moratorium
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