RIVERS -- A panel discussion titled Lower Snake River Dam Breaching: Embracing the Inevitable. Saving Money, Saving Salmon is scheduled for noon on Monday, March 23, in the University of Idaho Commons (Whitewater Room) in Moscow.

The free event is sponsored by the Palouse Environmental Sustainability Coalition, in conjunction with the University of Idaho Ecology & Conservation Biology Club and Friends of the Clearwater.

Panelists include:

• Jim Waddell, retired Deputy District Engineer Walla Walla District -Army Corps of Engineers,
• Kevin Lewis, Conservation Policy Director Idaho Rivers United,
• Sam Mace, Inland Northwest Director Save our Wild Salmon
• Linwood Laughy, dam breaching advocate.

Organizers say the panel will examine the decline of commercial navigation on the lower Snake River, the high costs of operating and maintaining the dams, replacing hydropower produced by the dams, potential extinction of wild chinook and the socio-economic benefits of a free-flowing Snake River.

A second discussion will take place at 7 p.m. at the Unitarian Church of the Palouse, 420 E. Second St. in Moscow.