‘Salmon Cap’ Proposed For Bpa Hatfield Hails Idea By Including It In Spending Proposal

Sen. Mark Hatfield tried to nudge Congress toward resolving a dispute over salmon and dams Tuesday by limiting the money the Bonneville Power Administration must spend to save the fish.

BPA supports the so-called “salmon cap” as a way to survive in an increasingly competitive energy market without increasing electric rates.

A similar idea was proposed in an earlier bill by Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont. Environmentalists opposed the bill, which has drawn criticism from Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. Murray fears it would prohibit the spending needed to rebuild stocks of several salmon facing extinction.

Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., former chairman of a task force on Bonneville, said Tuesday it would be “a prescription for salmon extinction and continued mismanagement at the BPA.”

Hatfield, R-Ore., chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, inserted the idea in a comprehensive spending bill approved Tuesday by the energy and water subcommittee.

The same bill restores the $10 million the House earlier cut from President Clinton’s request for $78.8 million for fish recovery in the Columbia River Basin in the next fiscal year, beginning Oct. 1.

Under the proposal, Bonneville’s spending on fish and wildlife would be limited to a percentage of its previous year’s gross power revenues.

Hatfield said he inserted it in the bill so the question could be addressed if lawmakers fail to agree on an alternative.

The limit would be imposed on Oct. 1, 1996, “unless there is a valid agreement which limits Bonneville’s exposure to increases in fish and wildlife costs consistent with its ability to pay and the needs for fish and wildlife resources in the Columbia River Basin,” the bill said.

Fish and wildlife programs cost BPA more than $400 million a year, an increase from about $150 million in 1991, when Snake River sockeye salmon were declared endangered, Hatfield said.

Those estimates include the amount of money BPA projects it loses as a result of dedicating water flows to salmon rather than power production.

Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., a member of the subcommittee along with Hatfield and Murray, supports the cap idea, his spokeswoman Heidi Kelly said.

Murray said she could live with the bill’s language because it allows lawmakers to continue working toward a solution that would avert a cap.