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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Agreement Limits Bpa’s Costs For Saving Fish Bpa Pays $435 Million A Year At Most; Government To Pay Any Additional Bills

David A. Lieb And Julie Titone S Staff writer

Northwest lawmakers and the Clinton administration announced a compromise Monday to limit how much the debt-laden Bonneville Power Administration can spend to save endangered salmon.

The agreement limits Bonneville’s salmon recovery costs to $435 million yearly. It creates an annual federal account of $325 million to cover anything extra.

That means taxpayers nationwide could have to contribute to salmon recovery. But it won’t mean rate increases for electric customers, such as the Kaiser Aluminum smelter in Spokane and rural electrical cooperatives that buy power produced at federal dams.

The dams are a major reason salmon are disappearing in the Columbia River Basin.

The six-year administrative agreement averted a divisive debate about a stricter, legislated limit that congressional negotiators were set to discuss today.

Support for the “fish spending cap” legislation drafted by Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., began falling apart last week when President Clinton threatened to veto any appropriations bill that included it. He objected to the fact that it would exempt Bonneville from environmental laws, including the Endangered Species Act, once the agency spent $375 million a year to bolster salmon runs.

The bill also had become complicated by the demands of Northwest senators. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, wanted to give states control over the water in their reservoirs, such as Dworshak, which is used to flush young salmon downstream.

Gorton wanted to cap salmon-recovery costs for public utilities that own Columbia River dams.

Such moves would hamstring the National Marine Fisheries Service in its ability to guide recovery efforts, said Will Stelle, regional director of that agency.

Stelle praised the agreement, which he said has been in the works for months.

“It lays out Bonneville’s fish and wildlife financial obligations in a steady and predictable way,” he said.

Environmentalists were relieved by news of the agreement.

“We dodged a bullet,” said Tim Stearns of the Save Our Wild Salmon Coalition. “This is not a nirvana for us. … But the really outrageous proposals got killed fairly effectively.”

Bruce Lovelin of the Columbia River Alliance preferred a legislated cost cap.

But Lovelin, who represents electric companies and other industries, said the agreement was “a good first step to recognizing there’s not an endless fund of money out there for fish.”

Senators from Washington, Idaho, Oregon and Montana united in bipartisan support behind what they called a “practical, short-term” solution.

Vice President Al Gore called the compromise “innovative, efficient and fair.”

“The agreement proves that Bonneville’s financial problems can be addressed without abandoning or overriding environmental laws,” Gore said.

But many Republican senators said this is only the first step in their effort to slowly shift control of the power company from federal to regional authorities.

“This is not a fix-all solution to a very, very technical problem,” said Craig.

“Federal authorities have failed, and it will be a regional authority that brings this together.”

As part of the agreement, Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Mark Hatfield, R-Ore., said he will add language to an energy and water spending bill that will study an expanded role for the Northwest Power Planning Council and allow the council to sell excess electric power outside the region.

The increasingly competitive market has let private utilities undercut BPA prices, causing the federal agency to trim about $500 million and 1,000 jobs at its hydro-electric dams on the Snake and Columbia rivers.

The agency also is burdened with debt from uncompleted nuclear power plants that were abandoned in the 1980s.

In response, many members of Congress have been clamoring for spending cuts at Bonneville.

Last year, the agency spent less than $80 million of its $2.2 billion budget directly on fish and wildlife efforts. But, when lost revenues were included, it incurred an overall salmon cost of about $325 million. The lost revenues occur when water is sent downstream at times favorable to fish migration, not power production.

Without the spending cap, those yearly costs were expected to rise to nearly $600 million by 1996.

Washington’s Sen. Patty Murray called the agreement a three-way win - for Bonneville, taxpayers and salmon.

, DataTimes