Guest Opinion: State leadership an environmental benefit

M uch has been written about this past legislative session in Olympia, but one of the most significant achievements deserves more attention. We should pause and consider the significance of the fact that the protections secured for Washington’s natural environment will also go a long way toward benefiting the state’s rural economies.

This winter, rural legislators from Eastern Washington joined with their urban West Side colleagues to pass two landmark bills that may provide the momentum needed to bring down the Cascade Curtain and usher in a new era of progress toward sustainable natural resource policies in our state.

For several decades the tension between providing water for Eastern Washington irrigators and the need to ensure that enough water remains in the Columbia River to protect fish, wildlife and water quality generated plenty of friction but no solutions. Consequently, gridlock developed under which almost no new water rights were issued and Columbia River flows were too low to protect salmon and steelhead.

Thanks to the leadership of Gov. Chris Gregoire and key legislators, including Sen. Erik Poulsen, a Democrat from West Seattle, and Sen. Bob Morton, a Republican from Kettle Falls, that dispiriting status quo was dramatically improved. With overwhelming support, the Legislature passed a bill that promises to develop new water supplies to benefit communities along the Columbia River while protecting the Columbia and its salmon and steelhead.

Conservationists and farmers were also able to come together under the banner of biofuels. Lawmakers from across the state united under Gov. Gregoire’s leadership to pass landmark biofuels legislation, which puts Washington state in the national vanguard in combating climate change and our nation’s oil dependency. The bill sets minimum requirements for the use of biodiesel and ethanol in vehicles, and has gained the support of farmers who will have a new market for their crops.

When it comes to protecting the environment and rural economies, there are also encouraging signs to the south. In the Klamath River Basin in Oregon and California, farmers, tribes, fishermen and conservationists are working together to resolve one of the most heated “water wars” in the country. The situation hit rock-bottom when farmers’ irrigation water was severely restricted in 2001. In 2002, 70,000 chinook salmon died in the lower river because of low flows and disease.

Though an agreement has not yet been reached and declaring success would be premature, the stakeholders are working constructively toward a solution that may involve dramatic changes in Klamath River management, including the removal of several hydroelectric dams owned by PacifiCorp.

In all three cases, bold leadership has been an indispensable ingredient. And that leadership has come from both elected officials and stakeholders. In a leadership void hostility festers, battle lines harden, uncertainty is rampant and money is directed toward court battles and ineffective actions that are assumed to be politically safe. No one is better off in such a scenario, including politicians who are perceived as indecisive and feckless.

These success stories by no means suggest that difficult and contentious environmental policy decisions are behind us. But we should recognize and celebrate the significance of what has been accomplished.

These collaborative efforts point the way toward progress on other seemingly intractable issues in the region, including recovery of Snake River salmon and the issue of removing the four costly dams on the lower Snake. They demonstrate what can be accomplished when ideology gives way to pragmatic problem-solving, and when antagonism gives way to listening to the concerns of others with whom you might not agree, but without whom progress is difficult or impossible to achieve.

So let’s give a hand to Gov. Gregoire and the Washington legislators from both sides of the aisle who have succeeded in enacting two new laws that will address the economic needs of their constituents while protecting and restoring the health of Washington’s environment for generations to come. And, here’s to many more collaborative successes in the future.