New Members May Kill Drawdowns

If Todd Maddock and Mike Field are joining the Northwest Power Planning Council this week hoping to rewrite the council’s salmon recovery strategy, they likely will be disappointed.

But the two Idaho members eventually could do what Gov.-elect Phil Batt appointed them to do: Prevent a series of reservoir drawdowns from taking place. Here’s why.

The eight-member council was created to set policy for the federal hydropower system. To keep any state from dominating, voting procedures make it difficult to approve a major rule such as the salmon strategy.

For a new strategy to be approved, at least one “yes” vote is needed from three of the four states.

However, a simple 5-3 majority is probably all that’s needed to prevail in the votes required for each phase in the multiyear drawdown process.

So if Montana and Idaho members stay on their anti-drawdown course, they would need to enlist only one vote from Oregon or Washington.

Field and Maddock aren’t familiar yet with council procedures.

“I have never been a close follower of the council,” said Maddock, a Lewiston resident whose holiday greetings from council staff came in the form of “a 50-pound box” of background materials.

Maddock, 59, is the first member from North Idaho in the council’s 15-year history. He has long been a spokesman for Potlatch Corp. The timber and pulp giant, which uses barge shipping extensively, has opposed drawdowns that would shut down inland ports every spring.

Field, 44, lives in Boise. His 20-year government career has included working for former Sen. Jim McClure. He has most recently been natural resources aide for another Idaho Republican, Sen. Larry Craig.

Neither Field nor Maddock gives any indication that they can be persuaded to support costly and disruptive reservoir drawdowns.

“If there’s no scientific basis for drawdown - and they have not shown us any scientific basis - then why are they proceeding with that strategy?” asked Field.

Another federal judge is looking over the shoulder of the National Marine Fisheries Service. That agency has authority under the Endangered Species Act to dictate federal river operations. The power council, while influential, can only advise river operators.

What will the council do if the upcoming federal recovery plan for Snake River salmon differs from its own basin-wide strategy?

That, says council attorney John Volkman, is the “the $64,000 question … People have been asking that ever since the endangered species listings first happened.”