CMR and the LSR dams

Salmon die in barges. Salmon die in trucks. Salmon die in turbines. Salmon die in overheated water behind dams on the lower Snake River. All facts supported by the best fishery scientists in the world. The Army Corps of Engineers knows these facts and knows the lower Snake River dams have outlived their usefulness and will soon cost more to maintain than the income generated from power sales.

Cathy McMorris Rodgers and her science-denier cabal continue to argue that everything else is responsible for killing salmon. Puget Sound, sea lions and birds. Oh my!.

Idaho Rep. Michael Simpson has proposed a solution that provides a ten year window to prepare, build infrastructure and acquire reliable, clean, renewable energy as well as build transportation alternatives to replace the subsidized river transport system currently used to kill salmon.

CMR calls to “build trust and engage in conversation” as a solution. Cathy, where have you been through the past five years of countless stakeholder meetings, actual scientific studies, community organizing drives across the region that have resulted in the public outcry over the ongoing decimation of a species?

CMR”s continual stalling any solution for the sake of more discussion shows her utter lack of political will to save a species, restore tribal fishing grounds and help insure the survival of downstream species that depend on the salmon that she continues to kill off.

Ed Parents

Spokane