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Looming Salmon Closures Will Hurt Coastal and Inland Communities
Coastal communities will be devastated by the looming closure of commercial and recreational ocean salmon fishing seasons off the California and Oregon coast. The cities of Sacramento, Knights Landing, Colusa, Corning, Red Bluff and Redding and other Central Valley communities will also also face losses of revenue generated by recreational salmon fishing. Although the Bush and Schwarzenegger administrations have tried to avoid any responsibility for this fishery collapse, it becomes clearer every day that federal and state mismanagement of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and the Central Valley rivers have played a huge role in the collapse. "In California and Oregon south of Cape Falcon (in northern Oregon), where Sacramento fish stocks have the biggest impact, the commercial and recreational salmon fishery had an average economic value of $103 million per year between 1979 and 2004," according to a statement from the Pacific Fishery Management Council on March 21. "From 2001 to 2005, average economic impact to communities was $61 million ($40 million in the commercial fishery and $21 million in the recreational fishery)." The Bush administration says that the reason for the sudden collapse of the Sacramento fall Chinook stock is "not readily apparent," but fishing, tribal and environmental groups point to massive water exports from the California Delta in recent years and rapidly declining water quality in Central Valley rivers as the key factors behind the fishery collapse. Although the ocean conditions were undoubtedly poor, many of the fish never made it to the ocean because they were sucked into the massive state and federal export pumps in the Delta or starved as they migrated through the estuary, due to the collapse of the Delta food chain. Photo: Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations (PCFFA), explains how dramatic increases in Delta exports correspond directly with salmon fishery declines.
Coastal communities will be devastated by the looming closure of commercial and recreational ocean salmon fishing seasons off the California and Oregon coast. The cities of Sacramento, Knights Landing, Colusa, Corning, Red Bluff and Redding and other Central Valley communities will also also face losses of revenue generated by recreational salmon fishing. Although the Bush and Schwarzenegger administrations have tried to avoid any responsibility for this fishery collapse, it becomes clearer every day that federal and state mismanagement of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and the Central Valley rivers have played a huge role in the collapse. "In California and Oregon south of Cape Falcon (in northern Oregon), where Sacramento fish stocks have the biggest impact, the commercial and recreational salmon fishery had an average economic value of $103 million per year between 1979 and 2004," according to a statement from the Pacific Fishery Management Council on March 21. "From 2001 to 2005, average economic impact to communities was $61 million ($40 million in the commercial fishery and $21 million in the recreational fishery)." The Bush administration says that the reason for the sudden collapse of the Sacramento fall Chinook stock is "not readily apparent," but fishing, tribal and environmental groups point to massive water exports from the California Delta in recent years and rapidly declining water quality in Central Valley rivers as the key factors behind the fishery collapse. Although the ocean conditions were undoubtedly poor, many of the fish never made it to the ocean because they were sucked into the massive state and federal export pumps in the Delta or starved as they migrated through the estuary, due to the collapse of the Delta food chain. Photo: Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations (PCFFA), explains how dramatic increases in Delta exports correspond directly with salmon fishery declines.
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