Millions of dollars in salmon restoration funds are apparently being held hostage in an effort to push forestry regulators to stiffen regulations to protect threatened fish.
The $11.5 million in bond money was stripped out of the budget this week, while the California Board of Forestry passed a rule package that disappointed environmentalists. The money would be used to match federal funds to do work to improve salmon habitat from Del Norte County to Santa Barbara.
”Restoration should be going on as constantly as possible,” said Will Shuck, chief of staff for Assemblywoman Patty Berg. “We don't want to see it used as a political tool.”
The Eureka Democrat's office has asked Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez and Budget Committee Chairman John Laird to put the money back into the budget. Of course, that money is a drop in the $105 billion budget bucket the Legislature is trying to carry to completion, and which is already late. In her July 9 letter, Berg said that losing the funds would send a terrible message about the Legislature's environmental stewardship.
Mitch Farro with the Pacific Coast Fish, Wildlife and Wetland Restoration Association said that the loss of funds would hold up a slate of projects proposed in May and sacrifice federal dollars that help pay for them. That would not only be bad for fish, but also for the industry that has been built up to do the restoration work.
”It's like they're playing chicken with us in the back seat,” Farro said.
Neither Nuñez's nor Laird's office returned phone calls seeking comment.
The state's rules to protect coho salmon have been called inadequate by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the California Department of Fish and Game. This week's decision allows landowners to more easily obtain permits for logging that may harm threatened coho salmon. Two of the major landowners on the North Coast, Green Diamond Resource Co. and the Pacific Lumber Co., already have their own plans addressing coho.
Berg and other Democrats on Wednesday sent a letter to the board of forestry voicing concern that the new rules would do little to address habitat degradation.
When the state secretary of resources last year proposed changes seen as favorable by environmental groups, they were whittled down, according to Paul Mason with the Sierra Club.
He said he believes the budget committee felt it was unwise to put millions more into restoration when forest rules may be counteracting that work.
”It's like trying to fill a bucket with a hole in the bottom,” Mason said.
Mason wouldn't say he supported the tactic, and lobbied last week to have the restoration money restored to the budget. But he also said he understands the quandary and added that there is not much support for the status quo.
Berg's office hopes the restoration funds can be put into the budget in a trailer bill after the budget passes, whenever that may be. |