A River Never Sleeps

Three years before Laura McCoy was born into the Ktunaxa First Nation in southeastern B.C. the Grand Coulee was built in central Washington, stopping the salmon runs abruptly.

She may never live long enough to see the salmon return, but now, 64 years after the biggest dam in North America cut off those runs, there is hope that the salmon might one day come back.

The Ktunaxa First Nation and other groups this year asked the International Joint Commission - a body that deals with border water issues - is being asked to consider whether U.S. authorities should be responsible for restoring Ms. McCoy’s lost fishing rights.

In submissions to the IJC, the Canadian Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fisheries Commission and West Coast Environmental Law, a non-profit organization based in Vancouver, have asked that salmon be restored to the Upper Columbia.

In a submission to the IJC the Inter-Tribal Fisheries Commission said that before the Grand Coulee dam was built up to 75,000 Chinook, 55,000 sockeye and 112,000 steelhead were estimated to have been harvested by the Ktunaxa.

But after the “the eighth wonder of the world,” was built, becoming the largest concrete structure in North America, salmon runs into the Columbia, in Canada, dropped to zero. A fishery that had existed for at least 10,000 years was snuffed out almost overnight.

That meant Ms. McCoy, now 61, became the first generation of Ktunaxa to grow up without being able to fish for salmon on the Columbia.

“We have a group of elders that meets regularly. Some of them remember when the salmon came. But not too many,” said Ms. McCoy yesterday. “One lady remembers when her family used to go down to get salmon. Then they stopped going. She asked why and they told her: ‘The salmon aren’t there anymore’.”

Ms. McCoy said the Ktunaxa were offered compensation for their lost fishing rights by the government, but it wasn’t much.

“I never got to go salmon fishing,” said Ms. McCoy. “But I remember we used to receive some canned meat because of that. Just a few cans every year for awhile. It wasn’t even salmon.”

And eventually, she said, even the canned meat stopped coming.

Bill Green, a biologist and director of the Inter-Tribal Fisheries Commission, said the Ktunaxa have been working for decades on a strategy to try and force the U.S. to restore salmon runs.

He said the Ktunaxa First Nations had a research project throughout the 90’s looking at the legal issues and devising a strategy. That resulted, in 2003, in a formal letter asking the IJC to review a 1941 U.S. document, known as an approval order, that outlined conditions for constructing and operating the Grand Coulee Dam and reservoir.

In response to that request the IJC sought other submissions from interested parties, resulting in the filing, this week, of a response by West Coast Environmental Law.

West Coast lawyer, Andrew Gage, said the 1941 order requires “the protection and indemnification of the Province of British Columbia or of any private or municipal corporation or citizen . . .(from) sustained damage on account of the raising of the natural levels of the Columbia River at and above the international boundary.”

Mr. Gage said the order does not set any time limit and the Ktunaxa claim should be just as valid now as if it had been filed immediately after the dam was built.

He said he did not know why the federal and provincial governments failed to complain in the 1940’s, but there’s no reason the Ktunaxa claim can’t be heard now..

“The historical record is clear,” states the West Coast Law submission. “The Grand Coulee Dam cut off the escapement of anadromous fish to the Upper Columbia Basin. In so doing, the dam destroyed the fishery of the indigenous peoples of the Upper Columbia who had historically depended upon that anadromous fishery for subsistence, livelihood and cultural purposes.”

Mr. Gage said the IJC could reject the submissions, on the grounds it is too late to do anything, but he’s hopeful the bilateral organization that resolves transboundary environmental disputes, will side with the Ktunaxa.

“Their powers are broad,” he said of the IJC. “They are operating at the international level. They could issue specific orders (to U.S. authorities) spelling out what has to be done to restore the salmon runs.”

Mr. Green said as a first step the U.S. could start netting spawning salmon below Grand Coulee dam, and releasing them or planting their eggs in tributaries of the Columbia River in B.C. That could be followed by the construction of a fish ladder on the Grand Coulee.

“It can be done,” he said of restoring the salmon run. “And the salmon are still important to the Ktunaxa. When I go to community meetings there are always a few elders there who recall when they used to go fishing. But there are fewer of them every year.”

If the project succeeds, and fish passage ways are built around the Grand Coulee and Chief Joseph dams, it may be possible one day to stand in the shadow of the Rockies, and once again catch steelhead in the Columbia River. And for the Ktunaxa, that would mean once again being able to go down to the river’s edge in the late summer evenings, to spear big chinook and set them on their drying racks.