Tweets, since the listprocessor hasn't deleted me yet (takes two tries,
apparently), I am responding to one last message below:

----- Original Message -----
From: Don Baccus <dhogaza at pacifier.com>
>
> With all due respect, having monitored the salmon situation for many
> years before they were listed, as well as since they've been listed,
> it's hard to put the US Army Corps of Engineers into that "almost
> everyone" category.

This is exactly what I was talking about. Thankfully, it's politely worded,
which is much appreciated. But I actually work with people at the Portland
District Corps, as well as NOAA, and have over the years met Herb and Helen
at Seattle Audubon, all key players in this story. There are a lot of
good-hearted people at the Corps - along with some older attitudes toward
rivers there are also a lot of dedicated people trying to reshape the Corps'
mission to include wetlands restoration, river cleanup, and other
environmentally beneficial goals. In this case, they believed they were
doing their part to reduce salmon predation.

It's true that the Corps as an organization has less experience with this
new mission than we or they might prefer, and they may make mistakes along
the way. The Corps of Engineers is changing. They are still largely an
organization dominated by engineers, but there is a new sense of mission and
doing beneficial things for the environment, of which, believe it or not,
the Caspian Tern thing was one. If you are basing your judgment on past
actions, you are missing the whole story. If they get slammed the first
time they try to do something positive, even if it was misguided, they're
going to be wary of trying anything again (and NO, that is not a good
thing). Believe it or not, the Corps of Engineers and the Port of Seattle
have been responsible for carrying out more contaminated sediment cleanup
and funding more habitat restoration on the Duwamish River than any other
entity (and I was involved with nearly every project, so I have a basis for
this statement). And many of these projects are working out very well - one
thing about the Corps, they know how to move stuff in the water, and almost
no-one else does.

I am still not certain what I think about this issue, or that the Corps was
completely wrong to think that moving the terns down-river to the mouth
might help. The concept may have been a bit misguided in the sense that
moving a flock of terns may be a little difficult to do (the term "herding
cats" comes to mind but may be inappropriate for this discussion group :-) -
remember when the Navy tried to move the terns off the Everett Homeport and
the Port of Everett tried to entice them to Jetty Island? (grin) But were
it to succeed, I am still uncertain as to its impact on either the terns or
the fish. I respectfully disagree with Seattle Audubon on their position on
this one, however, I do agree that they have thought it through carefully
and are doing what they believe is right. That's really all you can ask of
people.

That's what is missing in this and most of these discussions - respect and
an understanding that it is possible for thinking, intelligent people to
look at the same set of facts (assuming they can even get the facts clearly
in the first place) and draw DIFFERENT conclusions. Everyone's personal
biases play into their positions, and organizational biases too, not to
mention the information we choose to receive. If we all realized that our
own opinions may be colored by our thoughts and experiences and
informational filters, and may or may not be "right" in the final analysis,
our discussions would be a lot more civil (and educational).

> I'd also have to say that I find it hard to
> describe industry groups potentially affected economically by
> salmon conservation efforts in this manner.

I wasn't including industry in my comment, since they have little to do with
the specific Salmon/Tern issue under discussion. I have no experience
working with the industries on the Columbia River, so I'll keep quiet on
that one. - Teresa