[env-trinity] Klamath coho listing ruled illegal but protection stays for now

Wed Jan 12 06:59:51 PST 2005

http://www.oregonlive.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/news-9/1105490945268780.xml&storylist=orlocal 
Klamath coho listing ruled illegal but protection stays for now 

By JEFF BARNARD 
The Associated Press 
1/11/2005, 4:42 p.m. PT 

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) - A federal judge ruled Tuesday that coho salmon in the Klamath 
River should not have been listed as a threatened species without taking into account 
hatchery fish along with wild, but let stand the Endangered Species Act protection pending a 
federal review. 

In a repeat of his 2001 finding that struck down protection for Oregon coastal coho over the 
lack of genetic distinction between hatchery and wild salmon, U.S. District Judge Michael 
Hogan ruled from the bench in Eugene in favor of a lawsuit brought by property rights 
advocates challenging threatened species status for coho salmon in a region of Northern 
California and Southern Oregon that includes the Klamath and Rogue rivers. 

However, he granted a motion from NOAA Fisheries to let stand the threatened species listing 
until the agency completes a comprehensive review of 26 West Coast salmon listings 
prompted by the Oregon coastal coho ruling. 

That review, which considers hatchery fish along with wild, is expected to be finished this 
June, said NOAA Fisheries spokesman Brian Gorman. 

The ruling affects coho in the Klamath River, where agricultural and fishing groups and 
Indian tribes have been fighting over scarce water since the Bush administration was forced 
by the Endangered Species Act in 2001 to shut off water to farmers on the Klamath 
Reclamation Project to assure water for threatened and endangered fish. 

NOAA Fisheries has already said it expects Klamath coho to retain threatened species listing. 

Hogan allowed the plaintiffs, the California State Grange and Oregon State Grange, to return 
to court if they are harmed by any actions based on the listing, such as a repeat of the 2001 
irrigation water cutbacks, said Russell Brooks, an attorney for the Pacific Legal Foundation, a 
property rights public interest law firm that represents them. 

Brooks said the ruling left plaintiffs well situated to resume their challenges of Endangered 
Species Act protections for salmon after the new listings are issued this June. 

Glen Spain of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations, which represents 
California commercial fishermen and was an intervener in the case, said it was an empty 
victory for property rights advocates. 

"I would say this is a victory of common sense over denial and efforts to grab more water in 
the river," Spain said. 

Brooks added that they were considering appealing the case in hopes of winning a U.S. 
Supreme Court ruling that would leave judges with no option to let the threatened species 
status stand in future cases. A rule in force in the West Coast jurisdiction of the 9th U.S. 
Circuit Court of appeals allows that option. 

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