Communities around Washington State will receive $20.7 million in state grants to fix damaged rivers and streams, replace failing culverts and replant riverbanks with the goal of helping recover salmon from the brink of extinction, the Washington State Salmon Recovery Funding Board announced last week.
“Salmon are an important part of Washington’s economy and culture. These grants will do two things,” said Steve Tharinger, chairman of the Salmon Recovery Funding Board. “They will help put people to work improving our environment, and they will help us protect and restore salmon populations important to communities across Washington.”
The grants will fund big and small restoration projects across the state, including planting trees along streams to cool the water enough so salmon can survive, replacing culverts that currently prevent salmon from migrating to and from spawning habitat and restoring entire floodplains and estuaries. The grants are estimated to create or continue about 250 jobs in the next four years.
Grants were given to projects as noted below. See details on each project at http://www.rco.wa.gov/documents/press/2010/079-SRFBGrantListsbyCounty.pdf.
Benton County........................... $114,055
Chelan County....................... $1,070,750
Clallam County....................... $1,074,347
Clark County............................... $886,486
Columbia County................... $1,014,179
Garfield County...................... See Details
Grays Harbor County................ $474,737
Island County............................. $268,875
Jefferson County.................... $1,332,911
King County............................ $2,128,798
Kitsap County............................. $148,115
Kittitas County............................ $609,549
Klickitat County.......................... $294,214
Lewis County................................ $56,000
Mason County............................ $435,118
Okanogan County.................. $1,110,100
Pacific County............................ $505,708
Pend Oreille County.................. $402,000
Pierce County............................. $851,007
San Juan County...................... $310,855
Skagit County.......................... $1,416,732
Skamania County.................. $1,376,500
Snohomish County................ $1,007,566
Thurston County........................ $624,279
Wahkiakum County.................. $578,500
Walla Walla County................... $426,201
Whatcom County....................... $794,480
Yakima County.......................... $708,664
Multiple Counties....................... $758,270
Local watershed groups develop these projects based on regional recovery plans, which are approved by the federal government. Individual projects are reviewed by regional salmon recovery organizations and the state’s technical review panel to make sure each project will help recover salmon in the most cost-effective manner.
“This local, state, and federal partnership has made Washington a national model in salmon recovery,” Tharinger said.
In 1991, the federal government declared the first salmon, Snake River sockeye, as endangered. By the end of that decade, the federal government had designated 16 more species of salmon as at-risk of extinction, covering three-quarters of the state. Those listings set off a series of activities including the formation of the Salmon Recovery Funding Board to oversee the investment of state and federal funds for salmon recovery. Since 2000, the board has awarded nearly $417 million in grants, funded by federal and state dollars, for 1,775 projects. Grantees have contributed more than $189 million in matching resources.
Funding for the grants announced today comes from the federal Pacific Coastal Salmon Recovery Fund. The funding for these grants was approved by Congress earlier this year.
Information about the Salmon Recovery Funding Board and the Recreation and Conservation Office is available online at www.rco.wa.gov.
