Rift widens over EWEB fish ladder

A growing chorus of critics opposed to the Eugene Water & Electric Board's plan for getting threatened fish past the utility's Trail Bridge Dam gained an unexpected ally on Tuesday: EWEB President Sandra Bishop.

Bishop, whose term on the five-member elected board expires in December, voted against a resolution authorizing EWEB to go forward with efforts to secure a new federal license for the Carmen-Smith Hydroelectric Project on the upper McKenzie River.

Bishop said she could not support the resolution unless EWEB formally abandons plans to trap and haul upstream-bound fish around Trail Bridge Dam, rather than build a more expensive fish ladder.

"We are not honoring our responsibility as stewards - the river up there is the gene pool for very rare fish," Bishop said. "I do not believe that trap and haul is something that's viable for us to do."

Other board members said they were not taking a stand on the merits of how best to accommodate the river's threatened chinook salmon and bull trout, but were instead focused on meeting a Nov. 30 deadline for submitting a final license application to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

Members said a final decision on fish access can be made months or even years after the final application is filed. "We have plenty of time to work out the details," said board member John Simpson.

EWEB's license to operate the Carmen-Smith project expires in November 2008. The Trail Bridge Reservoir and dam are the final links in the project, which consists of three dams and reservoirs, two large water tunnels and a pair of power plants.

EWEB engineers originally proposed a fish ladder for Trail Bridge, then changed their minds in favor of a trap-and-haul program. Among their reasons: fears that a fish ladder would have to be partially constructed through the existing earthen dam, resulting in dam safety concerns; and uncertainty over how to make a ladder work in a reservoir that fluctuates by as much 12 feet each year.

Another factor: EWEB has projected that a fish ladder could cost as much as $20 million. A trap-and-haul system, in which fish would be steered to a holding pond, then hauled daily by special vehicle to Trail Bridge Reservoir, would cost about half that amount.

Federal fish agencies have said they are skeptical of EWEB's trap-and-haul strategy, and six local environmental groups weighed in with the same sentiment in a letter sent to EWEB on Monday. Two local residents, state fish biologist Jeff Ziller and attorney Bill Kloos, also spoke out against the trap-and-haul option at Tuesday's meeting.

"You're doing this for financial reasons," Kloos said of the trap-and-haul approach. "You're really putting power first and fish last."

Ziller said EWEB's switch from fish ladder to trap-and-haul model was a "bombshell" to fish and forest agencies, which he said unanimously support the former and oppose the latter.

Many agencies view Trail Bridge as one of the rare dams capable of accommodating a fish ladder because of its relatively low height, he said.

Bishop read aloud from the letter submitted by the six environmental groups: American Whitewater, Cascadia Wildlands Project, McKenzie Flyfishers, Oregon Wild, Pacific Rivers Council and Trout Unlimited.

The letter questions EWEB's "sudden and unjustified change in direction" on how to deal with upstream-bound fish, and blasts the utility for suggesting the trap-and-haul option after the deadline for comment on the draft application for a new federal license had expired.

Trap-and-haul is not viable, the groups' letter says, because it increases the risk of injury and death to fish. Trap-and-haul programs can delay the movement of fish upstream, especially if transported only once a day as proposed by EWEB, the letter says, while a ladder allows fish to choose the timing and extent of their travel, and keeps them in the water with no human handling.

Studies have shown that trap-and-haul fish have lower rates of genetic imprinting, important in finding spawning grounds, according to the letter. Fish also can suffer when forced to coexist in dense numbers with other species, such as when chinook salmon are bunched with steelhead or rainbow trout, the letter says.

Overall, EWEB has said costs related to securing a new 30- to 50-year operational license for the Carmen-Smith project could reach $100 million, much of it acquired through ratepayer-financed borrowing. EWEB already has issued $11.7 million in bonds for initial studies and other costs, or nearly $2 million more than projected.

The other big cost item is a fish screen that EWEB proposes to build to protect downstream-bound fish at Trail Bridge. The screen, with an estimated price tag of $23 million, is generally supported by federal agencies and environmental groups.