Editorial
Credibility endangered

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To a public already skeptical about the Bush administration's commitment to protecting West Coast salmon and steelhead runs, a proposal to roll back critical habitat is all the more alarming.

Layered on top of constant pressure to undermine environmental protections — from roadless regulations in national forests to clean-air standards — there is precious little credibility for its plan. Last week, the administration said it wants to reduce the land area designated as critical habitat by 80 percent along thousands of miles of rivers and streams.

Twenty Northwest runs of salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act would be affected by a redefinition of the scope of habitat needed for their recovery. Critical areas would be narrowly identified as where those runs now exist, not where healthy runs might expand to or return.

Four years ago, the National Marine Fisheries Service embraced a broader definition, but a change of administration and legal decisions pushed a reassessment that weighs the expense of salmon recovery along with biological viability.

Indeed, Bob Lohn, Northwest regional administrator of NMFS, said a sharper pencil of another sort accounted for the dramatic revisions: better mapping with more accurate data.

Fair enough, but Seattle Times reporter Craig Welch also explained the habitat plan was designed in part by a lawyer for the timber industry who had sued the government over salmon protections. Last spring, he was retained as special counsel to the Fisheries Service for salmon recovery.

Recovering salmon and steelhead runs has proven to be extraordinarily expensive. No one should oppose efficiencies and saving money.

Over the years, it has also become just as apparent the money invested in salmon is wasted if their habitat is not protected so they have a place to return. Concentric rings of habitat policy and practice affect our water supplies and other resources.

If the public believed the Bush administration bought into the bigger picture, its arguments for equity and efficiencies would have more credibility.