October 9, 1998

Gorton says Elwha Dam removal won't happen

By JOHN HUGHES
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. Slade Gorton says he is making good on a threat he made months ago.

He will kill legislation to remove the Elwha Dam on Washington's Olympic Peninsula because the Clinton administration has rejected a provision to protect other dams in the Columbia-Snake river system.

"Without an agreement, the Elwha dam removal language will be gone and we'll have to start fresh next year," said Rob Nichols, a spokesman for the Washington state Republican.

But nothing is for certain. Tim Ahern, a spokesman for the Interior Department, said Clinton officials were still discussing the dam proposal with Gorton on Thursday.

"We're hopeful we can work something out," Ahern said.

The latest chapter in the debate over dams began Wednesday night, when Gorton met with Katie McGinty, Clinton's environmental adviser. Nichols said McGinty refused to accept Gorton's latest version of his dam protection language.

That language states that Congress must approve any action that would remove, breach or "materially diminish" a dam in the Columbia-Snake system.

Gorton wrote the language mainly to prevent the administration from removing the earthen portions of four dams on the lower Snake River in order to help salmon migrate.

The National Marine Fisheries Service is scheduled to recommend next year whether the four dams in Eastern Washington should be breached.

But Clinton officials have said the Gorton language is written so narrowly that Congress would need to give permission for even minor, day-to-day dam operations on the Columbia-Snake system.

Gorton wants the dam protection language to be part of a $13.4 billion bill to fund federal energy and interior projects.

Gorton authored the bill, one of 13 that must pass this year to fund essential government operations, in his job as chairman of the interior subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

The bill also includes $2 million to "plan and design" the Elwha Dam's removal -- a provision that Gorton says he will strike.

The Clinton administration and environmentalists have sought for years to take down the Elwha Dam.

Studies show that taking down the 105-foot-high dam, which supplies some of the electricity for a pulp and paper mill in Port Angeles, will increase the region's salmon population by 30,000 after 30 years.

The salmon population near the Elwha currently numbers 3,000 to 4,000.

Congress has previously approved $29.5 million to acquire the Elwha and nearby Glines Canyon dams, but the $2 million in this year's bill would be the first money to go toward actually removing it.

Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., whose district includes the dam, said he will try to convince Gorton to hang on to the Elwha language in the bill.

"That is very disappointing," he said of Gorton's decision to remove it. "That's a serious mistake."