Funny fish

From the start, environmentalists opposed to Maine’s state plan for the conservation and restoration of wild Atlantic salmon have criticized it as too short on financial commitment and too reliant on volunteers.

Now, as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service evalute the plan after its first year in operation, and as the threat of an Endangered Species Act listing for seven Maine rivers looms large, those usually dour environmentalists must be beside themselves with glee. The money still isn’t there; the volunteers are getting bloodied by rock throwers.

The two federal agencies released their staff comments and the comments they received from the public on the plan Wednesday and the reviews hardly rave. Cited are delays: in building weirs to prevent the intrusion of farmed salmon; in developing water-use management plans to prevent a repeat of last summer’s ill-timed drawing down of a potentially listed river for agriculture irrigation; in designating critical habitat areas as resource protection zones.

Various delays with a common theme — no money. And that’s where the rocks start to fly.

Rep Edward Dugay, Democrat of Cherryfield, attempted to get Maine to ante up with legislation, first a resolve, now taking shape as a bill, to establish a pilot watershed-management program for the Narraguagus and Pleasant rivers. At an estimated cost of $100,000, the project would include the hiring of a watershed manager for each of the rivers to coordinate habitat protection and enhancement activities in the affected communities.

The first draft of the resolve, whether by mistake, by oversight, by poor choice of words, or just as a starting point, contained a clause that would repeal the authority of local code enforcement officers to enforce laws pertaining to watershed and water quality protection and to vest that authority in the hands of the watershed managers.

Dugay says his only intent was to get the state to put some money behind the plan and to have the watershed managers work in cooperation with local, part-time, overburdened CEOs, to serve as a central point of reference for what has to be a coordinated effort if it is to succeed. He also correctly points out that the legislative process still to come, the public hearings and work sessions, is where rough drafts are turned into finished products.

Not good enough for Maine’s property-rights activists. The proposal has been called a “Green conspiracy,” the resignations of the volunteer watershed committee members who suggested it are demanded. There’s talk of locking and loading, of sniper fire. Heads must roll.

So here’s Maine, perhaps a month from a crucial federal decision, pinning its hopes on a plan with no money and no local coordination. Here’s the Legislature, being asked to appropriate $100,000 to finance squabbling. Here’s volunteers being driven out because they’re not true believers. Here’s the true believers raving about local control as they roll out the red carpet for federal control under an endangered species listing.

It would be amusing if the stakes weren’t so high. Right now, the only ones smiling are the environmentalists.