I caught this article in our local newspaper and thought I
should pass it along to others. In my area of the country the
fishing issue has been just as horrible as in Washington State
or Minnesota/Wisconsin. Every year the Yurok and Hoopa Indians
have to fight for quotas so as their livelihood will not be
destroyed by the overbearing fishery or lumber groups.
****TIMES STANDARD****
Saturday June 4, 1994 Eureka, CA.
YUROKS BLAST BOSCO OVER FISHING RIGHTS
By David Anderson
EUREKA - Yurok tribal leaders defended their fishing rights
Friday and blasted former congressman Doug Bosco for disavowing
a legal settlement which they say he authored himself.
Tribal Chairwoman Susis L. Long said Bosco's alleged reversal
of postion was probably motivated by his primary campaign to
unseat Rep. Dan Hamburg, D-Ukiah, and regain his former seat.
"I guess he thinks he'll get some political advantage out of
it," she said. "It's too bad, because he was helpful in
arranging the settlement when he was still in congress.
Bosco declined to respond Friday Night.
In an interview on May 27, Bosco blamed federal policies for
the decline of salmon in the Pacific Northwest. He specified
diversion and Indian fishing allocations.
"The real cause for the disaster we face," he said, is "giving
50 percent of the fish to a few small groups of Indian fishermen
who catch thousands of fish just as they're going to spawn."
As a congressman in 1988, Long noted, Bosco authored the
settlement under which the Hoopa Valley Tribe retained the timber
on the reservation square, while the Yurok were compensated with
what they were told would be a $1 million commercial river
fishery in the Klamath River.
In fact, Long said, the tribe has never since the settlement
had a commercial fishery in the river, and in recent years has
not even harvested the 12,000-fish minimum allocation to which it
is entitled for subsistence purposes.
In a press release Friday, the tribal council accused Bosco of
untruthfulness on the issue.
"Candidate Bosco's statements are... inconsistent with the
position he took when he authored the Hoopa/Yurok Settlement
Act," the release said. "His statements reflect a lack of
understanding of current issues."
"The tribal allocation is assigned after the number of fall
Chinook salmon necessary for escapement purposes has been
identified," it added. "The allocation issue is independent of
the stock status issue."
"As one of the primary managers of the Klamath basin fishery
resource, the Yurok Tribe cannot let blatant misinformation of
this type go unanswered."
Almost all Pacific salmon stocks are depressed, the Yurok
statement notes, although tribal fisheries have access only to a
few of them. The tribes, along with other user groups and state
and federal agencies, are working together to restore the runs.
In addition to water diversion for agriculture and municipal
use, Long said, government policies that have hurt salmon stocks
include overharvesting and inadequate protection of spawning
streams on national forest and other federal lands during the
1980s.
In an unrelated article from the same paper and date:
NADER LABELS BOSCO 'TOOL' OF TIMBER INDUSTRY
EUREKA - Consumer acvocate Ralph Nader raided the Democratic
capaign for the 1st Congressional District seat Thursday with a
scathing volley at a challenger.
Nader blasted former Rep. Doug Bosco as 'tool of the timber
corporations," rather than a voice for the North Coast citizens,
for receiving a $180,000 annual salary as a lobbyist for Pacific
Lumber Co.
"Doug Bosco acted as a paid lobbyist for a timber firm," Nader
said in a fax statement from Washington, D.C. "That raises
serious questions abput his independence, and his ability to
advocate for North Coast citizens, instead of his narrow
interests of a few lumber corporations.
(there is more to this article but is unrelated to the above
issue)