By Doug Barker
The Daily World
The Quinault Indian Nation says it will oppose a proposal to build a dam designed to reduce flooding in the Chehalis Basin, particularly in the Centralia and Chehalis communities.
The tribe said the adverse impact on salmon and other aquatic species would be unacceptable and not enough has been done to explore alternatives that would reduce flooding without a dam.
The opposition, announced Thursday, comes now because the state is in the midst of taking comments on a recently released draft environmental impact statement considering the dam and other measures to reduce flooding and protect aquatic species. Comments on the draft are due near the end of May and the tribe is preparing a detailed technical response.
The draft EIS was done by the state Department of Ecology. The official sponsor for the dam, which would be built near Pe Ell, is a relatively small government agency in Lewis County called the Chehalis Basin Flood Control District, but the idea for the dam is part of larger flood control initiative born from the massive flooding in 2007 that caused millions of dollars in damage and closed the I-5 freeway for a week. Since then there have been at least two more major floods when huge storms have brought a deluge of rain to the Willapa Hills, headwaters for the Chehalis.
The Quinaults say their treaty rights for salmon and other resources are affected by what happens in aquatic habitat in the Chehalis Basin and their own evaluation determines the dam would virtually guarantee extinction of spring Chinook returning to the basin and accelerate the decline of coho, fall Chinook and steelhead runs.
The tribe’s statement Thursday describes the draft EIS as “superficial” and said the “lack of analysis of an alternative to the dam underscores the Quinault Nation’s long-standing concern that the state’s Chehalis Basin Strategy has focused too much on the dam for flood damage reduction at the expense of developing a credible alternative.
“It’s time to look at an alternative that can deliver flood damage benefits in an equitable way to communities throughout the Chehalis Basin. We need a Plan B,” said Quinault Indian Nation Vice President Tyson Johnston, who is one of seven voting members of the Chehalis Basin Board which oversees the Chehalis Basin Strategy, a roadmap of efforts to address flooding and the health of aquatic species in the basin.
As members of the board, the nation has worked closely with the coalition of state and local government interests. Some localized projects, including replacing a failed dam at Cosmopolis, have already been completed using state money, but the major emphasis on flood reduction has been the dam proposal. Cost estimates has been as much as as $600 million. Who would own and operate it and how it would be funded, haven’t been determined.
Proponents of building a dam have regarded the Quinault and Chehalis tribes as non-supportive of a dam, but hoped that proposed mitigation measures and the habitat improvements and other aspects of the plan would be enough to win their support.
Johnston said the tribe opposes the dam but it won’t stop working with the other parties looking to reduce flooding. “The nation doesn’t plan on disengaging from the process. We want to move forward full-speed ahead. We need to … look at other alternatives that get us to the same goal. There are other ways to address flooding than building a dam.”
Proponents of the dam disagree and say that landscape changes in the floodplain will have some effect, but won’t come close to the effects of a dam when it comes to reducing the catastrophic flooding that occurs when huge storms bring a deluge of rain to the Willapa Hills.
The Quinault Nation is committed to finding solutions to flooding impacts on the most at-risk communities in the basin, Johnston said, “.. but we have fought for decades to exercise our treaty rights off the reservation to protect aquatic species and we’ve made so much progress working together. … We don’t want to get into this mindset that it’s a forgone conclusion that things are going to go extinct anyway. We’ve proved it time and again — with best practices and science, we can see species thrive again.”
Johnston said the tribe wants to see a cost/benefit analysis comparing the dam with other solutions that would include multiple smaller flood-control measures. He also said the dam would focus most of the benefits in the upper parts of the basin, and fewer toward the bottom, where the Chehalis River empties into Grays Harbor.
He said that wouldn’t mean starting the review process over because much of the groundwork has already been started.
“All we’re asking is that the local actions alternative be considered and analyzed at the same level as the dam,” he said.
