Nisqually Restoration
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Original Air Date: 01/21/2010
The Nisqually Restoration
As we splash around in the waters of the Puget Sound, it's disheartening to realize that the Sound is one of the five most polluted waterways in North America.
Every year, roughly 52-million pounds of toxic chemicals wash into the Puget Sound. Five types of salmon and the orca are listed by the federal government as endangered species. Over all, one-thousand Puget Sound species are in decline. The price tag to clean up our famed waterway now sits at seven to eight billion dollars.
One clean-up project that is well underway is the restoration of the Nisqually delta estuary. After one hundred years of farming. The dikes surrounding the delta are coming down and salt water is returning to this important breeding and feeding ground.
Guests
You can follow the restoration efforts here.
Georgiana Kautz - Natural Resource Manager, Nisqually Tribe
Georgiana is a tribal elder of the Nisqually Tribe and used to fish in the Nisqually River for years. Her husband, Nugent Kautz continues to fish. Georgiana is a spokesperson for the tribe and speaks frequently about the importance of the Nisqually River to the Native Americans who have called it home for countless generations. Georgiana manages the Natural Resource arm of the Nisqually tribe and its efforts of estuary and salmon restoration.
Visit the Nisqually tribe website here.
Jean Takekawa – Manager, Nisqually Wildlife Refuge
As the manager of the Refuge, Jean has witnessed the entire Nisqually restoration take place. She is employed by the fish and wildlife service, and understands the logistical hurdles that had to be overcome in order to make the restoration happen. As someone who is at the site every day, Jean has first-hand knowledge of how the local ecosystem has been changing since the restoration began, and what how the estuary is responding daily.
Visit the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge website here.
Kathy Fletcher – Executive Director, People for Puget Sound
Kathy founded People for Puget Sound in 1991 with the aim to protect and restore Puget Sound and the Northwest Straits. Kathy previously chaired the Puget Sound Water Quality Authority, a state agency formed in 1985 to develop a comprehensive plan to clean up and protect the Sound and Straits. During the Carter Administration, she served on the White House Domestic Policy Staff, where she handled environmental and natural resource issues.
Visit the People for Puget Sound website here.
Stats and Facts
The tide is moving back in to the Nisqually delta. After more than 100 years without saltwater, historic farming dykes have been removed and the waters of the Puget Sound are moving in to recreate a fertile estuary for fish, birds, plants, and mammals.
In April, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced the $12 million delta project would receive $3.4 million through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. That was in addition to $1.45 million added in the 2009 U.S. Fish and Wildlife budget. In addition, a $50 million appropriation to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for Puget Sound restoration is working its way through Congress. An as-yet-undetermined portion of that money also is headed to the Nisqually.
Work on the Nisqually River estuary has boosted the total South Sound estuary habitat by 55 percent. Fisheries scientists predict the Nisqually estuary restoration will double survival of the river’s chinook salmon population, which is one of the stocks that landed on the federal endangered species list as a threatened species in 1999.
150,000 pounds a day of untreated toxics flow into Puget Sound.
One million additional people are expected to join the 4 million already here by 2025, a growth rate that intensifies every Puget Sound problem and adds complexity to every proposed solution.
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