Canoes return to Kettle Falls to support salmon's return (link). Grand Coulee dam drowned Kettle Falls, once a great salmon fishery where indigenous people from across the region gathered from time immemorial for the returning salmon. Tribes are working to restore salmon over Grand Coulee dam to the Upper Columbia River. Sierra Club's Columbia River Team is actively supporting the tribes' efforts to restore salmon. (John Osborn photo)
By John Osborn, The Columbia River Team
The Columbia River Team was established in 2019 as part of Sierra Club’s Grassroots Network to coordinate work between the Sierra Club’s four northwest chapters (OR, WA, ID and MT) and Sierra Club B.C. Our team has its roots in the old Northwest Regional Conservation Committee (RCC), which coordinated Sierra Club’s work on the Columbia River and public lands advocacy during the 1980s and 1990s.
The Columbia River Team is charged with speaking for the national Sierra Club on modernizing the Columbia River Treaty and restoring salmon above Grand Coulee Dam, returning home to ancestral spawning waters of time immemorial.
We work in support of Indigenous nations in modernizing the treaty and restoring salmon. Building upon a foundation established in the 1980’s, we support tribal sovereigns’ efforts to clean up massive mining and smelting pollution in the Coeur d’Alene-Spokane Basin and mainstem Columbia River behind Grand Coulee Dam.
Sierra Club is uniquely positioned as an NGO, working with Sierra Club B.C., in covering the Columbia River watershed, an area the size of Texas or France. We also coordinate with the Sierra Club team working on breaching lower Snake River dams to save salmon and Puget Sound orcas.
We work to educate and involve the public on the Treaty and restoring salmon. Public interest advocacy on an international river is novel, challenging, and an opportunity to advance the common good. Engaging on the climate crisis and with the U.S. State Department are just two elements of our treaty work.
We also help to host the annual One River, Ethics Matter conference series focusing on indigenous sovereigns and the ethical principles of justice and stewardship. In 2021, our 8th international river ethics conference will be hosted virtually by the Okanagan Nation Alliance and University of British Columbia (UBC) – Okanagan. Mark your calendar for the mornings of Nov. 17-18.
With the Washington State Chapter’s support, we also just completed a short documentary of our 2017 conference, Revelstoke: One River – Ethics Matter. In this film you’ll see the four Indigenous Nations of the uppermost portion of the international Columbia Basin coming together in Revelstoke, committed to restoring salmon to the upper Columbia River.
We recently published a two-page fact sheet that explains our approach and the issues we work on. You can find it, and more, on our team web page.
The Columbia River Team currently includes nine core members representing the OR, ID, WA, MT chapters, along with a B.C. liaison. We welcome Washington State Chapter members to join our team and participate in these important organizing efforts.
Interested in helping? Contact the co-leads for the team: John Osborn john@waterplanet.ws or Graeme Lee Rowlands graeme@wildsalmon.org