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Tulalip Tribes foster collaboration to restore salmon passages
By Venice Buhain
The Tulalip Tribes have worked to restore salmon populations for decades. In recent years, they’ve taken a new approach: coordinating public agencies and private landowners to remove culverts and restore streams.
“Fish passage projects are so important to get those juvenile and adult fish back to their habitats that they historically had access to,” said Brett Shattuck, who manages the Tulalip Tribes’ Restoration, Acquisition and Stewardship program.
There are thousands of culverts and other barriers to fish passage throughout the state on both private and public land. The Tulalip Tribes have not only coordinated the collaboration between agencies, but they have secured tens of millions of dollars in recent years, receiving money from both government agencies and private grants.
“So now we're working to replace those crossings that not only convey water, but also convey fish both up and downstream so that we can both get our transportation that we need to the places we need to go and allow those fish to access their habitats upstream,” Shattuck said.
The Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission, an organization that co-manages salmon and other natural resources along with state agencies, recently featured the Tulalip Tribes’ work in a short film called “Passage Home: Tulalip Tribes remove barriers to salmon habitat.” The short documentary was produced by Northwest Treaty Tribes, which is one arm of the commission.
The film features Jason Gobin, Tulalip Tribes’ Director of Natural and Cultural Resources, whose family works in the seafood industry. He said the work helps preserve the salmon and other fish for future generations.
“Projects like this and the returning fish that they provide, provides that opportunity for, you know, myself, my family, our people to go out and harvest out there on the saltwater and in the river here,” Gobin said in the film.
