Salmon recovery funding doled out

Published 4:32 pm Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Clallam County received more than $1 million in state grants for salmon recovery last week.

Statewide, $20.7 million in grants was distributed to fix damaged rivers and streams, replace failing culverts and replant riverbanks to help salmon recover from the brink of extinction.

Of the $1,074,347 in funding to Clallam County, $50,000 will go to the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe to build logjams in McDonald Creek. In 1982, significant removal of wood along the creek ended but logjams still are needed to facilitate habitat creation.

The project is the second phase of a plan to return spawning and rearing to the creek. The tribe will donate $13,277 in labor and materials and the Department of Natural Resources will donate wood.

Steve Tharinger, chairman of the Salmon Funding Recovery Board, said the money will put people to work improving the environment and help protect and restore salmon populations.

The grants are estimated to create or continue 250 jobs in the next four years.