Victory! State Senate passes bill to ban invasive fish net pens in Washington waters

The sec­ond month of the 2018 Leg­isla­tive Ses­sion is under­way in Wash­ing­ton State, and we con­tin­ue to see pro­duc­tive floor action on both sides of the Dome, but espe­cial­ly on the Sen­ate side, where bills have been fly­ing out of the Sen­ate Repub­li­cans’ grave­yard of progress thanks to the new Demo­c­ra­t­ic majority.

Today, the Sen­ate passed a bill that will safe­guard our waters and aquat­ic lands for future gen­er­a­tions. Spon­sored by Kevin Ranker, Sec­ond Sub­sti­tute Sen­ate Bill 6086 would do the fol­low­ing, as ana­lyzed by non­par­ti­san leg­isla­tive staff:

• Pro­hib­it the Depart­ment of Nat­ur­al Resources (DNR) from enter­ing into a new, or renew­ing or extend­ing an exist­ing, aquat­ics land lease or use autho­riza­tion that involves marine fin­fish aqua­cul­ture of Atlantic salmon.
• Pro­hib­it the Depart­ment of Fish and Wildlife (DFW) and the Depart­ment of Ecol­o­gy (ECY), under its water pol­lu­tion con­trol author­i­ty, from autho­riz­ing or per­mit­ting activ­i­ties or oper­a­tions involv­ing marine fin­fish aqua­cul­ture of Atlantic salmon after the expi­ra­tion date for the exist­ing aquat­ic lands lease.
• Cre­ate a reoc­cur­ring facil­i­ty inspec­tion process for oper­a­tions involv­ing marine fin­fish aqua­cul­ture of Atlantic salmon.

“In the months since the escape of hun­dreds of thou­sands of inva­sive Atlantic salmon from the net pen fail­ure, we have learned the extent of the mis­man­age­ment and neg­li­gence of Cooke Aqua­cul­ture,” said Ranker (D‑40th Dis­trict: Orcas Island). “This sort of care­less behav­ior is unac­cept­able for any com­pa­ny in Wash­ing­ton state. The state ban is a strong stance to ensure the pro­tec­tion of our marine envi­ron­ment and native salmon pop­u­la­tions in the Sal­ish Sea.”

More than two-thirds of the Sen­ate vot­ed in favor of 2SSB 6086. Here’s the roll call:

Roll Call
2SSB 6086
Non­na­tive fin­fish release
3rd Read­ing & Final Passage
2/8/2018

Yeas: 35; Nays: 12; Excused: 2

Vot­ing Yea: Sen­a­tors Angel, Bai­ley, Baum­gart­ner, Bil­lig, Car­lyle, Chase, Cleve­land, Con­way, Darneille, Dhin­gra, Erick­sen, Fain, For­tu­na­to, Frockt, Hasegawa, Hawkins, Hobbs, Hunt, Keis­er, Kud­er­er, Liias, McCoy, Milos­cia, Mul­let, Nel­son, O‘Ban, Palum­bo, Ped­er­sen, Ranker, Rolfes, Sal­daña, Shel­don, Van De Wege, Well­man, Zeiger

Vot­ing Nay: Sen­a­tors Beck­er, Braun, Brown, Hon­ey­ford, King, Pad­den, Rivers, Short, Takko, Wag­oner, War­nick, Wilson

Excused: Sen­a­tors Schoesler, Walsh

The vote did not break down along par­ty lines. One Demo­c­rat vot­ed against the bill (Dean Takko), while close to half of the Sen­ate Repub­li­cans vot­ed for it, includ­ing Jan Angel, Bar­bara Bai­ley, Michael Baum­gart­ner, Doug Erick­sen, Phil For­tu­na­to, Brad Hawkins, Mark Milos­cia, Steve O’Ban, Tim Shel­don, and Hans Zeiger.

Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee has indi­cat­ed he will sign the bill if the House approves it.

“It is no longer accept­able for the peo­ple of the state of Wash­ing­ton to expose our waters to the threats posed by non-native Atlantic salmon in net pens,” said the Gov­er­nor at his Thurs­day media avail­abil­i­ty. “We need to tran­si­tion and phase out the leas­es that now exist because this is a risk that is intol­er­a­ble and unacceptable.”

Pub­lic Lands Com­mis­sion­er Hillary Franz, who heads the Depart­ment of Nat­ur­al Resources, has already respond­ed bold­ly to the dis­as­trous fail­ure of Cooke Aqua­cul­ture’s Cypress Island fish farm last sum­mer. DNR has ter­mi­nat­ed Cooke’s Cypress Island lease, as well as its lease at Port Angeles.

“Cooke has fla­grant­ly vio­lat­ed the terms of its lease at Cypress Island,” Franz said in a state­ment pub­lished last week. “The company’s reck­less dis­re­gard endan­gered the health of our waters and our peo­ple, and it will not be tolerated.

“On behalf of all Wash­ing­to­ni­ans, and in ful­fill­ment of my duty to pro­tect our state’s waters, I am ter­mi­nat­ing the lease.”

DNR says it is cur­rent­ly review­ing Cooke’s oth­er Atlantic salmon facil­i­ties at Rich Pas­sage and Hope Island. When that review process is com­plete, Com­mis­sion­er Franz will assess DNR’s legal options.

NPI thanks Com­mis­sion­er Franz and DNR for mov­ing to shut down Cooke Aqua­cul­ture’s hor­ri­bly man­aged Atlantic salmon fish farms.

It is abun­dant­ly clear that Cooke is an irre­spon­si­ble com­pa­ny that has not only vio­lat­ed its lease agree­ments with the state, but threat­ened the health of our marine ecosys­tems. Cooke needs to be per­ma­nent­ly ban­ished from Wash­ing­ton’s waters, and the prac­tice of farm­ing non­na­tive fish disallowed.

Last autumn, NPI called for the kind of ban that passed the Wash­ing­ton State Sen­ate today in a post authored by our Vice Pres­i­dent-Sec­re­tary Diane Jones. We’re very, very pleased to see the Sen­ate fol­low up by pass­ing 2SSB 6086.

Now it’s time for the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives to fol­low suit.