Tri-City streamkeeper groups are crying foul after the federal government announced cuts to B.C. salmon enhancement programs that help volunteers raise fish and educate school children about the salmon life cycle.
Hatcheries in the Tri-Cities learned last week they will lose expert advice on restoration work with the phasing out of the Resource Restoration Unit and will no longer get technical support for day-to-day operations because fishery specialists contracts aren't being renewed.
Groups such as the Maple Creek Streamkeepers and Burrard Inlet Marine Enhancement Society, which runs the Mossom Creek Hatchery, say the loss of technical support as a result of Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) cuts will hamper the work they do.
"We won't have the support that we have now," said Sandy Budd, whose Port Coquitlam streamkeepers group restored a large portion of Maple Creek last year and saw results with more chum salmon returning to spawn.
"If there's anything wrong in our stream and we don't know what it is, we have nowhere to go to ask what is this problem."
EDUCATION CUTS
One of the biggest components of the work local streamkeepers do is raise the profile of salmon so more people understand the importance of the keystone fish to the local ecosystem. But educating young people will be more difficult with the elimination of a longstanding program that put aquariums in classrooms so children could raise fish from the eyed-egg stage to fry stage and then release them.
Two full-time, and 16 part-time staff who provide 900 aquariums to schools in B.C. for 35,000 school children are being affected.
"Our local teachers need the support of the community co-ordinators to maintain the vital Salmonids in the Classroom program. We need these positions to support the work we do. This decision makes no sense," stated Mossom Creek Hatchery co-founder — and retired teacher — Ruth Foster in an email.
In fact, one school has already approached Mossom to purchase fish for a school program, something the hatchery is not allowed to do.
The group is also upset that the cuts were announced quietly without an official statement to streamkeepers. "We have been blind-sided. It's a slap in the face to Mossom Creek and the thousands of volunteers throughout the Province who have dedicated over four decades to these important projects," Foster further stated.
Some groups plan to fight by writing to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and federal Fisheries Minister Dominic LeBlanc while a Port Moody-Coquitlam MP says the cuts aren't justified.
MANDATE CHANGE
Fin Donnelly, the federal NDP's critic for fisheries, said the cuts to salmon enhancement programs violate the spirit of the 2012 Cohen Commission recommendations, which are supposed to enhance salmon and fish habitat.
"These cuts come at a time when they should be implementing the Cohen recommendations, not cutting programs," Donnelly said, predicting the federal government will pay a "heavy political price" for this decision.
But for the feds, the cuts were required under a mandate to shift resources towards search and rescue services and protect the marine environment, according to a statement from Fisheries and Oceans Canada, which notes there are plans to hire 900 people across the country.
Meanwhile, some $27 million will continue to be spent on the broader Salmonid Enhancement Program, the statement notes.
Still, some are pointing to the irony of the cuts being announced just days after the Salmonid Enhancement Program celebrated its 40th anniversary.
They also note the work of streamkeeper groups is crucial because salmon start their lives in fresh water before moving into the marine environment.
"If you don't protect what we have in our streams, there won't be any fish to protect in the salt water," Maple Creek's Budd said.
