Letters to the editor

Salmon runs

The Middle Fork Salmon River is a refugium for wild spring/summer Chinook salmon. Two decades of work by the state of Idaho, U.S. Forest Service and Nez Perce Tribal biologists estimated the basin of the Middle Fork Salmon River could support up to 48,000 spawning fish.

The total spring Chinook count to the Columbia River basin this year will be close to 50,000 at Bonneville Dam. Wild fish make up less than a quarter of that total. Most of the Bonneville count will go to hatcheries.

The Middle Fork Salmon River contains some of the highest-quality spawning habitat that remains in the entire Columbia River Basin. Two decades of research on the Middle Fork clearly illustrates the cause of the decline in wild spring and summer Chinook lies out of the basin.

What factors are out of basin? Ocean conditions, main-stem Columbia River fishing, and the four lower Snake River dams are the principal ones. We cannot control ocean conditions. We can only reduce fishing as much as is politically feasible and breach the four lower Snake dams, if we have the will.

CEO wages

The May 25 Statesman reports that CEO pay went up on average 8 percent in 2018. Some CEOs got as much as a 200 percent pay raise. Meanwhile, back on earth in Idaho, where the 99 percent live, minimum wage remains $7.25/hr with no federal effort to raise it since 2009. If minimum wage had grown at the same rate as these CEOs’ pay, it would be greater than $21 an hour. If minimum wage had kept pace with worker productivity, it would also be greater than $21.

Meanwhile the average worker at the same companies got a median pay raise of only 3 percent.

Ever wonder what CEOs are doing for that high salary plus the great tax cuts their companies got from the GOP/Trump just a couple years ago? Most are not investing in research and development to create new products or improve the old. Most are not raising salaries and benefits for their employees. Most are doing stock buybacks, which make their companies look better on the stock market and give them their pay raises.

So hooray for local/state efforts to raise the Idaho minimum wage to $12; we’ll be about halfway there to parity. So let’s get this initiative on the 2020 ballot.

Eagle mayor

After moving to a home on Eagle Island to be closer to the Downtown Eagle core, I discovered there were many obstacles to walking or biking from my new home to downtown, including a dangerous crossing over the Boise River along the shoulder of Eagle Road. After being stonewalled by the Idaho Transportation Department, which “owns” this section of Eagle Road, I decided to approach the city of Eagle for help.

What I have discovered over the past six years on my quest for safer passage is that city government, like most other forms of government, is frustratingly slow and often subject to the whims and biases of its constantly rotating members. But my frustrations with getting something done to improve walking and biking safety in Eagle changed when Stan Ridgeway became mayor.

From the moment Mayor Ridgeway took office, City Council meetings became more organized and less frustrating. Individual member rants and rabbit trails began to lessen. Meetings became less confrontational and business was handled much more efficiently, including my petition for a safer crossing over the Boise River. I feel that Mayor Ridgeway honestly wants to hear from Eagle residents and bends over backwards to accommodate their input.