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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT size=3> </FONT><A
href="http://www.sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/news/politics/8705712.htm"><FONT
size=3>http://www.sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/news/politics/8705712.htm</FONT></A><FONT
face="Times New Roman" size=3> </FONT>
<P><B><FONT face=Arial> Federal whistleblower quits,
alleges</FONT></B> <BR><B><FONT face=Arial> politicization of
science</FONT></B>
<P><FONT face=Arial> DON THOMPSON</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Associated Press</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> SACRAMENTO - A federal biologist who said
his team's advice was illegally ignored prior to a</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> massive 2002 Klamath River fish kill has resigned,
accusing the government of politicizing</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> scientific decision-making and misleading the
public.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Michael Kelly had sought federal
whistleblower protection after he complained the Bush</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> administration violated the Endangered Species Act
by pressuring for altered scientific findings</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> by the review team he led for the National Marine
Fisheries Service, now NOAA Fisheries.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> "My efforts were ultimately
unproductive," Kelly laments in his resignation letter, released</FONT>
<BR><FONT face=Arial> Wednesday through Public Employees for
Environmental Responsibility, which represented</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> Kelly in the whistleblower case first reported by
The Associated Press. "Threatened coho salmon</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> in the Klamath basin still do not have adequate
flow conditions to assure their survival."</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Kelly alleged his team's recommendations
were twice rejected as the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> imposed lower water levels than were
scientifically justified.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> California wildlife officials,
environmentalists, fishermen and Indian tribes blame low water</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> levels for the death of 33,000 salmon that fall,
amounting to nearly a quarter of the projected</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> fall run in the river flowing from south central
Oregon through northwest California.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> The U.S. Office of Special Counsel
declined to investigate Kelly's complaint, saying it could</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> neither prove "gross mismanagement" by NOAA
Fisheries even if the agency relied on</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> conflicting science nor prove a cause-and-effect
relationship between the low water decision and</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> the subsequent die-off.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Kelly's testimony has since been key in a
federal court ruling overturning the agency's</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> long-term water flow plan for the Klamath, though
a decision allowing the government to</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> proceed with its plans through 2008 is under
appeal.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Kelly resigned from the agency's Arcata,
Calif., office Friday after nine years, saying Regional</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> Manager Jim Lecky had again intervened in
overturning his finding in the latest project to</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> which he was assigned. He feared a repeat of his
ethical predicament two years ago.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> NOAA Fisheries officials had no immediate
comment.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> The latest project is a proposal by the
California Department of Fish and Game to rebuild a</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> collapsed levee and re-establish a freshwater pond
in what has become a salt marsh at the</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> mouth of the Eel River. Kelly found that the marsh
has become an important rearing area for</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> young threatened chinook salmon and other
species.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> He objects in his letter that the state
agency appears to want to turn it back into a freshwater</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> pond mainly to concentrate ducks for convenient
hunting. Karen Kovacs, a senior state biologist</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> supervisor, said the state manages the 2,200-acre
Eel River Wildlife Area for all aquatic wildlife</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> - freshwater and saltwater - and to that end wants
to re-establish a 120-acre pond that collapsed</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> six years ago, while leaving 200 acres as a salt
marsh.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> As a result of Kelly's finding, PEER
called on the state to drop the proposal.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Kelly is the latest in a recent string of
scientists to accuse the Bush administration of</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> substituting policy for science, charges the
administration denies.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> In his Tuesday resignation letter, he
accuses his agency of doing so in recent decisions not to list</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> the green sturgeon under the Endangered Species
Act; counting hatchery raised salmon along</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> with wild salmon in protection decisions; and an
attempt, since blocked by a judge, to alter the</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> definition of dolphin-safe tuna.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> "My particular case is just symptomatic
of this agency's failure to correctly apply science and</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> caution to its decisions and public
pronouncements. I speak for many of my fellow biologists who</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> are embarrassed and disgusted by the agency's
apparent misuse of science," Kelly wrote.</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> "Federal service has just lost another
biologist with the integrity to speak up," said Karen</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> Schambach, director of PEER's California office.
"It is becoming increasingly difficult for</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> self-respecting scientists to continue working in
agencies where politics now routinely and</FONT> <BR><FONT
face=Arial> flagrantly trump science."</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> ON THE NET</FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Read Kelly's allegations in the Klamath
water case at <A
href="http://www.peer.org/kellynarrative.pdf">http://www.peer.org/kellynarrative.pdf</A></FONT>
<P><FONT face=Arial> Read the final biological opinion
at</FONT> <BR><FONT face=Arial> <A
href="http://swr.nmfs.noaa.gov/psd/klamath/KpopBO2002finalMay31.PDF">http://swr.nmfs.noaa.gov/psd/klamath/KpopBO2002finalMay31.PDF</A></FONT>
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