User:Chetsford/1999

Initiative to the People 696
5 November 1999

Shall commercial net, troll, and trawl fishing be prohibited in Washington state fresh and marine waters, except tribal fisheries conducted under a valid treaty right?
Results
Choice Votes % Yes 1,121,851 58.97% No 780,631 41.03% Total votes 1,902,482 100.00% Registered voters/turnout 4,181,279 45.5%

The 1999 Washington Initiative 696 was a ballot proposition in Washington state in the United States. The measure, if enacted, would have prohibited non-tribal commercial net fishing in Washington. It was defeated following an intense and volatile campaign.

Background

In the 20th century, according to HistoryLink, Washington state "continually maximized allowable harvest by state-licensed commercial fishermen" and, by 1961, salmon runs were "dangerously low" with some hovering on the brink of extinction. A 1998 study by NOAA documented a serious "decline" in the salmon fishery of the United States West Coast, the nature of which led the U.S. Department of Commerce to declare a fishery resource disaster. As of 1999, Endangered Species Act listings of Chinook, coho, chum, and steelhead stocks in Washington covered more than 75 percent of the state.

Declines were variously attributed to loss of habitat resulting from shoreline construction, installation of hydroelectric dams on the Columbia River, and overfishing. A study by Oceana found that "bottom trawling is one of the most destructive ways to catch fish, and is responsible for up to half of all discarded fish and marine life worldwide" while research done in Canada discovered that "mortality from incidental take in salmon gillnet fisheries has been identified as one of the largest sources of human-induced mortality for marine diving birds". According to a 1999 issue of the Kalama Bulletin, "fourteen states, including Florida, Texas, Louisiana and California ... successfully revived threatened marine species after prohibiting commercial net fishing".

Initiative 696 sought to ban 18 types of nontribal commercial net fishing in Washington's inland and coastal waters, including bottom trawling and gillnetting, which would impact approximately 50 percent of the state's commercial fishing industry of about 3,700 commercial anglers. A similar, but more complex, ballot measure had been proposed in 1995 (I-640) but failed at the polls. In neighboring Oregon, two attempts at a similar ban - in 1964 and 1992 - had also failed.

Washington Secretary of State Ralph Munro certified Initiative 696 for the November 1999 election ballot in July 1999 after supporters submitted 193,904 valid petition signatures, about 14,000 more than the minimum required for ballot qualification.

Ballot title and provisions

The ballot title of the initiative read:

“ Shall commercial net, troll, and trawl fishing be prohibited in Washington state fresh and marine waters, except tribal fisheries conducted under a valid treaty right? ”

If enacted, the bill would have banned most types of commercial net fishing in Washington state, violation of which would be a felony. Non-net commercial fishing, as well as treaty-protected fishing by Native American tribes, would be exempt from the ban.

Arguments for and against

According to proponents, Washington's "saltwater habitat has been so ravaged by 'underwater strip mining' with commercial nets that restoration may take decades. Removing these destructive nets will start the healing process of our underwater habitat". Proponents stated that job loss in the commercial fishing industry was inevitable as net-fishing had brought the state's fisheries to the brink of collapse and, without urgent action, there eventually would be no viable fishery anyway.

Opponents of the initiative countered that the measure would "destroy Washington's fishing families ... cost thousands of jobs ... and would seriously harm coastal communities".

Exemption of tribal fishery

To avoid the potential of future legal challenges, the bill exempted tribal fishing from the net ban. The tribal fishery was guaranteed by the Quinault Treaty, and other compacts, negotiated between the United States and the various tribes of the Washington Territory in 1859.

Opponents of the initiative said that, if the measure were enacted, Native American tribes would simply use the exemption to net an excess share of fish, resulting in the deleterious consequences the initiative sought to prevent coming to fruition anyway.

Proponents countered that tribes were already moving away from net fishing, citing the instance of the Cowlitz Tribe which had committed to adopting sustainable fish trapping if it were granted federal recognition; that the cessation of net fishing by the nontribal fishery would probably compel tribes to follow suit for reputational reasons; and that federal supremacy meant it was legally impossible for the state to regulate the tribal fishery in any case.

Campaign

The legal sponsor of the initiative was XXXXX, who also served as chair of Yes campaign; the campaign manager was XXXXX. Opposition to the initiative was led by a committee headed by Ed Owens. The Yes campaign was, according to the Associated Press, "badly outspent" by opponents of the initiative.

According to the Seattle Weekly, the campaign was steeped in "pranks, low blows, and bad blood" between the two sides. Opponents of I-696 accused the Yes campaign of packing meetings with their supporters, of cybersquatting on their domain name after they failed to register it, and of refusing to be in the same room with them during public forums. The Yes campaign countered by saying the reason they wouldn't conduct joint forums was because a spokesman for the No side had gone "berserk" at a previous event, "shouted at everyone", and made ad hominen attacks.

Supporters and opponents

Former Seattle mayor Wes Uhlman (pictured) was among those who endorsed Initiative 696.

Those endorsing the measure included Wes Uhlman, Bob Oke, Adele Ferguson, and Glenn Jarstad. Bern Shanks — the former director of the state's department of fish and wildlife who had been forced from office the previous year over what was widely described as political pressure from industry groups opposed to his regulatory efforts — also endorsed the initiative. A number of recreational fishing groups supported the initiative, as did six local chapters of the Audobon Society.

The No campaign was supported by Jim Buck, a local chapter of the Sierra Club, the Washington state chapter of the League of Women Voters, and commercial fishing industry groups. Trident Seafoods was a major financial donor to the No campaign.

The Earth Island Institute initially endorsed the initiative before retracting its endorsement and instead taking no position on the measure. Writing that he supported the idea of a commercial net ban in principal, talk radio host and newspaper columnist John Carlson nevertheless called for a "no" vote on the measure due to its exclusion of the tribal fishery, which he described as a "brazen double standard".

Later developments

From the 1990s on, the permitted commercial and sport catch of salmon in Washington continued to decline in tandem with plummeting fish stocks so that, by 2021, the Washington Policy Center reported, no further reduction was possible without a complete fishing ban. Wild salmon returns that year were approximately two percent of their 19th century levels

In 2006, State Senator Jim Buck - one of the opponents of the I-696 campaign - was unseated by challenger Kevin Van De Wege. In the senate, Van De Wege went on to introduce legislation to ban nontribal gillnet fishing across the state. After failing to pass the legislation, Van De Wege proposed a scaled-back version that would ban it only on the lower portion of the Columbia River, a measure which also failed to pass.

In 2022, the Washington State Legislature cut the number of Columbia River commercial gillnet fishing licenses from 240 to 67.

External links

• Full text of initiative