NRIC Director Ed Chaney founded the Northwest Resource Information Center in 1976 in response to the then-threatened status of wild salmon produced in the vast Snake River Basin.
Ed was initiated into Columbia/Snake River salmon issues in 1968 when the Army Corps of Engineers closed John Day Dam before the adult fish ladders were operational and killed an estimated 300,000-plus adult salmon and steelhead. Ed publicly blew the whistle; was placed under a gag order by the Oregon Governor’s office (for “jeopardizing the good working relationship with the Corps”); soon thereafter he took the job of Information Director for the National Wildlife Federation in Washington, D.C.
He continued his salmon advocacy at the national level, along with involvement in a wide variety of other issues, including the effects of lead shot on waterfowl, mercury contamination of waterways, public land mismanagement, implementation of the Clear Air and Water Acts, and litigating the new National Environmental Policy Act. He returned to the Northwest in the mid-1970s and picked up where he left off: documenting and actively resisting the epic failures of governance and rule of law that theaten wild salmon and the tribal and non-tribal economies that depend on them.
Ed has a half century of professional experience. He is author of numerous regional and subregional natural resource management plans, and innumerable technical reports, articles and essays. He has served as consultant to agencies of the United States Government, to agencies of state governments, to governors of states, to Native American Indian tribes, to regional inter-governmental councils and commissions in the Pacific Northwest, to the Western and Central Fisheries Boards of Ireland, and to non-governmental organizations in the United States, Mexico, Scotland and France. He has many times provided invited expert testimony before governmental bodies, including committees of the United States Congress.
A more detailed resume is available here.
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