2023 was an incredible year for Save California Salmon. The December 2022 publication of our free Traditional Ecological Knowledge, Science, and Management middle school curriculum  positioned us for an active year of teaching the curriculum and organizing related field trips and events. The curriculum, which includes six lesson plans, was highlighted by organizations and schools all over California and served as the basis of our Inter-Tribal Indigenous Science Camp and nine other outdoor events for Northern California Tribal youth. We also released the “Where the Water Flows Strong” comic book with Original Voices and Jackie Fawn’s curriculum-based artwork as part of this educational effort. 

We hosted California’s first ever Land Back Symposium in March with CalPoly Humboldt. The conference featured presentations by California Tribes and Tribal land trusts that are working successfully for land return, the state of California and universities, cities, and agencies that are returning ancestral lands. And we supported the creation of a Tribal Nature-Based Solutions Fund and passage of California’s 30x30 climate plan. We are now working to integrate LandBack into the state’s Nature-Based Solutions Implementation Plan, federal 30x30 planning, the Northwest Forest Plan update, and other federal public lands policies. The feds have committed to incorporating Traditional Ecological Knowledge in their management, and we plan to hold them to that commitment. 

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Our greatest accomplishments - on the Klamath River - were the result of decades of organizing with Tribal partners. In late 2022, Klamath Dam Removal was finally approved, and in summer 2023 the first of the four Klamath Dams, Copco 2, was removed. Currently, the three remaining Klamath dam reservoirs are being drawn down, seeds are being planted, and the river is flowing freely for the first time in 100 years. This is a community win that Klamath River communities deserve to be involved in, and to celebrate. Save California Salmon joined Klamath River Tribes in organizing dam removal field trips for public schools and is supporting documentation of the dam removal process, including related tours, events, art creation, and story-telling. We also supported the Trinity River and mid-Klamath sections of the 20th annual Klamath River Salmon Run and related school visits.

Restoration of the Klamath River does not stop with dam removal. Salmon populations are continuing to plummet throughout California, leaving Tribal communities without salmon for subsistence, and ocean fishermen without a season. Restoration of the Klamath’s tributaries, which are often dewatered for animal agriculture, is also critical. We continued to support Tribal efforts to establish both permanent and temporary emergency flows in the Scott and Shasta Rivers through the California Water Resources Control Board. In December, the board passed emergency irrigation curtailments for both rivers, and we are still pushing for permanent instream flow requirements. 

We also continued to fight for Trinity River flows, which are critical to the river, and to stop fish kills in the Klamath River. The Trinity is the Klamath’s largest tributary, but it is also an artificial Sacramento River tributary that feeds the Central Valley Water Project. The federal government is working on a new Biological Opinion for Endangered Species (water operations plan) for the Central Valley and State Water Projects. We are calling for a separate, protective Biological Opinion for the Trinity River, and for flows in the Bay Delta watersheds.

We are deeply dedicated to dam removal and flow restoration in all the North State’s watersheds. We want salmon back for all Northern California Tribes, which is why we are hopeful about Pacific Gas & Electric’s (PGE) December proposal to fully decommission the Eel River Dams. 

Positive change is happening in our watersheds, but California’s racist history lingers in its outdated water rights and pollution control systems and policies. The laws that governed water during California’s attempted genocide of Native peoples still govern our water to this day. This shameful legacy spurred us to aid in efforts to reform California’s water boards and resource agencies and enact meaningful water rights and land management reform. We worked with the state and regional Water Boards to create strong Racial Equality resolutions and action plans, and we began informing the process to reform California’s resource agencies policies. The state has a long way to go in implementing these plans and continues to resist Tribes and frontline communities’ calls to reform its archaic water rights systems. Thus, Save California Salmon joined a civil rights complaint against the California Water Resources Control Board to the US EPAin 2023. 

In July, we joined seven Tribes, environmental justice advocates, and NGOs for the first ever Day of Action for California Water Justice and Salmon to draw more attention to the fact that  industrial agriculture still controls 80% of California’s developed water and much of its water rights. Unfortunately, at the end of the year California approved both the massive Sites Reservoir and Delta Tunnel proposals, despite Tribal and frontline communities’ opposition, leaving us with no options but to file water rights protests and litigation. 

Save California Salmon is grateful for the partnerships we enjoy with northern California’s Tribal and other frontline communities working for freshwater ecosystem defense and water justice. Together, we are challenging the racist, industry-friendly systems and policies that impair our ability to live full and sustainable lives. Keep reading for more detail on this work.

In Solidarity,

Regina Chichizola, Executive Director