In search of salmon solutions

Dozens gathered on Monday evening in Cook Inletkeeper’s Community Action Studio to brainstorm ideas to address the impacts of pollution and warming temperatures on local salmon stocks.

The latest in Cook Inletkeeper’s “Local Solution” program, the ideas raised by attendees on Monday will see further consideration in March with the intention of selecting one project to implement locally within the next two years.

Previous solutions implemented by Cook Inletkeeper on the Kenai Peninsula include a community composting project that kept more than 60,000 pounds of food waste from Central Peninsula Landfill; “Solarize the Kenai,” which added new solar energy capacity to 142 local households; and “Project ReTree,” which planted more than 3,000 trees in areas impacted by the spruce beetle outbreak.

The meeting was facilitated by Cook Inletkeeper staff, including Regional Director Kaitlin Vadla, Energy Policy Analyst Ben Boettger and Community Engagement Coordinator David Knight.

The local solutions, Vadla said, have had “a tremendous impact.” She said that the idea of focusing next on salmon was borne of community conversations conducted by Cook Inletkeeper in recent years — where salmon and rivers emerged as top concerns.

“We decided that for our next solution we would really lean in and focus where people said their top concerns were, and really where the heart and soul of our organization is — in-river salmon habitat,” she said. “That’s why you’re out here tonight, to help us brainstorm solutions that we can implement here on the central peninsula.”

The solutions that Monday’s gathered community can handle on its own, Vadla said, are “middle-out.” That means they can achieve a far greater scale than a single person or family could, but perhaps not reach as high as changing federal policy. It’s exciting, she said, to bring that power to bear on “such an important issue.”

The meeting opened with a panel discussion by Syverine Bentz and Katherine Schake of the Kachemak Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve and Cook Inletkeeper Science Director Sue Mauger. The three discussed their backgrounds with salmon and with salmon science, the projects they’d worked on and the things they’d learned.

Understanding of salmon has evolved, Bentz said, as projects have filled in gaps of knowledge — she cited the discovery of the importance of peatlands and groundwater in providing nutrients to juvenile fish. Mauger, similarly, cited developing understandings of the increasing temperature of local streams as stressing to salmon — “they’re cold-water fish.”

After the panel, attendees broke into groups and brainstormed ideas.

During an episode of KDLL 91.9 FM’s Kenai Conversation published on Friday, Knight said that the ideas generally fell into three categories: education and outreach, restoration, or government engagement. He said some of those ideas included stream mapping — like that already being conducted by the Kenai Watershed Forum; development of educational videos; increased neighborhood signage warning of nearby spawning beds; and a focus on invasives like elodea and pike.

Cook Inletkeeper will host another meeting on March 20 where attendees will dig deeper into each idea and select one to implement. Vadla said that people would pitch each idea to the group — “like shark tank for salmon.”

For more information, find “Cook Inletkeeper” on Facebook.

Reach reporter Jake Dye at jacob.dye@peninsulaclarion.com.