Dear Supporters,

You’ve shared the heartache of Tahlequah/J35 who refused to leave her dead baby for 17 days. You’ve witnessed the will to live of ailing and emaciated Scarlet/J50. And you’ve watched as their extended family continues to surround and support them. 

You can help the critically endangered Southern Resident Orcas survive by contacting Washington Governor Jay Inslee this week and ask that he publicly endorse breaching the four lower Snake River dams in 2018!  Tell him the whole world is watching.  Ask him what he wants his legacy to be.  Will he save the orcas, or will he let them die, one by one?

Please contact Governor Inslee by noon on Monday, August 27, before the next meeting of the Orca Recovery Task Force.  Ask him to drive the plan to breach the four lower Snake River dams for salmon and orca recovery.

Contact Governor Inslee in as many ways as you feel comfortable: phone, email, Facebook, Twitter:

Phone: 306-902-4111
Fax: 360-753-4110
Email
Facebook
Twitter

Your help is crucial in convincing Governor Inslee to take this step. Won’t you join us?

We have more contacts, talking points, sample emails and sample social media posts available here, if you need them. 

Background

The Canadian government listed the Orcas as endangered in 2001. The US government followed suit in 2005. The population has plummeted from 98 in 1995 to only 75 today. The primary reason: the loss of their food supply, Chinook salmon. Despite our spending billions to mitigate their impact, dams “have played a central role in reducing salmon populations by more than 90%.” 

In order to increase the quantity of Chinook salmon, the salmon on which the Orcas’ lives depend, we must return the lower Snake to a free flowing river. That was what the public told the federal government when it completed an Environmental Impact Statement in 2002. It’s what the science also made clear in 2002: breaching the dams “provides the highest probability” of meeting salmon survival and recovery goals. However, the government chose other, costly, mitigating actions. And yet they have failed. Salmon numbers have not recovered. Orcas are starving. Freeing the Snake River by bulldozing through the earthen portion of the dams can be done rapidly and cost effectively

Thank you for your continued support! 

THE SRKW CSI TEAM
(Photo of Tahlequah carrying deceased calf
copyright Jeanne Hyde 2018)