Bill Taylor and Billy Frank had a oped piece in the Seattle PI this morning on the shellfish settlement:
Puget Sound shellfish growers and 17 Indian tribes have reached a fair solution to a thorny treaty rights issue. The agreement rights a historical wrong, preserves the health of the shellfish industry, recognizes the importance of tribal treaty shellfish rights and provides greater harvest opportunities for everyone in the state.
Everyone loses when we turn to the courts to settle natural resource issues. The shellfish resource is too important — to tribal cultures, to the shellfish industry, to the public and to the ecology of Puget Sound — for us to fight over it.
