The Point No Point Treaty Council’s Habitat Program is focused on taking care of healthy and functional nearshore and freshwater habitats, facilitating the restoration of degraded areas and undertaking research to identify and understand the organisms that live within these habitats. Treaty Rights, habitat protection and habitat restoration are intimately tied to each other.
The Habitat Program works with the regulatory agencies that manage areas within our member Tribes’ Usual and Accustomed fishing areas and historic hunting areas. Our staff works with the federal, state and local governments in order to support the PNPTC goal of protecting, preserving and restoring natural resources and to further protect Tribal Treaty Rights that are at risk. This department focuses on a variety of projects that focus primarily on Research, Recovery, and Regulatory Review.
Research
The Point No Point Treaty Council has been actively involved with research multiple areas of the watersheds that affect our member Tribes. Some of the project include:
1. Riparian vegetation land cover project in Kitsap, Clallam, Jefferson, and Mason counties that was funded through the US EPA.
PNPTC 2009 Riparian Land Cover Project Map Viewer and a detailed description can be found here (insert link) TODO
2. Streamflow and temperature climate assessment in Treaty Area.
More information can be found in our Climate Change program.
Recovery
The Point No Point Treaty Area is home to four federally protected salmon/trout species Hood Canal summer chum, Puget Sound chinook, Puget Sound steelhead and Coastal Puget Sound bull trout. All are listed as “threatened” under the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA). The Treaty Council has participated in developing comprehensive recovery plans for Hood Canal summer chum and Puget Sound Chinook. Included in these plans are strategies and actions that address harvest management, habitat protection and restoration, and hatchery management.
Regulatory review
The Treaty Council participates in reviewing many kinds of regulatory documents. Our staff is involved in reviewing Shoreline Master Programs for Clallam County, Jefferson County, Mason County and Kitsap County.
The Treaty Council also participates in the Inter-Agency Review Team, that has a primary purpose of reviewing potential development projects so that they meet the no net loss of aquatic resource functions standard by using a newly developed voluntary mechanism for those projects that require compensatory habitat mitigation for unavoidable impacts authorized by the Clean Water Act (33 U.S.C. 1251) and/or other federal, state, tribal, or local regulations through an in-lieu fee program. This program is run through the Hood Canal Coordinating Council.