OLYMPIA — Gov. Jay Inslee’s salmon adviser Friday outlined for the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission a proposal to require riparian buffers, which one commissioner called heavy-handed.
Conservation programs that rely on willing landowners have been successful, Commissioner Kim Thorburn of Spokane said. The governor’s proposed Lorraine Loomis Act depends on rules, she said.
“It seems pretty onerous really,” Thorburn told the governor’s adviser, Erik Neatherlin.
“Why the heavy hand in the Lorraine Loomis Act when we have a lot of experience with how beneficial incentive programs are?” she asked.
Neatherlin agreed habitat restoration “through grants and programs and incentives has been really effective.”
“I think on the flip side, Are we losing habitat more quickly than we’re restoring it? So that’s what this act tries to address,” he said.