Friday April 7, 2023
Lost Coast Outpost —
The Yurok Tribe recently received a $3,990,587 grant from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife for an urgently needed, large-scale river restoration project on the Trinity River.
“These funds will help us transform a severely damaged section of the Trinity into diverse, dynamic and complex habitat for salmon and steelhead,” said Frankie Myers, the Yurok Tribe’s Vice Chairman and President of the Yurok Tribe Construction Corporation. “I sincerely thank California Governor Newsom and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife for investing in our effort to rebuild these invaluable fish stocks and make the Klamath Basin more resilient to climate change. These funds could not have come at a better time.”
The Trinity River is the largest Klamath River tributary. The salmon and steelhead spawning stream plays a major role in the Klamath Basin’s fish production and contributes much to the overall health of the interconnected watershed. Dams, widespread habitat degradation and water diversions have reduced the Trinity’s salmon and steelhead runs to a small fraction of their former sizes. The Yurok Tribe is engaged in collaborative, complementary efforts to restore habitat, improve water management and rebuild fish stocks on the Klamath and Trinity Rivers. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife grant is funding a significant portion of the Oregon Gulch Project, which is the largest fish habitat construction initiative in the Trinity River’s history.