Final Environmental Impact Statement to Analyze Impacts of NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service Proposed 4(d) Determination under Limit 6 for Five Early Winter Steelhead Hatchery Programs in Puget Sound.

摘要

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has prepared this environmental impact statement (EIS) in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) after the co-managers submitted to NMFS five hatchery and genetic management plans (HGMPs) for early winter steelhead in Puget Sound for review and approval under the ESA. The HGMPs involve early winter steelhead hatchery programs in the Dungeness, Nooksack, Stillaguamish, Snohomish, and Snoqualmie River basins. NMFS began this EIS process in 2015 when it requested scoping input from the public to develop alternatives to evaluate in an environmental assessment (EA) for three of the early winter steelhead hatchery programs. After considering public comments on the draft EA, NMFS decided to prepare an EIS that would evaluate all five of the early winter steelhead hatchery programs in Puget Sound, including the three that were reviewed in the draft EA. Therefore, in November 2015, NMFS published a draft EIS for public review and comment. In that draft, NMFS evaluated the resource effects of four alternatives (one no-action alternative and three action alternatives). NMFS received about 2,000 comments from the public during the comment period.