Congressman Mike Simpson
2084 Rayburn HOB
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Congressman Simpson:
The Power County Farm Bureau would like to thank you on behalf of all farmers and ranchers in our county for your work for Idaho agriculture. We however must state our opposition to your plan to breach the four major dams on the Columbia Snake River system.
The world right now needs safe dependable energy more than ever. These dams do more than just create energy, they also help our northwest agriculturist deliver Idaho’s agricultural products around the world. The loss of the Columbia Snake River barge system would cause an increase of carbon of 1.3 million tons due to an increase of 35,000 rail cars, or 135,000 semi-trucks. This would cause 24 million additional miles of added wear to county, state, and federal roads.
We support researching different options to revitalize the salmon population, but breaching four major dams has not been proven to provide any real help to the salmon, but would certainly be harmful to agriculture in the North West. We hope you reconsider the impact you would have on farming and ranching.
The precedence that breaching these dams would set could have a lasting effect that would make it impossible to farm in southern Idaho. Without the ability to irrigate, Idaho will change from green and lush farm ground to a barren high mountain desert of its long ago past.
Cordially the Power County Farm Bureau, President Evan Call, board members Greg Andersen, Kryst Krein, Jamie Kress, Stan Schmidt, Paul Schmidt, Eric West, Clint Call, Kyle Matthews, and James Udy
Cc: Governor Brad Little, Senator Mike Crapo, Senator Jim Risch, Congressman Russ Fulcher
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