by Liz Hamilton and Mark Heckert

One thing every good angler knows is that our waters are all connected. The small streams and wetlands higher up in a watershed feed into larger lakes and rivers, which eventually connect to our coastal waters.

Salmon depend on the health of this entire system - from headwaters to estuaries - to support their complex life cycles. Wild salmon are the energy that fuels both the natural cycle and our local economy. When we talk about maintaining the survival of our precious wild salmon, we are talking about the survival of an inter-connected system that defines the natural heritage of the Pacific Northwest. Luckily Congress understood these connections in 1972 when it enacted the Clean Water Act to not only protect our major rivers and lakes, but also the headwaters so critical to water quality and our five native salmon species. However, these protections were removed during the Bush Administration, and it is now up to Congress to create a responsible solution.

The Clean Water Act was enacted to "restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of our nation's waters. Congress recognized that the water quality of large rivers and lakes is dependent on the health of the waters that feed them and so extended Clean Water Act protections to small creeks and wetlands. Thus, the Clean Water Act has been incredibly successful in protecting critical habitat and earned the passionate support of hunters and anglers whose sport relies upon the habitat this legislation protects.

But now the broad powers that made the Clean Water Act so effective are slowly disintegrating, and the habitat most critical to the long-term vitality of our fisheries in Washington State could be severely threatened.

Recent Supreme Court rulings could open almost 60 percent of the nation's streams and more than 20 million acres of wetlands to potential development, pollution and destruction. In Washington State, EPA estimates that 41 percent to 54 percent of our headwater streams are currently without Clean Water Act protections.

Unfortunately, these same water bodies play an essential, irreplaceable role in filtering pollutants, absorbing floodwaters and providing critical salmon spawning habitat in Puget Sound and throughout the Pacific Northwest. In view of this fact, it's not surprising that our state joined more than 30 states in asking the Supreme Court to uphold broad legal protections for small tributaries and their adjacent wetlands.

Congress must enact the strongest bill possible to restore Clean Water Act protections to streams and wetlands essential to the health of our wildlife and the people of Washington. In this effort, we are fortunate that Washington state congressional Reps. Brian Baird and Rick Larsen, members of the powerful House Transportation and Infrastructure committee, will be key in deciding the future of this bill. We urge our delegation to support and pass a bill that does not surrender the progress we have made in cleaning up the nation's waters and ensuring the long-term viability of our region's iconic and economically imperative salmon runs.

The fate of our wild salmon runs, which truly define the Pacific Northwest, are hanging in the balance. Congress should act quickly to reaffirm the historic scope of the Clean Water Act.

Liz Hamilton is executive director of the Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association. Mark Heckert is regional board director of National Wildlife Federation. Reprinted with permission from the Longview Daily News.