The Yurok Tribe is holding an informational meeting at its headquarters in Klamath today at 4 p.m. for a river rally.

Troy Fletcher, executive director of the Yurok Tribe, will coordinate the rally. He is asking all Yurok and the friends of the Yurok people and Klamath River to gather together for this informational commemoration of the infamous 2002 fish kill of September that year.

“The massive die-off left a stench in the air that few will forget,” according to a Yurok Tribe news release. “Official estimates were that 34,000 to 60,000 adult salmon died as a result of neglectful management by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and in spite of advance warnings by the Klamath River Basin tribes, (and) sports and commercial fisheries interests.

“Before the fish kill, it was argued in vain to the BOR that inadequate flows of water during critical weeks during of the salmonid migration could lead to a disaster.”

The rally’s purpose is to “urge the public to call upon the BOR to protect the tribal trusts that call for adequate river flows to preserve and restore all natural fish species to all regions of the Klamath Basin,” according to the news release.

Rally participants will march to the Klamath Community Center where the Bureau of Reclamation plans to hold a public hearing on its proposed conservation implementation program which tribal leaders and fisheries experts are calling inadequate to protect the river's salmonid populations and ignoring other species of fish and aquatic life altogether.

Written comments on the draft CIP can be sent to: BOR, 6600 Washburn Way, Klamath Falls, Ore. 97603.

The draft CIP is online at the BOR’s Web site: www.usbr.gov/.