Klamath Riverkeeper history & accomplishments, and Board of Directors

Posted to KBC 7/31/16

Klamath Riverkeeper was formed by river advocates in 2006 to fill a niche in the movement to UnDam the Klamath for a hard-hitting nonprofit that could get to work enforcing environmental and water quality laws in the Klamath Basin. Over the next 5 years, KRK worked with allies at the Karuk Tribe and Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations to apply a legal, policy, and grassroots full court press to dam-owner PacifiCorp and its owner, Warren Buffett. Our successful lawsuits, nonstop policy advocacy, and targeted grassroots pressure forced PacifiCorp to sign a stakeholder agreement to un-dam and restore the Klamath River in 2010.

KRK has built on this success over the last three years by widening our defense of the Clean Water Act and other laws to take on water quality and quantity issues basinwide. In 2011 KRK soundly defeated a dangerous, precedent-setting endangered species program on the Scott and Shasta Rivers, and we continue to partner with the Karuk Tribe in their ongoing and highly successful battle to end harmful suction dredge gold mining on California rivers.  We remain a “watchdog” working to ensure the dam removal agreements are actually implemented, the Clean Water Act is enforced basinwide, and the increasingly common agricultural de-watering of Klamath tributaries is met with fierce legal and grassroots resistance.

We work closely with Klamath River Tribal people, fishermen, and recreational groups in our campaigns to protect and restore the Klamath Basin. Our work focuses on three major campaigns inluding un-dam the Klamath, protect water quality throughout the basin, and restore key Klamath tributaries. Klamath Riverkeeper is proud to have built the largest grassroots network in the Klamath watershed of southern Oregon and far northern California. We have an active membership of people from all over the Klamath, and all over the Western US.

We apply four elements to all of our campaigns and projects:

• Expert-informed policy advocacy within existing regulatory processes
• Smart litigation strategy
• Grassroots outreach & education
• Scientific analysis & water quality monitoring

Board of Directors

• Leaf Hillman – Karuk Tribal Council – President
• Craig Tucker, PhD – Klamath Campaign Coordinator, Karuk Tribe – Secretary
• Peter Brucker – Salmon River Restoration Council – Treasurer
• Dania Rose Colegrove – Maintance Supervisor, Hoopa Valley Housing Authority
• Nathaniel Pennington – Klamath Salmon Media Collaborative
• Marc Valens – Sycan River property owner
• Taylor David – Klamath Tribes of Oregon
• Frankie Joe Myers – Fisherman & Yurok Tribal Member

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