This project supports implementing larger-scale projects to improve local watershed health and ecosystem conditions and function within the Pend Oreille subbasin, consistent with the NPCC Sub-Basin Plan. The Kalispel Tribe has a history of matching & leveraging  funds from various sources (e.g. SRFB, DOE, DOT, BIA, USFS) to implement large scale watershed projects.  Land management and watershed restoration will be based upon the jointly-developed objectives and expected performance outcomes. There is an opportunity for cost share on culvert removal projects in the LeClerc Watershed. This is a cooperative project with the US Forest Service and Salmon Recovery Funding Board (SRFB).  A total of 3 culverts that are blockages to fish passage will be replaced.  Two of these culverts are on streams that are tributaries to East Branch LeClerc and the other culvert is on West Branch LeClerc. This project will also develop a CE-QUAL-W2 temperature model of the Priest River between Priest Lake and the Pend Oreille River to investigate the potential impact of cooler flows released from Priest Lake.

This project includes plans to design and implement a feasibility study for a westslope cutthroat and/or bull trout conservation aquaculture facility. The Tribe will obtain BPA concurrence about purpose and need, and project objectives to be served through conservation aquaculture – including agreement about appropriate cost-share (relative to the magnitude of the impacts attributable to the FCRPS and Albeni Falls Dam in particular) – before beginning the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Major Projects Review (3-STEP) process in about years 5 through 7.
  
• Target Habitats: Pend Oreille River and its tributaries both upstream and downstream of Albeni Falls Dam.

• Projected Benefits: Land acquisitions and conservations easements in core bull trout and westslope cutthroat watersheds.  Large scale tributary fish passage projects.  Improved ecosystem function through re-establishment of ecological conditions that foster abundance, diversity, and productivity of affected species.  A better understanding of westslope cutthroat and bull trout rebuilding needs and objectives; greater definition of the purposes to be served through conservation aquaculture; and the possible construction of a production facility commencing after the ten-year term of this agreement.  

• References: Intermountain Subbasin Plan (Pend Oreille Subbasin), Draft Bull Trout Recovery Plan (Chapter 23)