The recovery of Columbia River salmonids requires that a sufficient amount and diversity of habitat opportunity is provided in the estuary to accommodate the full spectrum of stocks and life history types in the basin. To accomplish this, the primary objective of this contract is to increase the diversity, extent, and spatial distribution of habitats capable of supporting multiple salmon ESUs and life history types. With this contract Columbia Land Trust will increase the development, design and construction of on-the-ground habitat restoration actions in the Columbia River Estuary that benefit threatened and endangered salmonid species and help meet survival benefit targets/goals required under the 2008 Federal Columbia River Power System (FCRPS) Biological Opinion (BiOp). The Columbia Land Trust Estuarine Restoration Project is intended to assist in the implementation of RPA 37 of the 2008 FCRPS BiOp which states:  

“Estuary Habitat Implementation 2010-2018 - Achieving Habitat Quality and Survival Improvement Targets.  The AAs will provide funding to implement additional specific projects as needed to achieve the total estuary survival benefits identified in the FCRPS BA.”  
All restoration actions conceived of and implemented within this project are intended to benefit threatened and endangered salmonid species rearing and migrating in main stem and tidal habitats of the Columbia River estuary.   As a principle implementer of restoration in the Columbia Estuary, Columbia Land Trust has conserved over four thousand acres of Columbia Estuary floodplain over the last nine years.  Columbia Land Trust accomplished this by permanently securing a land base from willing land owners through fair market processes.  These lands now serve as a platform from which on-the-ground restoration projects are able to be implemented.  Columbia Land Trust restoration projects result in some of the highest survival benefits for threatened and endangered salmon in the estuary (Johnson et al. 2007).  

Columbia Land Trust will assist the Action Agencies achieve their specific estuary land protection and restoration goals by working closely with land owners, local, state and federal agencies, providing risk capital through a revolving transaction fund, negotiation capacity, legal expertise and an ability to leverage significant sources of project funding. This approach enables Columbia Land Trust to act quickly and effectively to meet estuary habitat restoration goals and allows Columbia Land Trust to accomplish restoration where other practitioners may not be able to. Columbia Land Trust has identified and is developing numerous estuary habitat acquisition and restoration projects within priority areas that this project will support.

The project types and actions developed within this contract are largely related to tidal reconnection actions that restore full or near full tidal influence to areas that have been historically disconnected from tidal and fluvial  hydrologic processes by levees, roads, dredge material and railroad causeways.  These restoration actions intend to restore such natural habitat forming processes as tidal hydrology, sediment accretion, and the movement of macro-detritus that shape and maintain estuarine wetland habitats.  Specific restoration objectives are:

1) Restore connectivity between river and floodplain, as well as in-river habitats
2) Increase shallow water peripheral and side channel habitats toward historic levels.  

Columbia Land Trust will coordinate with, and utilize the Lower Columbia River Estuary Partnership’ s Science Work Group for the initial level of scientific review for on-the-ground habitat projects.  The second level of scientific review will be done by the RPA 37 Expert Regional Technical Group as required in the 2008 BiOp; this review will be conducted in coordination with the Science Work Group.