The proposal and response left too many questions unanswered. The ISRP stands by its preliminary recommendation of "Not fundable."

The ISRP's preliminary comments from June 1, 2006 are:
The proposal requires considerably more detail and a better accounting of existing monitoring programs; i.e., what have we learned from monitoring other upper basin stocks that can be applied to this area? The proposal should be more than another plan to do planning. The proposal also seeks funding to develop a plan to monitor yet unnamed primary populations in the Mid- or Upper Columbia regions (smolt monitoring for two populations and adult monitoring for one population). The scientific merits of the monitoring project are difficult to evaluate without knowing what the final plan will be. Proposed construction of rotary screw traps is premature. Project personnel costs are high relative to the proposed objective.

The technical background provides a discussion of salmonid population monitoring and discusses NOAA Fisheries' viability attributes, but it does not describe the status and trends of mid- and upper Columbia salmon and steelhead populations based on the results of Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership (PNAMP) and Collaborative Systemwide Monitoring and Evaluation Partnership (CSMEP) efforts. Overall, the proposal omits many plans and programs to which this project could contribute in a meaningful way. Thus it does not really define the problem that is being addressed.

This project is related to six other WDFW proposals for monitoring abundance and productivity, as well as six ongoing projects; however, details of the relationships are not provided. According to proponents, the proposed project will provide an "overarching context for a coordinated approach to salmon recovery monitoring of abundance and productivity in Washington State" for this work. A better approach might have been to submit this overarching proposal along with the six other WDFW projects as a complete package in one proposal. Many of the monitoring design and process questions should be have been worked out before submitting a proposal. There is a wealth of information to draw on, and it appeared that this proposal would attempt to duplicate work that has already been done in monitoring design, especially if smolt production is the focus of the fieldwork.

It was still not clear how the fieldwork would be verified for accuracy. For example, the proposal describes an EMAP-like design for spawner surveys, but only 40 sites will be selected (how was this sample size determined?) and there are no procedures described in the proposal to verify precision, accuracy, or give confidence intervals.