Hell yes. The fish are a public resource shared by THREE states.

The Tribes have a legal right to those fish and if they disappear, we would be paying them off foreever. If the Tribes had the hatcheries subsidized by the feds, they would still be required to share the allocation.

The size of the retail industry alone, is enough to support a retail fishery. No only that, but you just dont arbitrary erase million of pounds of salmon from the food supply. Hatchery fish are a lot better then the pen raised atlantics. I do not know why the state has not come up with a viable production system that would make commercial harvest cheaper to operate than a regular hatchery that splits its time between species and summer or winter runs.

The money leaving the state for oregon, alaska and canada would drwarf the current reverse tourism dollars leaving the state. Look at the retail fisheries they push now. steelhead retention on the OP
Sockeye in the fall in 2008, when in fact, they should not have done so.

Imagine being in the legislature, when all the lobbyists from NMTA, ASA, NSIA, PSA, CCA, hotel and restaurant association, Car dealers, like selling trucks. who could say no to that. Since when did we elect a politician that was so tight with a dollar, the industry would be cut in half.