FYI, I recieved this from a friend and I know it's after the fact, but that should not deter you from calling in and supporting Peter's appointment. I have met him once and he seems to be a very gracious & knowlegeable person concerned about our resource, read on-

Vernon Young informed me this afternoon that commercial fishing interests will show up tomorrow at the Senate confirmation hearings of new commissioners to oppose the nomination of Peter Van Gytenbeek. Pete is, as we all should know, the nearest thing we have to "our" rep on the commission and he should be strongly supported. I'm enclosing a copy of Bob Mottram's article announcing Pete's appointment, as reminder of some of Pete's
qualifications. Every fly fisher whose senator is on the NR committee should send an e-mail saying the right things, TONIGHT or TOMORROW MORNING. Anyone living in/near Olympia who can show up and say a few words in Pete's behalf would provide an important boost. The hearing is at 1:30 in Senate
Hearing Room Two, Monday, March 29.

Outdoors: New commissioner would restore runs
>
> Bob Mottram; The News Tribune
>
> Advocacy for resources is what Peter Van Gytenbeek says he wants to
> bring to the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission.
>
> And it's not a new role for him.
>
> Van Gytenbeek, of Seattle, was the first national executive director of Trout Unlimited, a job he held from 1969 to 1974, working out of Denver to get that young coldwater-fisheries-conservation organization
"on the map," he said.
>He is one of two new commission members named by Gov. Gary Locke Feb. 24. The other is Fred Shiosaki of Spokane. Locke also reappointed Lisa Pelly of Bainbridge Island to the nine-member commission for a second
six-year term.
>
Van Gytenbeek, 66, is publisher of Fly Fishing in Salt Waters magazine in Seattle, and the author of two books on trout and streamside conservation. He's a graduate of Princeton University, and is a member
or former member of the International Fly Fishers Federation,American Museum of Fly Fishing, the American League of Anglers and the Trout and Salmon Foundation.
>
>In addition to fishing, Van Gytenbeek hunts birds."I used to hunt big game," he said. "I don't anymore. I've shot elk and lots of deer and antelope and a few predators. I just prefer bird hunting with a good dog."
>
But his concern on the commission will be all of the resources, he says. "I'm not there because I'm a fly-fisherman, a bird hunter," he said. "I'm there to do the best job I can for the resources of the state of Washington." How does a fly-fisherman-turned-commission-member look at fish hatcheries?
>"They are one proper tool of good fish management," Van Gytenbeek said. "Obviously, we've made a lot of mistakes with how we've used them. But they're part and parcel of management these days, and should be."
>
In fresh water, he said, "you need hatcheries to expand the opportunity; to put stockers in lakes that won't carry over or naturally produce fish. That's where they should go. Where you can naturally produce fish, you should enhance that production."
>In the anadromous fisheries, "the lesson we've learned is that ...you can't take fish from one system and stock them all across the rest of the systems. Because in each of the river systems, Mother Nature has provided for the fish to respond properly to those systems. "I think everybody realizes that today," Van Gytenbeek said. "But we're going to have to supplement of lot of what we've got, or we're not going to have any fishing at all. So a properly run hatchery is a key component."
Can Washington restore the fisheries about to be impacted by Endangered Species Act listing of wild Puget Sound chinook salmon?
"I think we can," Van Gytenbeek said. "We've got some awfully tough decisions to make. I think there are going to be times and places
that are maybe just hook-and-release, or just flies, or maybe total closures. I think we can bring it back - never to the level before
the white man came to the West, but I think we can have excellent fishing again."
One of the things that Washington needs to do is "something about the high-seas situation," Van Gytenbeek said. "It seems to me it's foolish to chase a salmon that we know is going to come back to a certain place in the prime of health. I think our fisheries should be terminal fisheries."
>
> © The News Tribune
>
> March 04, 1999



[This message has been edited by Rich (edited 03-31-99).]

Has anyone heard how the hearings went? Anyone attend?