Glen Spain, Part I: The Fight for the Columbia River

Damming the Columbia River may have electrified the Pacific Northwest, but it also turned the world’s greatest salmon producing river into a series of sun-heated slackwater pools—hot enough to kill salmon at both ends of their epic migration. Glen Spain, a veteran leader of West Coast fishermen’s efforts to protect their livelihood from environmental harm, updates us on recent progress in the decades-long struggle to force improvements in dam operations and give the fish a better chance.

Glen Spain is the Northwest Regional Director and Salmon Protection Program Director for Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations (PCFFA) and the Institute for Fisheries Resources (IFR) at their joint Eugene, OR office. He has been a vocal advocate for better watershed and riparian protections on both private and public lands, and currently serves on advisory committees to the Board of Forestry in both California and Oregon. He works as an advocate for sustainable aquatic resource use and the protection and recovery of salmon throughout northern California and the Pacific Northwest. He lectures widely on forestry/fishery and marine resource protection issues throughout the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere. He is also the recipient of the 1993 David Simmons Award for Environmental Vision from the Oregon Natural Resources Council, Oregon’s largest and most effective environmental protection organization. Glen received his law degree from San Francisco State University.