We will hold our February Program and Membership Meeting on Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010.

The Program will begin at 6:30 P.M.  We will view the award-winning film Red Gold.  Red Gold documents the lives of many who work and fish in the Bristol Bay drainage and details the adverse affects that the Pebble Mine would have on the area.  If you have ever fished in Alaska, if you ever plan to fish in Alaska, if you have even dreamed about fishing in Alaska, this film is a "must see!"

The Membership meeting will be held at 7:30 P.M.  We have lots of exciting and critical projects planned for the upcoming year.

We hope that you can join us.

The Program and Meeting will be held in the lower Conference Room of the Papio-Missouri River NRD Building.  The Papio-Missouri River NRD Building is located at Chalco Hills (Wherspann Lake).  Directions can be found here.

 

The Nebraska Chapter of Trout Unlimited 2010 Banquet will be held at Anthony’s Steakhouse Saturday, January 30^th, 2010.

Anthony’s Steakhouse is located at the northwest corner of 72^nd and “F” Streets in Omaha, Nebraska. Cocktail hour begins at 5:00 with dinner and program following after 6:30. Dinner tickets are $30 and will be available at the door. Please join us for a enjoyable evening of fun.

 A special screening of the documentary “Red Gold” will be shown starting at 5:30. This important film documents the ongoing fight to save Bristol Bay in Alaska from hard rock mining threats. This area of Alaska is home to the world’s largest population of Sockeye Salmon.

The Banquet is our chapter’s main fundraiser for the year. Along with door prizes, we have a large number of raffle prizes and silent auction items. We would like to thank our major donors, as we could not be what we are without their contributions.

Thomas D Mangelsen’s

“Images of Nature”

 

Dave Ellingson’s

Canyon Creek Guest Ranch

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Larry Hutchinson's Letter  from Last Years Banquet

Greetings all,

At the TU banquet I asked our crowd to help fight two pieces of recently introduce legislative bills, especially one by Senator Fischer in LB 438.  I said I would send info to our webmaster and others so I hope you can help spread the word far and wide, and vigorously.

Attached is note I received from Dave Sands that quickly notes the legislative bills that directly affect instream flow protection efforts.  If passed LB 438 would prevent filing a water right application to protect fish, wildlife or recreation on the Niobrara River above upstream of Spencer Dam all the way to Wyoming including trout streams like Plum Creek, Fairfield Creek and others.  It would amend current instream flow laws by inserting the following words “(5) The instream appropriation is not in a river basin, subbasin, or reach that has been determined or designated by the department to be fully appropriated or over appropriated;”  LB 438 has several damaging amendments to statutes that authorized creations of a local stakeholders group to oversee, advise and assist the National Park Service administer federal actions on the Niobrara Scenic River near Valentine.  It has been very helpful for Nebraska and local interests.  It has been supportive of instream flow protection under Nebraska’s laws.  Dave Sands in the attachment LB666 - LB 438 Sands message.pdf did a good summary of what these amendments would do.   To help appose these bills please write or call your state senator and ask him to oppose such changes to protect public interests in public resources, and ask the senator what his/her position on them will be.  Don’t be bashful. 

If you want to read the bills that have these proposed amendments you can go to the Unicameral website at http://www.nebraskalegislature.gov/ then type the bill number in the search box at the upper right on that webpage.  When you get to that page, note where it says “Text Copies” and click on “introduced copy.”  That should bring up the entire bill to read but you need to look through it to find where words show strikeouts and or underlines to see the proposed amendments to the existing law.

Larry Hutchinson

 ““Our obligations loom large.  While we need to care about and fight for our favorite stream, we also need to care about and fight for the other fellow’s stream, the other fellow’s river and the other fellow’s offshore reef.”  - From “Pavlov’s Trout” by Paul Quinnett -