LITTLE ROCK — On Wednesday, Sen. Johnny Key, R-Mountain Home, introduced a senate resolution requesting continued federal funding for the Norfork and Greers Ferry national fish hatcheries.
Since 1957, the Norfork National Fish Hatchery has produced trout to restock the tailwaters primarily below Norfork and Bull Shoals dams. Congress established the hatchery in 1955 to replace native warm water sport fisheries in the White and North Fork rivers that were lost with the construction of Bull Shoals and Norfork dams. The hatchery raises rainbow, brown and cutthroat trout, including brown trout in the lower Mountain Fork River below Lake Broken Bow, in southeast Oklahoma.
The Norfork National Fish Hatchery is a major economic engine for the White River region. According to the hatchery’s official website, www.fws.gov/norfork/index, it is also a very efficient operation in terms of compounding tax revenue. “For each $1 spent of budget expenditures, $5.86 tax revenue was generated,” the website says.
The federal government created the Greers Ferry National Fish Hatchery in 1965 to replace the native warmwater sport fishery that vanished with the construction of Greers Ferry Dam. History buffs might be interested to know that President John F. Kennedy dedicated Greers Ferry Dam on Oct. 3, 1963. It was one of his last public appearances.
Besides being a potent economic engine for Heber Springs and the Little Red River Valley, the Greers Ferry hatchery is also an efficient tax revenue generator. According to the Greers Ferry hatchery’s official website, www.fws.gov/greersferry, the hatchery’s 2009 budget was only $458,086, but the economic impact of the trout it produced was $45.7 million (in 1999 dollars).
Obviously, the hatcheries are inexpensive to operate in comparison to their economic impact. Key’s resolution says that the two hatcheries produce a total economic impact of $150 million, but they only cost a total of $1.5 million to operate. It also says the hatcheries generate $5.5 million in federal tax revenues, or a return of about $3.65 to every $1 in operating costs.
Originally, the dams were built for flood control and togenerate electricity. Replacing lost fisheries was an afterthought. Key’s resolution flips the priorities by pointing out that Bull Shoals and Norfork dams generate about $100 million in electricity, and that Bull Shoals, Norfork, Greers Ferry, Beaver, Table Rock and Clearwater dams averted a combined $51.4 million in flood damages in the last fiscal year. According to Key, the trout fisheries on the White, Norfork and Little Red rivers almost equal the value of electricity and flood control combined.
The resolution instructs the secretary of the senate to forward official copies of it to the president of the United States, to the speaker of the House of Representatives, to the president of the U.S. Senate and to all members of the Arkansas congressional delegation, with the request that the resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record.
MORE ARKANSAS HONORS
At its 35th annual convention Feb. 19 in Nashville, Tenn., the National Wild Turkey Federation gave one of its highest awards to the Arkansas chapter of the NWTF.
Also, Stephen Richardson of Springdale placed second in the gobbling division of the NWTF’s Grand National Turkey Calling Championships.
The Arkansas chapter received the L.A. Dixon Memorial Chapter Award for winning first place in the membership achievement category for state chapters with 2,000 to 4,999 members. The chapter has been a leader in the NWTF’s chapter system.
Additionally, Mike Widner, former turkey biologist for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, received the NWTF’s Wayne Bailey Lifetime Achievement Award for Excellence in Conservation. Cpl. Roger Tate, an AGFC wildlife officer from EveningShade, won the NWTF’s National Enforcement Officer of the Year Award.
PAPA’S ELEPHANT GUN
How would you like to own Ernest Hemingway’s elephant gun? If you have an extra $200,000 lying around, you might have a shot.
The gun is a double-barrel Westley Richards .577 Nitro Express, made in 1913. Hemingway took it on safari in 1953. Hemingway’s Guns, written by Silvio Calabi, Steve Helsley and Roger Sanger, devotes an entire chapter to the gun. Hemingway also took the gun fishing off the coast of Cuba in the 1940s. According to Calabi, Hemingway hoped to use it against a German U-boat if one ever surfaced close enough for a shot.
James D. Julia Auctioneers of Maine will auction the gun March 14 along with about 1,000 other collectible firearms.
Sports, Pages 29 on 02/27/2011