$25 million in COVID-19 relief bill for Tennessee carp fight dubbed 'wasteful' by Trump

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter/ Carp swarm out of the Cumberland River as Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency Reservoir Biologist Michael Clark, left, Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources Fisheries Biologist Matthew Combs, center, and Kentucky DFWR Fisheries Biologist Joshua Tompkins work to remove them from the water during an electrofishing demonstration at the Barkley Dam on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2019, in Grand Rivers, Ky.
Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter/ Carp swarm out of the Cumberland River as Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency Reservoir Biologist Michael Clark, left, Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources Fisheries Biologist Matthew Combs, center, and Kentucky DFWR Fisheries Biologist Joshua Tompkins work to remove them from the water during an electrofishing demonstration at the Barkley Dam on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2019, in Grand Rivers, Ky.

The Tennessee Wildlife Federation and the chairman of the state's Carp Advisory Commission are applauding a significant funding step forward in the battle against invasive Asian carp despite President Donald Trump's call for changes and threats to shoot it down.

This year's version of the Water Resources Development Act of 2020 passed this week by Congress includes $25 million dedicated to projects to manage and prevent the spread of Asian carp in the Tennessee and Cumberland river basins.

Advisory commission chairman Sen. Mike Bell, R-Riceville, and Wildlife Federation CEO Michael Butler were delighted with the funding even though President Trump on Tuesday called the $25 million in spending "wasteful," and criticizing it as part of COVID-19 relief legislation.

The president has threatened not to sign the massive $900 billion stimulus package Congress passed alongside a $1.3 trillion spending bill covering most regular federal government operations and programs. He has also demanded changes and called on legislators to cut spending on items such as the carp program in order to increase direct payments for most Americans from $600 to $2,000 for individuals.

(READ MORE: Taste testing Asian carp: Effort to market the invasive fish for consumer consumption continues)

Trump's complaints aren't entirely unwarranted, Sen. Bell said Thursday.

"I believe President Trump's criticism is directed at the dysfunctional process in D.C. more than the specific funding of the fight against Asian carp," Bell said.

"The omnibus bill passed by Congress should have been broke down into numerous individual bills," he said. "The WRDA bill containing the carp funding had already passed the House unanimously and was waiting on action by the Senate when they decided to throw everything into one bill."

Bell agreed with Trump saying the funding "should not have been in a bill labeled 'COVID Relief,'" he said.

That said, Bell was glad to see some funding for the battle against the invasive fish.

"The $25 million absolutely helps," Bell said. The money "is directed to our federal agency partners like the [U.S. Army] Corps of Engineers and TVA. Those agencies will decide how the money will be spent. Barriers are at least one possibility."

QUICK FACTS

*Asian carp are now found in all three of Tennessee’s grand divisions — from the Mississippi to the Tennessee River north of Chattanooga*Tennessee contains more than 60,000 miles of streams and riversand its reservoirs span hundreds of thousands of acres*Every year in Tennessee, fishing generates $1.2 billion in economic impact, $112 million in state and local tax revenue, $149 million in federal tax revenue, and supports 7,669 jobs*Boating generates $2 billion in economic impact and supports 23,500 jobs every year in Tennessee*Chickamauga Lake is one of the top three bass fishing lakes in the United States*The Duck River is—mile for mile—the most biologically diverse river in North America and is critical to several endangered mussels species, which are threatened by black carp. The Duck River flows from northwestern Coffee County west across the state to where it joins the Tennessee River near New Johnsonville.Source: Tennessee Wildlife Federation

The $25 million "is to set up a pilot program within the Corps for Asian carp prevention to carry out up to 10 projects on the Tennessee and Cumberland river watersheds using innovative technologies, methods and measures," Bell said. He noted the funding doesn't specify barriers, specifically.

Barriers, however, are widely viewed as the leading method for limiting the movement of Asian carp, according to wildlife officials in Tennessee.

Tennessee Wildlife Federation officials say the appropriation - which also establishes an Asian Carp Eradication Program in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and would provide $4 million a year for 2021 through 2025 - could reasonably fund three to five barriers that often use combinations of sound, light, bubbles and other technologies to block fish movement. One such barrier is now being tested at the Barkley Dam, separating the Cumberland River Basin from the Ohio River, the federation said.

The federation's CEO, Butler, praised the federal funding and lawmaker support for the effort. He said the funding would help stave off the ecological damage and harm to local economies in communities impacted by Asian carp, an invasive species.

'The federation has been working with leaders across the Southeast and creating a place for collaboration that helped lead to this funding win," Butler said.

"Tennessee Wildlife Federation is proud of its contributions to securing these funds and extends a thank you to the many groups and people involved in this legislation, particularly Senators [Lamar] Alexander and [Mitch] McConnell" as well as members of Congress and legislative staff, said Butler. "The federation has been working with leaders across the Southeast and creating a place for collaboration that helped lead to this funding win."

Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency chief of fisheries Frank Fiss, a fan of barriers who has studied the carp problem for about 10 years, this week said barriers to stop the fish work.

"These barriers are an essential part of the block-and-tackle method of managing Asian carp," Fiss said this week in a statement on the funding.

"We have observed very little reproduction by carp in the Tennessee River, especially upstream of Kentucky Lake," he said. "Throughout the valley, steady immigration from downstream reservoirs is the greatest concern, and this is a problem that we can control with barriers."

Bell, Butler and Fiss are three members of Tennessee's newly formed, 10-member Asian Carp Advisory Commission, created through an executive order from Gov. Bill Lee. Commission members voted in their first-ever meeting to look at the economics of controlling the fish and discussed how preventive actions in Tennessee and elsewhere are succeeding.

The study would look at the whole Tennessee River Valley in Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi.

WHAT IF I CATCH ONE?

If you catch a small Asian carp — 9 inches or less — anywhere in Tennessee other than the Mississippi River, or if you catch any Asian carp in East Tennessee or other water where they are not known to be established, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency is asking that you put the fish on ice or freeze it and contact them immediately.If you are unable to keep the fish, the agency asks anglers to submit photos of the fish in hand and send it to them.You can contact the nearest TWRA office by phone at a region office, or by email at ans.twra@tn.gov. The Chattanooga region’s Region III office in Crossville can be reached at 931-484-9571.Source: Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency

(READ MORE: Asian carp advisory commission votes in first-ever meeting to seek funding for controlling invasive species)

The population of Asian carp in Tennessee's waters, now mostly in the western part of the state, is increasing and the fish are competing for food and habitat with native species.

Asian carp, some of which can grow to 60 pounds, migrated from the Ohio River into the Tennessee River, threatening the region's renowned biodiversity, commercial fishing industry and posing a health risk to recreational boaters.

The fish has been a serious problem in Illinois, Missouri and Kentucky. Millions of pounds of the fish swim in Midwestern states, and there's a large federal effort to keep the fish out of the Great Lakes. In Tennessee, most of the fish have been kept to the north, with large populations in Lake Barkley and Kentucky Lake along the Tennessee-Kentucky border.

Fiss told fellow commission members during their Dec. 8 meeting that the fish was encountered on the Mississippi River in Tennessee in "decent numbers" in the late-1990s/early-2000s.

"It's been serious ever since," Fiss said.

(READ MORE: Focus remains on Kentucky, Tennessee in fight against Asian carp)

There are four species of Asian carp, black, grass, silver and bighead, all brought to the U.S. in the 1960s and 1970s. They escaped from aquaculture ponds during floods in the 1980s and 1990s, and by the later 1990s self-supporting populations were established in the Mississippi River and its major tributaries, according to Fiss. Of those species, the silver and bighead are most concerning in the Tennessee Valley.

photo Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter/ Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources Fisheries Technicians Andrew Porterfield, left, and Nathan Rister, right, move fish caught during an electrofishing demonstration into another boat at the Barkley Dam in the Cumberland River on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2019, in Grand Rivers, Ky.

Silver carp - the variety that leap from the water and pose a danger to boaters and skiers - and bighead carp are filter feeders that eat phytoplankton that other native species rely on, he said.

In recent years on the Tennessee River system, Asian carp have been caught in Wheeler Reservoir and Guntersville Lake and there have been reports of the fish in Nickajack and Chickamauga lakes near Chattanooga.

The advisory commission, with Bell serving as chairman, includes Butler, Fiss, TWRA designee Kurt Holbert, Department of Economic and Community Development appointee Sammie Arnold, Department of Tourist Development appointee Dennis Tumlin, Department of Environment and Conservation Commissioner David Salyers, Tennessee Valley Authority representative Robert "Bob" Deacy, University of Tennessee, Martin director of safety Monte Belew and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers representative Travis Wiley.

The panel will meet again in late January as it prepares its first interim report to Lee due Feb. 1, 2021.

Meanwhile, Bell expects the effort to gain more financial help in the future.

"I believe you'll see funding from both the federal and state government increase as we are better able to quantify the problem and identify solutions," he said.

Contact Ben Benton at bbenton@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6569. Follow him on Twitter @BenBenton or at www.facebook.com/benbenton1.

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