The Departments of "the Interior and Commerce announced today the addition of representatives of the Department's Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to the federal task force working to attain a settlement of the salmon fishing controversy in Washington state.
Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs Forrest Gerard and Richard A. Frank, Administrator of NOAA, were added to the task force organized in April 1977 to seek to assure sound development of salmon fishing in the context of Indian treaty rights and the economic problems of non-Indian fishermen.
Attorney General Griffin Bell, Secretary of Commerce Juanita M. Kreps, and Secretary of the Interior Cecil D. Andrus head the task force.
In April, the Secretaries designated the following to serve as their representatives in Washington, D.C.: Peter Taft, Assistant Attorney General of the Department of Justice; Leo Krulitz, Solicitor of the Interior Department; Robert L. Herbst, Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Fish and Wildlife and Parks; and Anne Wexler, Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce.
Gerard and Frank were added today to this group to provide additional direct representation of Indian and fishery management concerns.
Discussions on a settlement of the fishing controversy have been conducted in the Northwest by a regional field team representing the task force.
