Deal Reached Over Protection of Salmon A compromise reached Monday with four Northwest Indian tribes would commit federal agencies to spend $900 million over the next decade on improving conditions for endangered salmon while leaving intact hydroelectric dams that harm fish. The deal would end years of legal battles between the Bush administration and the four Northwest tribes. However, it would not affect a fifth tribe that is party to a lawsuit nor environmental groups that vowed to press on in their efforts to breach four dams on the Lower Snake River in eastern Washington. Federal officials called the agreement a landmark in the long-running dispute over balancing tribal and commercial fishing rights, protection for threatened salmon and power demands from the region's network of hydroelectric dams. "This deal defies the decades of salmon science that say salmon recovery in the Columbia and Snake River Basin is not possible with habitat and hatchery programs alone," said Bill Shake, a retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service official who advises a Northwest sportfishing group. Any scientifically sound plan must include increased spill at the two dozen dams and irrigation projects along the Columbia and Snake rivers as well as removal of four outdated dams on the lower Snake River in Eastern Washington, Shake said....