ABOARD THE CAN DO III ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER, Benton County — Todd Steele learned the river from his father, Rich. He got the boat, the Can Do III, from his dad, too. And back in 2000, Todd helped launch the Can Do II when Vice President Al Gore came to the Reach.

Gore’s visit on June 9, 2000, coincided with President Bill Clinton signing an executive order at the White House designating the Hanford Reach National Monument, preserving more than 196,000 acres and 46.5 miles of the Columbia from future dams, dredging and agriculture.

The presidential pen stroke protected the Chinook salmon gravel beds, the pelican roosts and the striking geology of the sagebrush steppe in one of the last relatively undisturbed pockets of the Columbia Basin. This parcel adjacent to the Hanford nuclear site i

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