ARMS wants to restore a sockeye salmon run in the South Alouette River. (THE NEWS/files)

For a quarter of a century, a group of mostly unpaid helpers have been talking about fish habitat, and enlightening the uninformed about fish conservation, riparian areas and water quality.

All of that work by the Alouette River Management Society, based out of Allco Park in north Maple Ridge, was recognized last week by the City of Maple Ridge’s Community Heritage Commission which gave the society the Stewardship of a Community Cultural Asset award. The recognition is part of the commission’s annual Heritage Awards given out last week.

The award co-incides with ARMS’ 25th anniversary. The group was formed as a non-profit in 1993 with the goal of preserving the South Alouette River flows which is regulated by outflows from the Alouette Dam, built by BC Hydro in the 1920s. ARMS was key in getting the first water- use plan in the province requiring consistent water flows downstream from the dam.

“We’re very pleased to get it (the award) on our 25th year of operation,” ARMS president Ken Stewart said Wednesday.

“We believe we’ve become an integrated part of the community participation in the Alouette River.”

The society wants to continue its community education work, and to continue to press for re-establishing the connection between the South Alouette River and the lake.

Finding a passage way from the South Alouette River around the dam and back into the Alouette Lake Reservoir so fish can complete their natural cycle remains the society’s flagship project.

Maple Ridge Mayor Nicole Read and Stewart are going to Victoria this month to make their case for a fishway to NDP Environment Minister George Heyman.

“We’re going to explain our case to the minister,” Stewart, a former Liberal MLA said.

He said building a fishway could be one of the conditions BC Hydro could be required to meet by the water comptroller when the water licence for the river is renewed in 2018.

When B.C. Hydro built the Alouette dam in 1928, sockeye were cut off from the lake, leaving the sockeye that had been trapped inside, becoming landlocked kokanee.

A fish passageway will not only allow returning Alouette sockeye to get back to the lake to spawn but also re-connect other species of salmon, such as chinook, chum, coho and pink.

“They would go up there tomorrow,” if a connection was made between the river and lake, Stewart added.

The Alouette River Management Society proposed building a fishway in 2010, but needs B.C. Hydro funding to pay for the project, which would cost at least $3 million.