Chehalis Basin Partnership

 

 

 


Meeting Summary – September 23, 2005

 

A.      GENERAL PARTNERSHIP BUSINESS

 

Introduction

Chair Bob Spahr welcomed everyone and opened the meeting.  Thirteen of the Partnership's twenty-eight member organizations had a representative or an alternate at the meeting.  Eleven additional citizens, alternates, or visitors were at the meeting. (See attendance list on the last page of this summary). 

 

Chairman Spahr asked everyone to introduce themselves. 

 

Chairman Spahr read a letter of resignation from Jim Haslett.  Jim resigned from Napavine City Council on October 25.  He intends to still be active with the Partnership, but in another capacity.

 

Monthly River Flow Report

Jennings reviewed the flow charts he created for this month’s report.  The graphs describe real time data from the USGS gage sites at the Newaukum, Skookumchuck at Bucoda, Chehalis at Grand Mound, Chehalis at Porter, Satsop, Wynoochee and Humptulips Rivers. The graphs show the regulatory flow, the actual flow, and the median flows for the 15th day of the month and measure the flow in cubic feet. 

 

Chehalis Basin Watershed Festival

Chanele Holbrook-Shaw reported that she attended the Nisqually festival is this month.  She was able to get some ideas from this festival.

 

Anyone who is interested should contact either Chanele or Kahle.  She will continue to provide progress reports during the monthly meetings.

 

B.     Special Projects

 

Justin Hall, Executive Director of the Nisqually River Foundation, introduced the group to the Nisqually River Management program through a Power Point presentation.  He described the first attempt to develop a plan in 1970.  This plan was developed in Olympia and did not include much citizen input.  In 1985, the Nisqually River Task Force was formed at the request of the legislators.  This group developed their first plan in 1987. 

 

He explained the various volunteer programs and activities such as the stream team, school district educational outreach (primarily Yelm), water quality monitoring, the annual festival, land acquisitions and restoration.   Some of their accomplishments include:  

·         The formation of a Land Trust. The Land Trust has acquired many properties with primary funding from the SRFB. 

·         Developed the Nisqually School Outreach project.

·         Worked with the Nisqually Tribe to develop the Chinook Recovery Plan

·         Developed a project management and monitoring plan that is used as their habitat work schedule to track project status and outcomes. 

·         To date, they have complete 70% of the tasks identified in their 1985 plan.  They updated their plan to expand beyond that earlier focus to include more community and economic issues and sustainability of the watershed. 

 

The group asked questions of Justin:

·         Do you have an annual budget?  The base funding for the Nisqually River Foundation is a legislative appropriation of $100,000 per year.  Project implementation will be accomplished through board of directors fund raising efforts and willingness of outside agencies to obligate themselves to the tasks.

·         How do you encourage citizen participation? Justin explained that citizen involvement fluctuates.  If there is an issue of interest, such as Wal Mart coming to town, then involvement is greater.  He has found that citizens tend to be more involved with hands on type of activities such as monitoring activities or the festival.  Steve Craig added that in the earlier days, they recruited volunteers and Ecology provided staff to the citizen group. 

·         When you acquire land is it removed from the tax rolls?  No, the owner is a nonprofit group and they do pay taxes. 

 

Justin explained that the Nisqually River Council has also established a data clearinghouse.    They distributed copies of various maps that show their ownership and habitat restoration projects.  Their start-up costs were funded through a nonprofit group called Stewardship Seattle. 

 

Their data sources are donations from the state departments and counties.  They have experienced some challenges.  Some data sources do not allow the data to be shared beyond allowing the Nisqually River Council to produce maps. The federal data sources are not generally compatible. 

 

What was the cost to set up the clearing house?  With one staff person the cost is estimated around $75,000 per year and also includes a computer, plotter and software (ESRI), but excludes indirect costs. 

 

Steve Craig announced that Ecology has earmarked $75,000 for the Chehalis Basin to form a GIS clearinghouse.  The money can be used to purchase equipment.  He is trying to clarify if the funding could be used for staff support.  The group would like to focus time at an STC meeting to further discuss this issue.

 

Guy added that this clearinghouse also needs new data such as aquifer conditions and other data gaps.

 

Mark White added that tribes have an agreement with ESRI and do not pay full price for the software.  He also told the group that Grays Harbor College is looking for a GIS instructor on a part-time basis.  This might be a two fold opportunity. The group may be able to work with the college for part of the instructor’s time and/or we could get assistance from the interns.

Legislative Report

Napier reported that she had contacted two legislator’s offices inquiring about their availability to attend the November 18 meeting of the CBP.  Both contacts encouraged her to consider scheduling time during the December committee assembly meetings.  If the group followed this suggestion, the chances would be greater that more legislators would attend the meetings.  The group agreed and asked Napier to schedule the time and the STC to help organize the meetings. 

 

Watershed Plan Implementation –Phase IV

Napier updated the group regarding the Phase IV contract.  Beginning this month, time spent at CBP meetings and committee meetings will be counted as in-kind service match.  The Phase IV grant requires a 10% match.

 

The first task in that contract, with an upcoming deliverable due date, is a letter to the group A Water Systems.  A draft letter was sent out with the monthly mailing.   Napier is still finalized the distribution list, but the estimated number of contacts is around 300.  The Group A water systems are shown on the map posted on the wall.

 

The group reviewed the letter and commented that it was better organized.  A suggestion was made by John Blacklaw to simplify the definition of Group A by using language from the WAC.  Another suggestion was made to add a section for useful links.  The group suggested a link to Department of Ecology’s water right page and Department of Health’s drinking water site.

 

Napier will send the letters out the first week of November. 

 

Steve Craig asked the group to provide feedback regarding Ecology’s review of the draft water system plans.  Each water system plan must have a consistency review by Ecology staff.  For our area, Steve will review all the water system plans for consistency with the Chehalis Basin Watershed Management Plan.  The first plan for review is from the Grand Mound system.  The group asked Steve to provide feedback regarding his review of this plan.  In the future, the group may only ask that he let them know which plans he is reviewing.  They will make a determination as an outcome of the Grand Mound review.

 

Watershed Council Action Grant

Napier reported that during the last STC meeting the group initiated the development for this grant proposal.  The scope of work for this proposal would provide additional funding to help the Partnership to further evaluate Group A Water System water rights.  As part of its Phase IV effort, the Partnership committed to review existing water rights for municipal water supply purposes (Group A systems of 15 or more connections), to identify those that may be inchoate, and to initiate a process to determine how these rights might be used to meet the projected future needs.  The grant could help with an analysis of the relationship between these rights and implementation of instream flow strategies.  The funds requested in this application would be used for outreach to the universe of Group A systems, compilation of information regarding these systems relevant to this task, development of a decision framework which the Partnership will use to address this issue, and preparation for presentation(s) and discussion(s) of this work at meetings of the Partnership and at meetings of Partnership’s Steering and Technical Committee (STC), and participation in STC and Partnership meetings on this issue.

Napier asked the group to consider submitting this application.  The group agreed to submit the proposal.

Nomination of the Chair and Vice Chair

Mark Swartout reported that the annual plan of work indicated this is the month to nominate a chair and vice chair.  Since Jim resigned the group is without a vice chair.  The STC would like to suggest that a nomination committee be formed to help with this election.  He asked the group to consider asking the CAC to serve as the nomination committee.  The group agreed with this approach.  Jim, Terry, Lyle, and Chanele agreed to help.  This group will meet before the next meeting and determine who should be nominated to fill the two positions. 

 

C.  Open Comment

 

The next meeting of the Chehalis Basin Partnership will be held a week earlier on November 18, 2005 from 9:30 AM to 12:00 m at the Lucky Eagle Casino near Oakville.

 

Decisions

 

§         The CBP accepted the Group A Water System letter

§         The CBP accepted the grant proposal to the Department of Ecology for the Watershed Action Council program

§         The CBP accepted the suggestion by the STC to form a nomination committee

 

Chehalis Basin Partnership Attendance Record

Bob Beerbower

Grays Harbor County

Lee Napier

Grays Harbor County

Bob Macleod

Thurston County

Mark Swartout

Thurston County

Kernen Lien

Lewis County

Mark White

Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis

Art Lehman

Port of Centralia

Chuck Caldwell

Port of Grays Harbor

Bonnie Canaday

City of Centralia

Kahle Jennings

City of Centralia

Bob Spahr

City of Chehalis

Patrick Wiltzius

City of Chehalis

Terry Willis

Grays Harbor County CAC member

Lyle Hojum

Lewis County CAC member

Jim Hill

Lewis  County CAC member

Chanele Holbrook Shaw

Thurston County CAC member

Steve Kalinowski

Department of Fish and Wildlife

Chad Stussy

Department of Fish and Wildlife

Ann Wick

Department of Agriculture

Steve Craig

Department of Ecology

John Blacklaw

Department of Health

Guy McMinds

Quinault Indian Nation

Bruce Jones

Quinault Indian Nation

Jennifer Kelly

Congressman Brian Baird’s Office

Nancy Allison

CP RC&D