Meeting Summary – June 23, 2006

A. GENERAL PARTNERSHIP BUSINESS

Introductions

Vice Chair Bob Beerbower welcomed everyone and opened the meeting. She asked everyone to introduce themselves.   Eleven of the Partnership's twenty-eight member organizations had a representative or an alternate at the meeting.  Six additional citizens, alternates, or visitors were at the meeting. See attendance list on the last page of this summary. 

Chehalis Basin Watershed Festival

Kahle reported on the planning progress for the festival.  The Chehalis Tribe was contacted to request their participation.  They have agreed to participate.  The City of Centralia has some artifacts to transfer to the tribe.  Napier mentioned that for the 2007 festival it might be locate in the Lower Chehalis.  A suggestions was made to look into using Friends Landing as the site. 

FINN, the salmon was reserved.  Kahle hopes to share FINN with some of the schools in the upper Chehalis before the festival. 

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 River near Chehalis, Skookumchuck near Bucoda, Chehalis River near Grand Mound, Chehalis at Porter, Satsop River near Satsop, Wynoochee River above Save Creek near Aberdeen, and Humptulips River below Highway 10 near Humptulips. The graphs show the regulatory flow, the actual flow, and the median flows for the 15^th day of the month, measured the flow in cubic feet and described discharge.  This month the flows are at are slightly below the minimum flows. 

B. Special Projects

Watershed Planning-Phase IV

John Kliem presented an overview of the draft Detailed Implementation Plan (DIP) and distributed copies.  He asked the group for general comments regarding their initial impression. 

• The group liked the new format. 
• Are the notes from each workshop included in the draft DIP?  Yes, the notes are now part of each DIP with additional information such as an introduction and some language to put context for each DIP.
• A suggestion was made to allow time for the BoCC’s to meet and review the draft before the CBP adopts the final document in September. 
• Add text describing how the five DIPs were selected and the future work plan for the remaining thirteen DIPs.
• Explain how the DIP relates to the watershed plan. 

The next step(s) will include work by the standing committees to reconcile the five work plans.   Anyone who would like to provide input before the next draft is sent out to the CBP should attend the STC meetings on July 6^th and August 3.  The document will be available electronically from Lee or from Grays Harbor County’s website.

Watershed Council Grant

Napier stated that the group needed to finalize a scope of work for the $75,000 appropriated by the legislators.  The money would be available July 1.  During several STC meetings, the group discussed ways to use the money.  Options included money for outreach, project management and watershed plan implementation.  Napier discussed one watershed plan implementation option, development of a Coordinated Water Quality Monitoring program.  She presented a scope developed by Randy Lehr of Grays Harbor College.  He put his thoughts to paper after participating in a recent working group meeting organized by Steve Craig.  There is some interest in pursuing this program because in recent months, Napier received several calls from various parties asking for opportunities to implement projects.  The individuals were either looking for projects as a way to settle a fine or lawsuit.  Establishment of a coordinated water quality monitoring program might be a way to fund the program while also implementing the action of the watershed plan and TMDL DIP.

Randy Lehr presented his proposal to the group.  The group seemed receptive and would like him to continue to working on this proposal. 

Napier reported on the work to date by Lee Daneker. 

Progress as of June 1, 2006 STC Meeting

• Daneker reviewed DOH and DOE data bases to identify the largest Municipal Water Service Purveyors and the largest municipal water rights.   This resulted in a list of approximately 60 purveyors that appear to be those most likely to have significant water rights in excess of future needs.  This includes all municipal purveyors in WRIAs 22 and 23 which provide service at least 100 connections plus some smaller purveyors who appear (based on the DOE WRATS data base) to have large water rights.
• Began the review of Water System Plans (WSPs) of the 60 purveyors.  NOTE:  (1) WSPs that were prepared subsequent to the Municipal Water Supply legislation of 2003 are required to address (among many other things) the demand for water at the time the plan was prepared, a projection of water demands 20 years into the future, water rights held by the municipal purveyor, and an identification of any inchoate rights.  (2) Plans completed earlier may not cover all these points specifically.  (3) Municipal systems with fewer than 1000 connections are required to prepare less detailed plans. (4) WSPs may not be available for all 60 purveyors – to be determined when Karen Klocke, DOH is back from vacation.
• Began preparation of a summary data sheet for each of the purveyors for which a Water System Plan is available (from DOH).  The data sheets will include information on demand, rights, and expected future surplus or deficiencies in water rights.  Presented early drafts of a few data sheets for comments and suggestions at the June STC meeting.  Final drafts for all 60 systems should be ready for STC review at the July meeting.

Upcoming: 

• CBP is committed to engage municipal water purveyors in the process of identifying how any inchoate rights may be used to implement instream flow strategies. 
• Last November, Napier sent letters to the all Group A purveyors in the Basin inviting them to participate.  Only fifteen responded out of the 297 letter sent to both operators and owners. 
• The STC would like to try again to engage the purveyors by offering them the opportunity to comment on the results of our estimation of inchoate rights.  If the CBP concurs, the STC would work out the details of the process for contacting purveyors at its July meeting. 
• Napier presented a draft letter for the group to review.  The group asked Napier to work through some issues with Daneker and the STC. 
• Regarding the letter, the group asked the STC to consider how to explain that participation by the water systems would not be a negative action.  Should personal contact be made before sending the letter? 
• The CBP members asked if people really understand the term inchoate water right.  A comment was made that DOH/DOE will evaluate water system plans for consistency with watershed plan. 
• A question was asked if we are looking for new information by sending out the letter?  No we are asking the systems to validate the information presented by Daneker in the water system summary data sheets.

• Phase II of this project would examine ways in which excess rights could be used to benefit instream flows.

Salmon Recovery

Napier announced that the Coastal Region members were meeting on July 5^th in Lake Quinault to continue discussing and exploring options for sustainability planning.  She also mentioned that the Coastal Lead Entities were approached by the Pend Oreille/Northeast group about working together to develop a proposal for consideration by the SRFB.  This proposal would describe a request for assistance and might include support for coordination and planning.  She predicted this effort would produce similar results to the Coastal groups work on July 5^th. 

Napier asked the group for their input related to a request she received from The Nature Conservancy (TNC).  TNC was awarded a SRFB grant in 2002 to acquire a piece of property in the Black River subbasin.  They intended to negotiate with Aloha Timber, a willing seller, to acquire the site.  Negotiations have stalled and the TNC has another acquisition opportunity in the Black River area.  This site is close to their current holdings and adjacent to the Capital Forest.  She supports the request because the alternative site is located in a high priority basin, benefits similar stocks, and appears to be a logical acquisition when considering the ownership near the subject property.  She also is concerned about losing the money in the basin.  The SRFB established a policy that unspent funds are returned to the state pot.  Recently WDFW returned funds for the Satsop Floodplain Restoration Project because the Corps of Engineers could not deliver their financial portion for the project.  This resulted in less money in the Chehalis and even though she request the funds be transferred to another Chehalis project, the SRFB used their recent policy to deny the request. 

The group supported Napier sending the letter. 

C. Open Comment

The next meeting of the Chehalis Basin Partnership will be held on July 28, 2006 and begins at 9:30 AM at the Lucky Eagle Casino near Oakville.

Decisions

Chehalis Basin Partnership Attendance Record
Commissioner Bob Beerbower	Grays Harbor County
Lee Napier	Grays Harbor County
Mark Swartout	Thurston County
Bob Fink	Mason County
Terry Harris	City of Chehalis
Kahle Jennings	City of Centralia
Terry Willis	Grays Harbor County CAC member
Ann Wick	Department of Agriculture
Steve Craig	Department of Ecology
Ellie McMillan	Chehalis Basin Fisheries Task Force
Ron Mauel	Lewis County Farm Bureau
Annette Grainger	Weyerhaeuser
Vicki Cummings	Grays Harbor Council of Governemtns
Bruce Jones	Quinault Indian Nation
Randy Lehr	Grays Harbor College
John Kliem	Creative Community Solutions