California Watershed Management Forums
Forum #4 – “Filling in the Framework”
Forum #4 Objective: “To develop the outline of a robust, collaborative framework for watershed management in California and to identify achievable steps to accomplish such a framework.”
§ This is the last of a series of four forums hosted by the Watershed Management Council, with support and assistance of many other partners, beginning in the fall of 1999. The first three events focused on ideas and inspiration from programs and projects in three other states, experience from a variety of California watershed management initiatives, and ideas and recommendations for improving the framework for watershed management in California.
§ This forum series is also serving as the California Watershed Roundtable, through designation by the US EPA as part of the federal Clean Water Action Plan. We are one of a number of regional roundtables throughout the country, “serving as a focal point for information, dialogue, and consensus building among diverse interests and to foster commitment to collaborative approaches for watershed restoration and protection strategies”.
Nina Gordon, Resources Agency (substituting for Maria Rea)
§ These forums have evolved to where it’s more like a region of friends & familiar faces, which is what collaborative groups are all about.
§ Propositions 12 & 13 passed in the last election and provide lots of opportunity for funding watershed efforts.
§ The Resources Agency is promoting interagency collaborations like this forum
§ All of the work you’ve been doing through all of these forums will really help position yourselves to respond to funding opportunities and other opportunities that come about.
§ We’ve already been quoting from some of your comments from the minutes of these forums to help promote these watershed efforts.
§ We’re still working on a statewide watershed framework as that takes awhile to develop as we recognize the regional differences.
§ These forums are good building blocks towards that effort.
§ There are a lot of different issues and perspectives that have been presented, all of which are very important and well thought out.
Santa Monica Mountains
§ About 3 years ago the California Association of Resource Conservation Districts (CARCD) made a “Watershed Science 1A” video.
§ It’s very basic and lasts only 5 minutes.
§ It should be very valuable in promoting watershed awareness and help everyone’s efforts in outreach.
§ You can get a copy from the CARCD at (916)447-7237 or contact me at (310) 455-1651.
“Working Across Boundaries” Workshop – Julie Tupper, CALFED Liaison, U.S. Forest Service, Region 5
§ Workshop was held in Lake County on April 25-26. Minutes, pictures, notes, and results can be found at this website: www.ca.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/wf.html
§ Federal agencies hosted the event for the purpose of sharing among federal, state and local agencies and some local stakeholder organizations about how to better work across their boundaries.
§ A field trip to Middle Creek Watershed kicked off the dialogue and was a good example of working across boundaries with the local CRMP, USFS, County Public Works, Robinson Rancheria, and more. A joint watershed assessment resulted that formed the basis for several projects that got funded. No one started the process thinking about collaboration but now no one does anything without collaboration.
§ Shared ideas were sorted into 2 basic topics: 1) accountability issues (e.g., financial, administrative, and agency mgt.), and 2) interaction issues (e.g. with public and between agencies).
§ Action items that resulted were: 1) create a web page for sharing information; 2) create a “white paper” of the ideas discussed at the workshop; 3) present this paper to the Calif. Biodiversity Council, 4) propose this group to continue as the CBC Watershed Working Committee when the current WWG concludes its tasks, and 5) meet again.
§ We’ve got to give the Watershed Management Council and Polly Hays (of WMC Board and formerly Region 5, USFS) credit for getting us going on this.
“Unified Federal Policy on Watersheds” – Laurie Fenwood, Director of Ecosystem Conservation, U.S. Forest Service, Pacific Southwest Region.
§ The Unified Federal Policy (UFP) on Watersheds can be found at this website: http://cleanwater.gov/ufp where a Power Point presentation can also be viewed.
§ This policy is a portion of the Clean Water Action Plan commitments made by the federal government.
§ Last year 10 federal agencies from 4 different departments worked as a team to draft the UFP . There will be many signatories to the final: USDA (USFS, NRCS), USDI (BLM, NPS, FWS, BOR, BIA, USGS), Dept. of Defense, Dept. of Commerce (NMFS), Dept. of Energy, EPA, Tennessee Valley Authority, and Army Corps of Engineers. This is a lot of federal agencies cooperating in an unprecedented way.
§ The Policy’s goals are to: 1) use a watershed approach to prevent and reduce water pollution resulting from federal land and resource management activities; and 2) accomplish this is a unified and cost-effective manner.
§ There’s ample impetus for collaboration in this policy.
§ By taking a watershed approach, it means that we will be assessing the function and condition of watersheds across the state, incorporating watershed goals in federal agency planning and programs, enhancing pollution prevention, improving our monitoring, restoring watersheds, identifying waters of exceptional value, and expanding collaboration with federal agencies, states, tribes, and interested stakeholders.
§ Instead of being afraid of the federal agencies cooperating, I think we should welcome it for a change because we do get caught up in a lot of conflicting rules and responsibilities.
§ Since the policy is still short on how it will be accomplished, it will be a work in progress and can’t be done without collaboration and stakeholders. The Public Comment period has been extended to May 24, 2000.
Moderator: Julie Tupper, U.S. Forest Service
Panel Members: Teresa Pacheco (Army Corps of Engineers); Karl Stein (Bureau of Land Management); Walt Sykes (Natural Resources Conservation Service); Laurie Fenwood (U.S. Forest Service)
Questions # 1: What should the role of federal agencies be in watershed management? #2: What are one or two examples of current watershed management successes your agency is involved with?
§ Fenwood/ USFS: The UFP identifies what these agencies need to do in way of collaboration. These types of watershed forums and workshops help get the message out to the national forest managers. National forests in CA occupy about 20% of the land base but produce about 50% of the state’s runoff.
§ Where we’ve had success, we’ve had leaders who are willing to seek and nourish partnerships and had an engaged community. One good example is the partnership between the Karuk Tribe, the Six Rivers NF and Klamath NF, and CDFG in the Klamath Basin, where they combined efforts to decommission 7 mi. of road damaging a stream. Another success is the Santa Margarita River Watershed Cleanup, where 25 agencies and groups with 600 people came together to remove trash from the area.
§ Stein / BLM: My goal is to ensure that the polices and budgets that BLM develop are consistent with the needs of the field. Two watershed roles for BLM are: 1) serving as an anchor point for parts of the statewide watershed recovery by providing the primary protection, initial restoration, and long-term maintenance (e.g., Northwest Forest Plan and Oregon Salmon Plan), and 2) being a liaison or facilitator, especially where BLM lands are located in mixed-ownership watersheds (e.g., for land exchanges & purchases).
§ Successes in CA include: 1) Lower Clear Creek Watershed Restoration Program, near Redding, where BLM served as an anchor point and helped obtain land exchanges and funding for channel and wetland recreation; and 2) Grass Valley Watershed in Trinity County, where BLM worked with others to acquire and restore a former intensively managed area that was contributing much sediment to the Trinity River.
§ Pacheco / COE: Federal agencies tend to look at individual projects or multipurpose projects but we haven’t always looked at the whole watershed itself. Another role is to know more about what each agency’s involvement and other missions are so we can work together better.
§ Successes include: 1) Upper Putah Creek Watershed, west of Davis, where the Corps has worked with a local entity and a tribe in looking at the watershed and getting funding for a project, and 2) Everglades in Florida, where the Corps realized its project had done damage to the environment and it’s now going back with a comprehensive ecosystem restoration plan that hopefully will be a true success.
§ Sykes / NRCS: Helpful federal roles include: a) institutionalizing a uniform set of practice installation standards, such as our NRCS field office technical guides, as a form of technical assistance to the landowners; b) long-term data-gathering activities like the US Geological Survey’s (USGS) stream gages and the NRCS soil surveys; c) financial assistance for remedial work; d) local offices with a presence in the community, such as USFS and NRCS, where we can get personally acquainted; and e) educational, such as the EQUIP Program giving out grants each year.
§ Successes include: 1) Elkhorn Slough Watershed Project near Monterey, where partnership efforts helped produce a watershed plan that enabled a full-time team to get funded, which is now very active with land users and owners and agencies; and 2) Upper Stony Project (Glenn/Colusa counties), underway for more than 10 years, where NRCS has set up a series of ~36 workshops and makes attendance at a workshop a precondition to cost-sharing (which we can legally do).
§ Audience Question: How can the Forest Service be collaborative and work with citizen watershed programs and still meet the requirements of FACA (Federal Advisory Committee Act)?
§ Response: Very carefully. The relationship with federal-state partnerships is fairly clear and easy to understand. FACA’s purpose is to shine a light on what goes on and not have behind-closed-doors deal-making. But sometimes it stands as a stumbling block, though not an insurmountable one, to open communication. We can have FACA-chartered committees but just have to go through the process. The other way is a less-structured form of collaboration where federal agencies can serve in advisory capacities but not where they might have some financial conflict-of-interest.
§ Audience Question: What options to federal land acquisition policies are there? And have you considered their economic impact to local counties?
§ Response: Land acquisition is one of many alternatives that BLM uses. Nothing is forced as we only acquire land from willing landowners. We have lots of discussion with counties and will not go forward if there are impacts to the county.
Question #3: What are your expectations for local watershed partnerships?
§ Sykes / NRCS: Locally-led groups can help with decision-making, such as approving one of many alternatives in an EIS. Local partners can do a better job in data-gathering on specific project areas and doing long-term monitoring. Grants could fund local watershed coordinators for 1-2 years but then it should become locally paid if it’s going to become permanent.
§ Pacheco/ Corps: Early on, bring all of your interest groups on board to make the process go a lot easier. Look at the problem area and the solution area. Don’t forget about those upstream or downstream of the actual area you’re looking at because those people need to be involved.
§ Stein / BLM: 1) Look at whole systems and blur the lines – animals and water don’t understand ownership boundaries; 2) Identify needs of watershed restoration by understanding the ecological function and processes and then set priorities based on those needs; 3) Use BLM as a partner since we can be very effective in watersheds where we have land ownership.
§ Fenwick / USFS: I hope that people will participate not only out of enlightened self-interest, which we must all have, but for that portion of our brain that thinks about the future and about community in a true ecological sense with an understanding about our linkage to the landscape and our dependence on the land for producing what we need.
Question #4: What are your top recommendations on how federal agencies can support watershed efforts in California?
§ Stein / BLM: Since the Feds have an awful lot of money and a lot of infrastructure, the highest priority should be to agree upon common information needs for doing assessments, identifying treatments, and identifying any accountability or monitoring requirements. If we’re all speaking the same language, we can be sure that we’re speaking to the same resource.
§ Fenwick / USFS: My two key words are patience and persistence. We all must have persistence if we want to make sure the watersheds are improved. Sometimes partners need to be courted, cajoled, or forced into it, but we all need to be partners.
§ Sykes / NRCS: First, developing and disseminating updated technical standards of information that we have. Secondly, sustain our programs of direct assistance, either technical or financial.
§ Pacheco / Corps: Through communication crossing boundaries among the federal agencies, like CalFed where we are forming better communication lines.
§ Audience Comment & Question: I think the USFS, BLM & NRCS can do rural economic development well, even though OMB doesn’t see it that way. You’re well-positioned to work with local communities. However, while there’s lots of rhetoric, it seems to fall apart in the details of procurement (e.g., Jobs in the Woods). Do you see any increased effort in removing barriers to the procurement of services (such as cooperative agreements instead of low bid contracting)?
§ Panel Response:
§ It gets down to the nuts and bolts where government works, which is an incredible Byzantine system. That’s where the persistence comes in. I’ll take this issue up with our regional person.
§ This is a symptomatic problem and is not unique to any one program. Senator Wyden of Oregon performed a simple solution for Jobs-in-the-Woods: as a simple rider to the Appropriations bill, he made a number of funds directly available to work with local government to get on-the-ground work done. And there has been none of the feared abuse that all of the federal money was going to drain out of federal lands. It’s being used very judiciously to accomplish good work.
§ Identify the specific barriers and see if the solution is legislative or administrative. If it’s administrative, then maybe you can work it out with the folks in this room. If it’s legislative, then you work on it with your congressmen.
§ In the CalFed process, we have seen on the Federal side that it’s their authorities and contracting abilities that’s causing the delays. But it’s the same type of issues on the State side too. Next week’s meeting will be addressing the State’s side of the problem. So hopefully, since it’s reached this level and crossing boundaries through CalFed, we may find some better solutions.
§ Audience Comment & Question: While all of you talk about working more on the local level, the bottom line is that you are really struggling with budgets that don’t allow you to do it. What’s your view about how to get over that hump when OMB thinks it’s the biggest waste of money we can do?
§ Panel Response:
§ One of the issues with Direct Assistance programs is the inability to mix those moneys and focus them on projects that allow us to work through the watershed, both on private and federal lands, so that we’re leveraging our restoration opportunities. The State has a great deal of discretion on how those dollars are distributed, but they’re not necessarily distributed in a way that will allow them to focus on partnerships with the funding that’s directed at federal lands. But the state agencies generally don’t want to see the distribution changed. It’s not just a federal issue.
§ Federal agencies often have a real difficulty in prioritizing where to spend money. We have to take limited funds and go through a reasonable prioritization process. It doesn’t get us more money, but it distributes it more appropriately.
§ OMB takes the big federal pie and says that so much is going to go to different agencies. Federal agencies can appeal OMB decisions. BLM appealed the 2001 budget but the Bureau had to “market” to the Administration and to OMB priorities. By packaging our proposal better (e.g., “threatened watersheds” as one of 4 themes), we got almost another $19 million add-on. OMB listens to the Administration and to national groups.
§ Audience Comment: USGS gage stations are needed for local monitoring but some have been abandoned and funding continues to be threatened. Local monitoring programs are having to use a large amount of their precious few dollars to reestablish these stations. The State and Feds should do this within their budgets.
§ Panel Response: I agree. Don’t use precious local dollars. Find state and federal matches.
§ Summary: I vote for the word persistence. Agencies need to step back and decide whether their program is really the right thing to do by looking at the whole picture. Watershed groups need to make sure they’re considering all the values. Be persistent about looking at the bigger picture.
Presenter & Moderator: Sari Sommarstrom, Watershed Management Council
§ This Questionnaire was prepared by Sari from the 55 pages of summaries of the past 3 forums and boiled down into 10 pages of statements, representing comments made by participants and/ or speakers. It was an initial attempt to develop some synthesis of what has been discussed as a group to date.
§ It was mailed out to the Forum #4 Invitation list (of 173) on April 26th with the forum announcement and draft agenda.
§ The purpose of the Questionnaire was to try to see if we are coming close to agreement on anything from the range of interests and regions that have been represented.
§ In Forum #3, we tried a green dot (agree) and red dot (disagree) visual rating of various statements as one sense of evaluating agreement. This 10 page list is a more systematic attempt to evaluate the level of agreement, or conversely, the range of disagreement, after three forums. It was not set up to be a statistical survey (e.g., comparing a rating of 3.5 versus 4.1) but to depict the range of opinion.
§ A total of 20 questionnaires had been returned as of 5/15. I tried to ensure replies from the range of opinions that were apparent from past forums, so we didn’t just get certain categories of interests responding. Respondents came from: 7 state gov’t, 3 local gov’t, 4 local watershed groups, 2 land manager/owner groups, 3 federal gov’t, and 1 academia. While the number of respondents is not great, the range of interests & opinions represented is still quite wide and typical of the participants in the forums.
§ Their responses on a 0-5 scale (0=can’t live with it; 1=strongly disagree; 3=neutral; 5=strongly agree) were grouped for each statement and the range of scores were listed on the Results form before you. If the ratings were grouped together (3-5 or 1-3), I added the word “Yes” – we seem to concur or converge in the same way about that statement. Either weall seem to agree or all seem to disagree with that statement.
§ Then there are those responses that indicated something “extra” strong, as indicated by an asterisk (*). “Yes* ” = extra consistent agreement (all 4& 5) or disagreement (all 1&2). “Maybe*” = almost a “Yes”, with only 1 or 2 mildly dissenting; perhaps a minor word change could lead to agreement.
§ Problems mentioned with this approach include: 1) It’s difficult to respond to each statement without the context in which the statements were originally made; 2) A few word changes would make a big difference for some respondent’s answers (e.g., “could” instead of “should”); 3) Some statements seemed to simplistic; 4) Some statements that seemed to pit state or federal agencies against the local level appeared to be “wrong-minded”; 5) It may be common for responders to cite the same rating for completely different reasons, so apparent agreement is really not agreement at all; 6) Certain issues were missing in the survey (mainly because we didn’t cover them during the forums).
§ Strengths with this approach that were mentioned include: 1) It’s a “fantastic tool” to sort out the random brainstorm ideas from the more universally accepted needs and beliefs.; 2) It’s a good summary of the comments so far; 3) It was sent out to the entire list of invitees, which allowed the opportunity to get really broad input.
§ The 20 responses are not enough to be used as any statistical tool, and represent only 1/3 of the number of people here today. Ideally, one has a 50% response rate from questionnaires. But I see it mainly as a tool for jump-starting our discussions today as well as for future discussions in other meetings – to help identify where a convergence of opinion is forming on watershed management in California.
§ The intent of the questionnaire results is to use them as a tool to see if there’s any sort of agreement on certain statements related to watershed management.
§ Focus on the areas of agreement today and how we can move forward on those, because at least we’ll be moving forward. To focus on the areas of disagreement and try to resolve them will probably not be too successful.
§ Need to reorganize the table results and sort out where there’s agreement. Reword the awkward / “no” default statements into positive ones. Then talk about what consensus you have on those items that seem to be in agreement. Then you’ll have a product.
§ Identify the No agreements as an Unfinished Agenda.
§ Martha Turner will assist Sari in this task for the Draft Report.
Moderator: Dennis Pendleton, UC Davis
§ One visual image of a framework is provided by Oregon in its recent report, “A Guide to State Teams, Oversight Bodies, and Funding Agency” for the Oregon Plan for Salmon and Watersheds. [Overhead]
§ This diagram is not how California has to do it but it is a model.
§ The Governor and Natural Resources Cabinet is on top along with the Legislative Assembly but in the center - or core - of the concentric ovals are the Local Partners. This to me says that Oregon really supports the local effort: landowners, watershed councils, local government, and conservation districts.
§ Oregon has a very loose definition of watershed council in law, but the state does not dictate who sits on the council, the number of members, or the scope of the watershed, so the state has not been very prescriptive at all.
§ Local partners are the cornerstone of Oregon’s plan and its watershed framework has been built to fit around those local partners.
§ The next layer is the Regional Agency Teams, which provide interdisciplinary and interagency technical assistance to the local partners at the regional level. Federal agencies would fit into this layer along with the primary state agencies.
§ Outside this layer are the State Implementation, Outreach, and Monitoring Teams which all of the state agencies sit on. Each team has a different focus. For monitoring, the team is trying to make sure that any data gathered at the local level is used in state programs.
§ The last layer is the Core Team, which provides policy direction to other state teams and consistent direction for agency implementation.
§ The Governor meets every 2 weeks with his cabinet and asks, What have you done for salmon in the past 2 weeks? There is a message from on top that this is important.
§ But there is a lot of respect for local knowledge and local projects.
§ An Independent Multidisciplinary Science Team is made up of 7 scientists who evaluate key scientific issues related to implementation of the Oregon Plan.
§ Cooperation has allowed state agencies to be able to stretch their budgets a lot longer.
§ One of the reasons Forum #1 had speakers from Washington, Oregon and Massachusetts was because they had a state watershed framework that could be handed out to you. It’s been harder for California to have such a concise product to share with others.
§ Our objective for this forum is to develop the outline of a “robust, collaborative framework”, building on the survey results and other sources.
§ A framework can provide a context for actions that have occurred or could occur towards watershed management in California. This is really not just about delivering money to local projects.
§ The handout in your packet presents a matrix with various headings, many relating to the state’s role, and under the headings are key elements. The columns represent 3 possible options (A,B,C) which can be combined any which way “like a Mr. Potato Head” (as someone from the audience described it).
§ Some of the statements or concepts that were explored in the Questionnaire were included here, particulary those in apparent agreement (“yes”) or near agreement (“maybe”). But they’re put in a new context here.
§ The headings are very similar to those used in the Four Corners’ Watershed Innovators Initiative report described in Forum #1, which seemed to work well to synthesize the differences among the states.
Audience Comments on the “Some Framework Options” handout under these headings:
§ It would be great to have all three options (A, B & C ) in place: Executive Order, Legislative statute, and Cabinet-level Secretary policies.
§ Legislative option difficult in an election year: it’s more a campaign issue than a real interest to solve anything. But we need the Legislature on board.
§ A budget ought to be attached to any legislation. Maybe it won’t be giant the first few years, but there ought to be a commitment from state funding to at least support watershed efforts.
§ I support the same thing because you’re going to need all of the intents. AB 2117 (Wayne) can be helpful as a legislative intent document that a lot of us see as having potential.
§ Yes, this bill certainly is an intent document. It sets up a process in the program but doesn’t have a lot of details so there’s room for implementation changes.
§ Under “Type of Commitment”, there is also reorganization and other things to have a commitment to watersheds without funding, but then there’s jobs and they need to be funded.
§ Line items in the State budget are “really hot” this year as the budget surplus can go to one year expenditures but not annual entitlements.
§ “Area of Commitment” should be statewide.
§ Add another category: dedicated agency staff [See similar Heading below]
§ With the OWEB example, it became an independent agency as its budget and responsibilities grew. While people don’t like the idea of starting a new agency, its staff took on a lot of responsibilities centralized into one agency which might save funds in the long run.
§ Governor and Cabinet level need to give staff the mandate as an important priority and to connect across categories.
§ It seems like we’re saying that it’s useful to pursue all three levels of commitment. (DP)
State Agency Program Coordination - at the Watershed Level
§ The “Resource allocation”element is a touchy one because there are authorities that go with this (e.g, SWRCB is legally bound for certain things). I’d like to see an interagency roundtable with senior state managers but “ramifications” in the laws won’t let it happen. We need an allocation process but not necessarily this option.
§ The State Conservation Board was defunded 25 years under Reagan and Brown but its original mechanism was to coordinate the Resources Secretary with RCDs. My point is that there once was a coordination mechanism and it was sent out the door.
§ The weakness of the interagency roundtable concept is that typically these types of activities really only result in reporting from agencies as to what they’re doing. It does not result in any decision-making or modification of what the agencies are doing. Since no one come to that forum with any authority to make decisions or set resource allocations, my experience is that it hasn’t been that effective of a forum
§ What might be done to make it effective is to get the agency’s directors there, but that’s not likely.
§ The value of a CBC (Calif. Biodiversity Council) type of group is: powerful message that high level folks are there; informal dialogue; information exchange, and some collaboration occurs.
§ The State tried to pull agency regional managers together by CBC bioregions but nothing specific came out of it. But when there’s funding (e.g., CalTrans, Prop. 13) available together with strong direction from the top, then you start to get better coordination between agencies.
§ It seems to me that all we have in this table is just top-down examples. We need to start bottom-up from locals (government, water districts, RCDs…) and then see how the agencies can help. But if the state and the feds have the money, that tells us where to go. But dollars shouldn’t drive all of this.
§ CalFed model has shown that continuous commitment, such as meeting weekly with high level involvement, is a key to coordination.
§ How can state agencies link better with the local watershed communities so that there isn’t too much high level discussion with none of the real issues brought in?
§ A good example is the two regional county efforts: Five Counties in the North Coast and Fish Net 4 C in the Central Coast. The county supervisors took a proactive stand by themselves and the State should get credit for funding them but letting them take initiative otherwise. They opened the door graciously and asked how they could make it easier for the other side.
§ It seems that we need cross-fertilization of information and coordination bewteen agencies but with direct input from local entities to reduce the risk of just operating in isolation (director to director).
§ These options are not mutually exclusive at all. But I do think it’s a burden for the state to go out there and do outreach for 250 watersheds. Having regional watershed coordinators is the notion of a handful of individuals to communicate a lot with the local groups.
§ I like the Interagency Regional Roundtable concept with local groups and communities since it is the regional people who know the watershed groups and work with them on a daily basis. There could be 10 regions, but it could expand to 30.
§ Problem of top-down and bottom-up when it’s really both
§ Example of San Diego and Orange County regional areas of experience: they know local issues and stressors.
§ Joint local-state-federal effort allowed Corps special authority to go in and do water quality monitoring on Aliso Creek, with an important beach at mouth.
§ Locals don’t always have the funding but there’s lots of money out there.
§ Interagency Round Table was the “epiphany” for CZARA evaluation; each state agency could contribute something and senior leadership could make progress
§ Dual budgeting with SWRCB / CalEPA and Resources Agency: there’s a real value in bringing these people together for a Report Card on how funds were spent.
§ It seems the audience likes the idea of an interagency roundtable with local representatives but that this should be done on a regional basis.
§ “Flexible Funding Authority”: This topic brings us back to the issue of priority watersheds. We saw mixed results from the Questionnaire. I think it’s important to leave some discretion to the local level; you might get some bad projects, but I think you can trust them in general.
§ Oregon prioritized watersheds with criteria and scientists in a process similar to the SB 271 process, which gives some flexibility.
§ We’ve got to build flexibility for the local decision group and landowners.
§ “State land management consistency with local watershed plans”: My sense is that we’d want some consistency in state land mgt.
§ ‘Incentives for voluntary actions”: The issue is minimum strings vs. legislative mandates with strings.
§ On a very small scale, we should try “no strings attached” and instead give reward for proactive efforts (e.g., Truckee’s Excellence in Education Foundation gives $1500 to teachers to use at their discretion). Here the funding is an incentive that really rewards those for being proactive.
§ In a venture capitalist model, we’d essentially have a panel of creative people who would sit in judgment of creative projects that came to them. One would open the door to a funding pool and allow local group to get creative, with another group being the appropriate judges.
§ One creative example is having the local water districts help local schools adopt stream reaches in Calaveras County, and giving the schools funding to start children looking at the whole watershed.
§ One thing to help flexibility would be to change from the state’s grants from annual funding to multi-year funding, so groups know that the money is going to be there.
§ The idea here seems to be that funding doesn’t have to be done in a traditional way. The concept of a venture capital model or an endowment that will provide earmarked money from year to year will be a good opportunity for flexibility.
§ “Role”: State staffs can play multiple roles. One key piece is plugging into the local group as needed, which could be options A,B, and/orC.
§ Maybe what we’re arguing here is the flexibility and to let the role be determined on the local circumstances and preferences.
§ Interaction is a good topic. Groups need to identify what type of staff assistance they need because the specialties they need might be available from various state and federal agencies. We then need to be more creative since a lot more federal and staff are not likely.
§ Allocating staff time and money is an important issue. Often staff involvement is a “labor of love’, but some explicit funding for that involvement would help.
§ Staff support does not have to be in a traditional way. The USFS has “Enterprise Teams” combined of different specialists and they’re used where needed and when as they’re not needed all the time.
§ We’re making a mistake just saying state agency here and federal agency in another place in the document. Match state and federal help as both are needed for resources and assistance to local groups. But local folks have to take the initiative to ask.
§ We still need a higher level of commitment (cabinet, legislative) to allow state agencies the time and flexibility to work with local groups. That would go a long ways. The connections between some of your categories needs to be drawn.
§ Coordination is not there with state staffs for getting the permits to implement local watershed projects funded by the state: that’s the challenge. Representatives of agencies can offer more advice about how to deal with the permit challenges.
§ One possibility is a State team designed for permit expediting and a one-stop permit shop, much like a nonprofit is now doing to help streamline projects in the Navarro watershed by using NRCS/RCD as the one stop.
§ The CBC-Watershed Working Group’s “Recommendations (5/10/00) for Best Funding Practices for Watershed Management” (4 p.) was presented in summary.
§ The Watershed Working Group (WWG) is open to anybody, not just members of the CBC. You’re welcome to get on its e-mail list for meetings and issue papers.
§ The 28 Practices listed in this handout were developed upon bottom-up ideas.
§ Our intent is to present the issue paper to CBC Meetings on June 7th, Sept. 20th, and November (final)).
§ The WWG used a quick vote procedure to prioritize issues at their last meeting, as noted by the underlined practices on the handout.
§ Since local groups lack time to write grants, high priorities were to have agencies adopt a common application procedure and to use Pre-Proposals to direct a project to the most appropriate funding source.
§ Another priority is the timely release of funds, such as within 6 months of award.
§ Top priorities are: provision of technical assistance, locally-led watershed planning, regional forums for funding questions, documentation of watershed success stories, and promotion of science-based proposals.
§ From a state perspective, it’s really important to be able to have some performance measures that it can use for accountability of the funds awarded.
§ Public policy makers still often give a blank stare and ask, what’s a watershed? So public relations and education is very much needed.
Moderator: Laurel Ames, Sierra Nevada Alliance
§ These steps are tied to all of the things we’ve done today and the past forums. We’re coming to a good sense of where people are coming from and what it is they really want.
§ This draft handout suggests 7 of the 12 steps, and we’ll be filling in the rest today. Also, we want to add who should be responsible for getting this step done.
§ These steps aren’t necessarily sequential. They can move at the same time at different paces.
Step 1: Form a statewide coalition/ network of local watershed groups.
§ Proposed Leaders: Lynn Barris, Cherokee Watershed; Allen Harthorn, Sacramento River Watershed Program; Laurel Ames, Sierra Nevada Alliance
§ The reason why is to have a unified voice for watershed groups in dealing with state, federal, and local agencies; to be able to advocate for more money, and running watershed management programs at the state level in ways that are supportive of local groups.
§ We could show that we’re non-controversial, collaborative, and all those things.
§ The Questionnaire results should be reorganized to clearly define where there is agreement and circulate that, making sure people are on board. The “no” agreement statements can be an Unfinished Agenda for the next 5-10 years.
Step 2: Coordinate Agency watershed work officially through formal agreements.
§ The reason why is because we’ve heard that it’s much easier for agency folks to get their work done if there’s direction from the top of their agencies.
§ One model is the MOU existing for the CA-CRMP council, with 15 agencies as signatories; already have departments and some federal agencies involved.
§ California Biodiversity Council (CBC) MOU is also a model for MOUs.
§ Local government is needed for this too.
§ Some things are missing in existing MOUs that need to be added.
§ Exchange order of this Step #2 with Step #5 (Governor’s endorsement).
§ Leaders: Tom Wehri, CARCD; Nina Gordon, Resources Agency; Cal/EPA
Step 3: Support collaborative watershed groups that are community-based.
§ This is a theme that has come out throughout the country, not just California.
§ #3a: use Step #1 coalition/ network to help; also MOU signatories of Step #2
§ #3b: separate step; use “advocate” instead of “obtain”
§ Add a new #3c: Provide technical support
§ Make sure that groups that serve more than one watershed can qualify too
§ SB271 (Thompson) can only be used for start-up funding but not for older groups
§ Follow up with Step #4 – Legislative endorsement
§ Leaders: California Watershed Network/Coaltion; CA-CRMP; Resources Agency/ CalEPA
Step 4: Obtain legislative endorsement of the State’s commitments.
§ Educate Legislators
§ Agencies can’t lobby but they can educate
§ Need broad-based support but there are groups still worried about watershed bills
§ AB 2117 (Wayne) is one current example of statewide watershed legislation.
§ Agencies can use a “Governor’s Action Request” to initiate the legislative process
§ Calif Biodiversity Council (CBC) agreement & Governor’s support example
§ Seek support from new appointees to the Regional Water Quality Control Boards
§ Leaders: Mike Wellborn , Orange County; Connor Everts, SoCal Watershed Alliance; Laurel Ames, Sierra Nevada Alliance
Step 5: Seek endorsement by Governor Davis for the State’s commitment to the watershed approach.
§ Make this Step #2 and move existing #2 to #5.
§ Provide photo opportunities for the Governor. Get him out with some people who love watersheds on a boat and have him fish, or in a coastal watershed setting.
§ Leaders: Sungnome Madrone, Redwood Community Action Agency
Step 6: Prepare State watershed handbooks and guidelines.
§ Start with or adopt Oregon’s watershed manuals.
§ This task is not a trivial one as it took Oregon 2 years and $250,000 to do their Watershed Assesssment Manual.
§ Use existing manuals (e.g., USFS) since there are already many now.
§ Watershed Assessment protocols are not there yet.
§ We do need an agreement on protocol and the state has a responsibility to work on it.
§ Flexibility is needed in Watershed Assessment depending on purpose/goal/objectives.
§ Don’t lock into single methodology; we need to stay adaptable.
§ Do it as a long-term effort in stages and simplify the steps.
§ Use DFG’s Watershed Academy manual.
§ We need to create one like the “Napa River Watershed Owner’s Manual” and make it available to all.
§ We also need to define Analysis versus Assessment.
§ It’s a trust issue in California with environmentalists and agencies.The science is not simple and scientists don’t always agree. see Oregon Science Team experience.
§ Manuals are fine but it’s the fact that people are working on this together that makes a lot more sense.
§ This step ties into Step #5 (MOUs) and Step #7 (methods & effectiveness)
§ This is something the state agencies need to send back out so that they get comments and it becomes a participatory process so there’s no surprises in either direction. It’s going to take 2 years or more.
§ Leaders: Russ Henley, CDF; Fraser Shilling, UCD; Nina Gordon, Resources Agency?
Step 7: Share state-of-the-art watershed restoration methods and effectiveness.
§ Blend with existing conferences (e.g., WMC, Salmonid Restoration Federation)
§ Include website sharing, such as on WMC’s website for exchange of information
§ Have more regional gatherings, such as one in the north and one in the south.
§ Add #7b: “Use Field Tours as a means of sharing.”
§ CARCD and CA-CRMP annual meetings could be broadened to include this topic and to better focus on watersheds
§ National Forestry Congress is a model for decision-making
§ Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board (OWEB) now joins with the Soil and Water Conservation Districts (SWCD) in their annual conferences
§ Leaders: Everyone
Step 8: Add “Education, Communication, & Outreach”.
§ This topic needs its own special emphasis.
§ We need to communicate the baseline of what people need to know.
§ Get the Governor on the ground with those who love watersheds.