AGENDA

 The meeting was called to order at 9:00 a.m. and began with introductions.  A meeting agenda with copies of the September 21, 2004 meeting minutes had been distributed to the Planning Unit for review.   Walt asked for any comments or corrections to the minutes.

On second page under Implementation Strategies and the second paragraph:  “You then take it into Regional Health and they say whether it is ok to build if you have one gallon per minute coming out of your well.”  This should read: “You then take it into Regional Health and they say it is ok to build if you have at least one gallon per minute coming out of your well.”

In the same section and paragraph six under ISSUE:  “Should the County adopt policies, which limit the maximum daily withdrawals from? individual domestic exempt wells?” This should read: “Should the Counties adopt policies, which limit the maximum daily withdrawals from individual domestic exempt wells?”

There was a question regarding the next section (beginning with RECOMMENDATION) as it seemed confusing.  Walt stated that he would have to go back over the minutes and the tape of the September 21 meeting to see if he can clear up the confusion. He will get back to the Planning Unit on this.

The approval of the Minutes was tabled until later.

Minutes

Announcements/Open Discussion/Public Comment – No Comment

Multipurpose Storage Status Report

Walt reported that Golder Associates will deliver a draft report on September 11 to the Planning Unit members.  The draft report is being sent to the Planning Unit so that the they can review the report prior to the October 19 WRIA meeting.  Golder will be giving a presentation at that meeting and taking comments on the draft Storage Proposal document.

Reforestation Issue Update

Walt talked with Golder Associates about some of the needs of the Planning Unit in terms of reforestation and asked them to draw up a Scope of Work.  Walt distributed a copy of the document to the Planning Unit for review. The timeline for this to be completed is the end of October and a report to the Planning Unit by the end of November.  The planning unit discussed the proposal and would like to see more detail regarding per cost of acre and clearer quantification with what Golder is going to be able to give the Planning Unit.  Walt asked the Planning Unit if the Planning Unit agreed with the cost range and the Planning Unit agreed.   Walt will ask Donna, from Golder, about the specific quantifications they can come up with and be stated in the proposal.   Walt will get with Golder after today’s meeting and will e-mail the Planning Unit with what he finds out.

Final Recommendations and Strategies Report

Walt stated that he is working on getting a draft of the final product of Recommendations for the Planning Unit to review.  He will have this report to the Planning Unit by October 7 for their review.  This way a decision of what recommendations the Planning Unit wants to keep and which ones they want to get rid of can be made within the next month.

Implementation Strategies  - Feedback

Special Guests Deana Taylor, DOH and Sandy Dotts, WDFW

Walt introduced Deana Taylor from the Department of Health and Sandy Dotts from Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife.  They are here today to bring some comments on the Recommendations the Planning Unit has been working on.

Under Habitat and Land Use, a—Fish barriers should be identified and mapped within the mainstem and tributaries.  An action plan to eliminate the barriers shall be developed.

Sandy said that Fish & Wildlife typically does not do this, but they do provide training for conservation districts, fish enhancement groups, etc. to do this and then provide Fish & Wildlife with the information.

Walt noted that the Planning Unit would come back to this recommendation and make some adjustments as a result of this information.

Under Habitat and Land Use, c—Evaluate whether the current hydrology is capable of supporting flows required for returning migratory salmonids.

Sandy asked what would be required of Fish & Wildlife with this recommendation.  Walt explained that it would most likely be sitting down with Fish & Wildlife and reviewing information that was collected.  Sandy said that Fish & Wildlife would be ok with this recommendation as it is.

Deana Taylor from the Department of Health is a regional planner, but her specialty is more in the conservation field.  She is currently working on the Municipal Water Law  (HB1338) and water use efficiency and is here to offer some suggestions on the recommendations under the Water Quantity section of the recommendations.

Under Water Quantity, Issue—The planning unit recognizes that the watershed may be fully allocated.  Water savings will occur from implementing water conservation measures.  Communities may want to consider instituting a plan to prevent shortages in the future.

Recommendation a-Work with the water purveyors to implement conservation provisions of HB1338.

Deana suggested that this should be changed to “be required by the Department of Health.” to make it a little more clear as this is actually where the Conservation Program resides.  HB1338 is now called The Municipal Water Law.  The rules will be written in 2005 for the Municipal Water Law (HB 1338).

Walt mentioned that there was some concern that this recommendation might not be strong enough and that purveyors would be able to make their own goals and requirements.  Deana said the rules haven’t been written yet but the Conservation Program, through the Department of Health, was strictly purveyor focused and they will choose their goals, through a public process, along with reporting requirements set up by the Department of Health.  Deana said that if the Planning Unit wanted to be more specific and require more conservation through the Watershed Plan that is an option. Deana will e-mail the website information for the advisory group for the Conservation Program ruling to Walt and he will see that the Planning Unit gets the information.

After some discussion, Walt said that he thought the original recommendation/strategy with the modifications Deana suggested should be kept and another strategy be added for this recommendation.  The Planning Unit will work on this a little bit later in the meeting.

Deana asked what the purpose of the strategy was under (a)—Spokane County should be the lead on this in cooperation with the State Department of Health.  These agencies should facilitate a process to convene local purveyors to develop their own conservation provisions.  Bill Rickard explained that it was to encourage the County and the State Department of Health to work together.  The County, with the responsibility of having a coordinated water system plan, would get them to come together and develop a coordinated water conservation program.  Deana said that the education program with the purveyors in the Spokane area suggested in the recommendations was a great idea.

Under recommendation (i)--Identify funding sources for small town infrastructure upgrades (i.e. leak detection repair, storage, metering).   Deana said that the IACC, Infrastructure Assistance Coordinating Council, has a website and they have taken all the funding sources and put into a database that can be searched by project, entity, etc.  The website is found at www.infrafunding.wa.gov.

Deana suggested that the recommendation (b) should be made clearer.   (b)--Recommend new legislation to prevent water saved by improved irrigation efficiency or conservation from being subject to relinquishment. With the passage of the Municipal Water Law, municipal water suppliers was defined and those systems are not subject to relinquishment.  Because the relinquishment already won’t happen for certain systems it should be clarified that the Planning Unit wants to work on new legislation for non-municipal water suppliers from being subject to relinquishment. 

Deana stated, if the Planning Unit decides to do any identification of service areas in water systems it needs to be consistent with water system planning. 

Deana had copies of the Municipal Water Law for anyone that wanted a copy.

Deana will e-mail a list of the water systems in WRIA 56 that the Department of Health has listed in their database to Walt.

Implementation Strategies (Continued discussion by Planning Unit)

Walt said that he had e-mailed the recommendations list to some planners for them to look them over and comment but he hasn’t received any comments back from them yet. 

Reanette Boese reported that she has e-mailed Steve Holdabee at the Regional Health District about the requirements for septic system inspections and the idea about requiring more than one gallon per minute before they get a building permit and she hasn’t heard back from him yet.  She will try contacting him again.

Continuing Implementation Body and Plan

The Planning Unit discussed whether they wanted a recommendation about a continuing body and what the body would look like for the implementation phase during Phase IV.  The Planning Unit agreed that they wanted a recommendation. 

Walt distributed a document with some ideas for the Planning Unit to look over and think about.  He asked the Planning Unit to then put forth some suggestions on what they think this Continuing Body should look like and how it should function.

The first step is to decide the different characteristics of the continuing body.  Some things to consider might be:  should there be an authority involved, name of the body, how is the body formed, and who is on it, etc.   Walt asked the Planning Unit what they would like to do. 

Bill Rickard likes the idea of two different groups – one that answers directly to elected officials and the other one that puts the information together and figures out where things go.

Peter Grunte proposed that the Spokane County Conservation District be the lead agency.

Dee Bailey – agrees

Reanette Boese – no objections

Bill Rickard – has some objections but won’t disagree at this time

Gary Ostheller – SCCD should be a committee but would also like to see one elected or appointed water master that would then answer back to the County Commissioners         

Steve Bortfeld – wasn’t given an opportunity to say what he thought…

Bill Rickard stated that he was thinking along the same lines as Gary Ostheller and he likes the idea of two different groups – one that answers directly to elected officials and the other one that puts the information together and figures out where things go.

Bill Rickard proposed that an establishment of a formal structure put in place by means of Inter-Local Agreements amongst the participating local governments

Walt asked the Planning Unit if they agreed that the Spokane County Conservation District be the lead agency for the first part of Phase IV to write, facilitate and administer the grant as well as devise the entity that will

Final DRAFT Document/Public Meeting

Homework

Next Meeting

The next meeting will be held on October 19, 2004, from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. at the SCCD offices.

The meeting was adjourned at 12:30 p.m.