Full Council Meeting

Cloverdale Veterans Memorial 9-2PM

Bob Anderson and Zeno Swijtink were the moderators for the meeting. There was not a quorum at 9AM, so the meeting began with announcements.

AGENCY ANNOUNCEMENTS-Miles Croom reported on the ramifications of the recent court ruling to consider hatchery fish when estimating populations of salmonid species. National Marine Fisheries Service will be reviewing the hatchery policies and developing a status update for listed species by Fall 2002. NMFS hosted a demonstration of the GIS system on March 6. The information will be available for the RRIIS and on CD's by April 2002.

Kerry Williams announced the Sotoyome Resource Conservation District has received a grant from the City of Santa Rosa to distribute its household and urban pest audit. The audit manual suggests alternatives to pesticides for homeowners and will be available during Summer 2002. The RCD webpage is now active at www.sonomamarinrcd.org.

Karen Rippey announced the project for arundo removal in Alexander Valley is incorporating landowner concerns into the next PRP. She will be meeting with the Sonoma County Water Agency next week.

Bill Cox reported that the fish are coming in with reports from fishermen and hatchery staff noting the arrival of winter run chinook.

ANNOUNCEMENTS-Brenda Adelman announced that the Russian River Water Protection Committee was the source of grant monies awarded to Sotoyome RCD and 9 other local projects for the watershed for a total of $120K from a legal settlement. Several important series of meetings are now in progress. The water contractors meet at 9AM the first Monday of each month (except for meeting on April 9) to discuss amendments to the water supply agreement. The Sonoma County General plan update is under way with work groups specifically addressing Water Resources and Riparian Corridor elements. The Citizen Advisory Committee will meet on March 26 at 5:30PM at PRMD, 2550 Ventura, Santa Rosa. The Sonoma County Water Agency will present a water policy update to the Board of Supervisors on March 25 from 9-11AM.

Brock Dolman announced the availability of his comments for the water resources element. The main emphasis is to address water resources by watershed basins rather than political boundaries. Funding from SB271 will allow Occidental Arts and Ecology Center to present the Basins of Relations training this July. Anyone interested in a comprehensive review of watershed principles, monitoring and management techniques, is encouraged to contact Brock to register for the 4 day residential training program. Their website is www.oaec.org.

Bob Clemens announced the Russian River cleanup days for 2002 will be September 27-28. The annual coastal cleanup is the weekend before September 20-21. Please contact Bob if you are interested in working with the board or helping out with the cleanup. Their website is www.russianrivercleanup.org.

David Berman reminded folks of the Watershed Day at Salmon Creek Middle School on May 18 that is being organized by the West County Watershed Network. David is working on a $15K grant to develop a watershed map from the Laguna de Santa Rosa to Jenner that will be used with approximately 600 classrooms of 3rd to 8th graders.

RRIIS UPDATE-Karen Gaffney review the progress in developing the Russian River Interactive Information System. Approximately $75K is committed to the three contractors for the system for tasks 1-5. Circuit Riders is performing the project management. UC Extension in Hopland is working on the ARC/IMS and GIS data sets. MIG is working on developing the website architecture and database structure. A multi agency team led by Bob Klamt (WQB) has been coordinating data collection and development among NMFS, DFG, WQB, SCWA, RCD's and UC. Sonoma County Water Agency's KRIS system is being developed simultaneously with the main difference being that KRIS is a static system that can be queried while RRIIS can be queried and data inputted/manipulated/reviewed by different users. As the KRIS system is publicly funded, any citizen can request information about it from the Sonoma County Water Agency.

The RRIIS project is currently ahead of schedule with a web prototype due soon that will have some preliminary data sets and links to other data sources. Any suggestions for data to be included should be directed to Karen Gaffney. There is documents list suggested by WIAM, which includes references recommended by the agency working group, that will be sent out every few months.

Steve Kokotas reviewed a sample of the website with demonstration links to show how the calendar, discussion group, map and search functions would work. Any information the user views can be stored/shared as MY threads for a personal archive, GROUP threads from any discussions, or by TOPIC. Any machine with web browsing capability will be able to access the website and login. There is no chat feature associated with the current scope of work but it could be included in the next phase if the WIAM group asks for it. The clipboard function can be customized to each user.

Suggestions from members included:
· making the name "Russian River Watershed Council" more visible on the site
· using or linking to information being developed by the Napa Sierra Club on water diversions within Napa, Marin and Sonoma counties
· including outreach to the community for the website when it is ready
· including data from the City of Santa Rosa

Within the next six months, the site architecture will be finalized and the data sets will be defined. There have been five meetings to date to gather inputs. The contractor will continue to meet with WIAM.

APPROVE AGENDA/MINUTES OF 1/12/02-Quorum of 30 members was present to approve the agenda and minutes at 10:05AM. Introductions of new participants were made for Bob Abbott who is replacing Bill Carrillo, Johanna Becker and Dell Tredinnick.

MOTIONS-The first motion for consideration was the public motion to reduce the quorum number to 40% +1 or 24 members.

Once a quorum is established, it applies for the meeting with 60% majority approval for any previously agendized motion. It still requires 66% approval to amend the rules of operation.Discussion of motion reviewed members' frustration with lack of participation by listed members. Amending the motion to include a year trial period or quorum majority based on the initial number of votes rather than votes remaining in the room failed with 20 ayes to table the amendment. The original motion passed as stated with 26 ayes, 4 no.

The second motion to support the Steering Committee seeking $130K in DFG grant funds was approved with 30 ayes. A report on which projects were submitted at the May meeting was requested.

The third motion to remove Ann Maurice from the RRWC for disruptive behavior was passed with 26 ayes, 3 no, 1 abstain. Members stated that other members who are not participating should also be removed from the membership roster.

PHASE II PLAN OF ACTION-Daniel Iacofano reviewed previous RRWC work to identify issues for the POA. Most of the work products will be available on the www.rrwc.net website as they are developed by the Council. Each forum topic was accompanied by a large map that detailed pertinent projects associated with the topic in the watershed. Eventually with the RRIIS system you will be able to point at a portion of the map and access whatever information is available for that geography, including a list of current projects. Members asked that the existing and planned beneficial uses for the ten sub watershed basins be included. Members are encouraged to identify high leverage activities that will affect the long term health of the river. Each of the twelve strategy areas identified within the framework are addressed in the breakout as such:
·* Fluvial Geomorphology and Species/Habitat Recovery group will address stream corridor restoration, species and habitat recovery, and uplands restoration.
·* Water Conditions and Characteristics group will address water supply, quantity and storage and water quality.
·* Human and Habitat Connectivity group will address land use, regulatory accountability, stewardship and public education and outreach.

Members self sorted into the categories and took a short break before resuming in discussion groups. A champion from each group summarized the group's discussion for the Council.
·** Water Conditions and Characteristics group recommends a water budget to assess how much water is coming into the system and being diverted from it at what season. The RRWC cannot make policy but can influence policy by working with the agencies to address water quality impacts. Chemical impacts include nutrient loading, dissolved oxygen, toxics, biochemical oxygen demand and pesticides. The impacts of timber harvest, vineyard conversions, construction and legacy projects should be quantified. The whole water column needs decent monitoring to collect data on the chemical parameters mentioned as well as bacteria.
·** Human and Habitat Connectivity group had five goals.
1. Promote public education and take information to local policymakers at the city, county and state level.
2. Examine the finances of resource extraction with a cost/benefit analysis. For example, gravel mining could be discontinued by buying out the leases of gravel companies. Emphasis should be on financial strategies that conserve the resource for the public for the longest period.
3. Increase the role of the agencies to promote effective regulation.
4. Inventory council members to see if a stewardship project can be demonstrated on a local parcel.
5. Examine water policy that exports water out of its basin of origin. When well water is disposed to a regional treatment system, the treated wastewater is exported beyond the original recharge area for the well. Water should remain within its basin of origin.
**· Fluvial Geomorphology and Species/Habitat Recovery group determined:
1. Temperature is the highest leverage remedy for focusing restoration efforts. By negotiating easements and promoting models that identify long term impacts of removal of riparian corridor vegetation, the agencies and RCD's can develop cooperative relationships with landowners.
2. Stream flows are critical for species recovery. The amount of habitat and vegetative cover for riparian areas should be expanded.
3. Continuing education on grading and soil erosion control practices will reduce sediment loads to the system.

Members requested that hard copies of the revised information be made available when the documents are posted on the website. When updates of previous documents are made, some obvious marking or lettering to indicate the revision will help members identify documents.

HOPLAND BYPASS-Praj White from Caltrans reviewed plans for a Hopland bypass. Mendocino County is the project sponsor for 10 miles of two-lane highway to be expanded to a four-lane freeway. The project is being undertaken to address current and projected levels of traffic through 2020. Currently, level of service is good except for 3-5 mile queues of traffic on holiday weekends. Without a bypass, those traffic levels will begin to occur more frequently as regional and local traffic is accommodated. Now, 14,000 cars and 1300 trucks per day use the highway. By 2020, it is expected that 21,000 cars and 2800 trucks per day will use the highway.

The bypass project also includes widening the highway north of Hopland. By looking at collisions at intersections that involve injuries or death, removing those intersections from the highway by using a frontage road will reduce accidents. Several alternatives around Hopland have been discussed with the community. The Western Alternative was soundly rejected by the community.

Current funding only covers the environmental impact assessment with the draft due in the summer of 2003. The project is estimated to cost $230-300M with a record of decision to proceed in 2004, design engineering by 2006, construction in 2009 and open for use by 2011. The constructed project includes an elevated roadway across the floodplain and strips or swales to collect runoff as well as sedimentation and infiltration basins. State and federal mandates require runoff to be contained where it falls. The existing road surface would be upgraded. The budget and public comments will determine which aspects are in the final design. Members suggested that impervious surfaces should be retired in some ratio to the amount of new surface created.

Comments should be submitted to Praj White, CALTRANS Environmental, PO Box 3700, Eureka, CA 95502-3700 by April 30, 2002. Please include your name, organization affiliation, and address.

MAY 11 AGENDA-Include agency voting status, review/disqualify non-attending members, a letter of support for the fishway as part of the reconnaissance study for Coyote Dam, and a report on the partnership talks with the Sonoma County Community Foundation.