Meeting Minutes October 10, 2005

The meeting began at 7:05 with introductions. Sandra Coveny, our coordinator and facilitator for the evening, gave us a run-down of her activities. It is grant writing time again, and many are due in October. 5 grants will be submitted: 1. Woods Creek Fish Passage (resubmit) 2. Outreach and education program support (2 more years) 3. technical assistance for two landowners in Wren to develop plans to restore wetlands. 4. Technical Assistance Staff position for 8 watershed councils in the Willamette 5. Technical assistance grant for 8 watershed councils in Willamette to help identify priority landowners to participate in NRCS Wetland Reserve Program. Additionally, talks are taking place to begin a proposal to remove fish passage barriers in Rock Creek. The MRWC Fish Passage Committee has been meeting with Benton Fish Passage Program, Benton SWCD, City of Corvallis, and will engage the Forest Service as partners in this effort.

The Cardwell Hills project is moving along nicely. It started with only 8 landowners, but now 22 are involved around in this region. Oregon Solutions is considering this a model for other watersheds. Sandra asked us to consider a different structure for our council, including revamping committees and meeting structures. More on this soon.

Committee Reports:
1) Outreach and Education: Karen Fleck Harding reported that they had met and talked about strategies and objectives. Also, Healthy Waters Institute, is actively helping Philomath school teachers and looking at community resources by linking to websites in the school district. Announced that there is a workshop on False Brome on October 13th;
2) Fish Passage: are in the planning stage for Rock Creek;
3) Land, Air and Water Use: plan to hold a workshop soon hosted by Janine Salwasser for landowners interested in learning how to use the Willamette Explorer.

Announcements:
1)Thom Whittier informed us that the City of Corvallis is holding a series of meetings on the Rock Creek Watershed and adjacent land. They are involved in a visioning process which will be presented to the City Council. The 2nd phase of the stewardship process will take place in over a year. 2) BLM is revising their management plan for Oregon and California lands, which include late successional reserve forest lands. They were sued by the federal government because they are not getting enough timber production off of their lands, and they are now proposing to open these reserves to timber harvesting. Opposition to opening late successional reserves (old growth) is strong, as it could further imperil already endangered species dependant on old growth forests. They are looking for comments from the public immediately. Most or all of the BLM Lands in the Marys River watershed are O & C lands and subject to this change if its adopted. Creek. For more information, contact the BLM office in your district (if you live in the Marys River watershed it is Salem: 503 375-5646 http://www.publicland.org/forestPlansRevised.htm Also see the ONRC website http://www.onrc.org/alerts/229.oldgrowth.html (they are the environmental group organizing opposition to opening these reserves to logging. I was unable to find a position statement on any of the forest industry websites.

Special Presentation:
Water Use and the Marys River: This 3-part presentation was by Thom Whittier and Amy Schoener, of the MRWC water monitoring committee and Bill Pearcy, of Wren. Thom introduced the subject and talked about the US Geological
Survey's gauging station on the Marys river. He showed graphs he made by plotting the data from their website, showing the lowest flow per day. The Marys has been going below the legal minimum (the in-stream water right for the State of Oregon) 25 times in the year 2002. Showing data from several decades, on average the Marys hits the 10 cfs or below 50% of the time, and 25% of the time it is down to 7 cfs. There is a gap in the data from 1980's to 2000. Amy explained that there are many designated beneficial uses for the Marys River according to the State of Oregon, although municipal use may seem the most important to Philomath residents, since their water comes from the Marys. She explained that the Marys is monitored by DEQ for many substances and is okay presently for most but not for the following: dissolved oxygen, water temperatures, fecal coliform bacteria and low flow (which is termed flow modification). Therefore, the Marys River is considered "water quality limited" and is on the 303(d) list. She asked if there are observations that individuals have made over the years, such as trends in crayfish abundance in the Marys River. Please let us know if you have such observations yourself. Next, Bill Pearcy reported on the USGS data he examined from their website and showed us the "natural flows" of the Marys River . These get below the 10cfs at least 5 % of the time. He also discussed water rights issues. He then presented data about precipitation trends, and concluded that long-term trends persist for 10-20 years. Questions and discussion followed.