The URL can be used to link to this page

Home My WebLink AboutM062901 Northwest Straits Leslie Locke From: Sent: To: Subject: Richard Wojt Thursday, July 05, 2001 10:06 AM Leslie Locke FW: MRC and NWSC Minutes From: Joanna Sanders[SMTP:SANDERS@WAVPT.COM] Sent: Thursday, July 05,2001' 9:57:20 AM To: mrcmembers@onenw.org Subject: MRC and NWSC Minutes Auto forwarded by a Rule Two items are attached: Minutes of the last MRC Meeting and Minutes of the last Northwest Straits Commission Meeting. Action items for the MRC meeting were noted as follows (and are italicized in the minutes). Please let me know if you have any changes or additions to the minutes. Our next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, July 18 at the Jefferson County Courthouse. If you have suggested agenda items, please forward them to me and Andy Palmer. Please remember to post subcommittee meetings on the list serve so that others may attend if they desire. ACTION ITEMS FROM JUNE 20 MEETING: The Operations and Administration Committee agreed to meet and draft an agenda. Joanna Sanders agreed to poll the MRC membership to see if any of the Saturdays in August (4, 11 or 25) would work for a retreat. The Public Outreach Committee agreed to circulate a sign-up sheet to arrange for booth staffing. Linda Newberry agreed to provide tribal contact information to Spike Hall. Dave Christensen agreed to forward a list of tribal representatives to the MPA subcommittee. ~."""" ~ ~ ~ 'I 01 -06·29 _NWSC _ minu tes.doc June 20. 2001 MRC.rtf ATT00236.txt 1 NORTHWEST STRAITS marine conservation initiative Northwest Straits Commission Meeting Port of Bellingham, Harbor Center Building June 29, 2001 Decisions and Future Agenda Topics DRAFT Members attending: Kent Scudder, Kathy Fletcher, Andrea Copping, Gary Wood, Duane Fagergren, Mike Sato, Anne Murphy, Kevin Ranker, Mike Stoner (alternate), Amy Kraham (alternate) Bill Dietrich, Jim Darling, Terry Williams, Buck Meloy, Joe Schmitt Tom Campbell, Kirby Johnson Rachelle Hein Tom Cowan, Cathy Angell, Kate Smukler Members absent: Alternates attending: Resource support: Staff: Kent Scudder, Commission Chair, opened the meeting at 10:10 AM with introductions of the Commission and audience. Kevin Ranker, newly appointed Commissioner representing the San Juan MRC, described some of his experience and interests. The minutes of the May 25, 2001 meeting were approved as presented. MRC representatives summarized their current MRC activities. Clallam MRC: No report. Jefferson MRC: Sponsored a public presentation on the North Olympic Salmon Coalition (NOSe) and MRC forage fish inventory and reviewed a draft questionnaire that will be mailed to waterfront property owners; selected a contractor to update the web site and make the annotated bibliography searchable; began work with the City, Port and others to consider restricting anchorage to protect eelgrass. Island MRC: Sponsored the presentation "How Salmon Use the Nearshore" by Si Simenstad; successfully negotiated a contract with WDFW for using Dan Penttila for forage fish; Announced that the eelgrass report is now available on CD or on~line. San Juan MRC: Forage fish volunteers are trained and will begin inventorying three days per week; except for outreach efforts, the Bottomfish Recovery Program is struggling and needs to be redefined; concerned that funding for the fish tagging project could be better utilized. Skagit MRC: Convening a workshop of experts/constituents to discuss next steps for Rocky Reef Bottomfish Recovery; sponsoring a spartina removal project with the refineries, community and tribes in the March Point area. Snohomish MRC: The Edmonds beach expo was very successful with 240 people attending; reviewing shoreline inventory protocols in order to integrate with existing ShoreZone Inventory developed by DNR. Whatcom MRC: Sponsored the first Speaker's Bureau presentation by Kurt Fresh on salmon in the nearshore environment; continuing to upgrade the MRC Web site; discussed the recent Tosco Dock oil spill; county received a CZM grant for a shoreline inventory that wi]] complement the MRC Rapid Shoreline Inventory. Committee chairs provided updates of committee activities. AdministrativelPlanning: recommending changes to the current committee organizational structure and to the process for adopting Commission policy. Education: Continuing to develop a communications strategy; developing ideas for organization and theme for the October MRC Training Conference. Fundraising: No report. Technical: Announced that the Puget Sound Action Team is sponsoring scholarships for MRCs to attend the upcoming Submerged Lands Conference. Tribal: No report. Kathy Fletcher, Chair of the Education Committee, led a discussion regarding the October 26/27 MRC Training Conference. The Committee recommends that Friday evening should be celebration oriented with opportunities for MRCs to showcase their successes. Saturday should be divided into two themes: 1) communication - getting the message out and 2) current science and resource management subjects that wi]] help MRCs address priority topics. The Commission agreed and asked the Education Committee to begin working on specifics and to begin inviting speakers. It was moved, seconded and approved by consensus to elect Andrea Copping chair of the Technical Committee. Washington State has approved the Northwest Straits Marine Conservation Foundation as a nonprofit corporation. Terry Stevens, Gary Wood, Kent Scudder and Amy Kraham wi]] work on the IRS application for tax-exempt status. It was noted that it must be made very clear how the Foundation differs from the Commission. The Commission discussed the process for adopting Commission policy following agreement that the current procedure is not efficient. Staff will draft a new procedure for consideration at the next Commission meeting that wi]] include the following elements: sponsors of proposed resolutions and position statements must justify how the proposal wi]] contribute to achieving Performance Benchmarks; proposals wi]] be referred to the AdministrativelPlanning Committee for consideration; MRCs will have the opportunity to discuss the proposal and may endorse or not. Duane Fagergren led a discussion on Committee roles and responsibilities. The Technical Committee will rely on a pool of interested and qualified MRC and NWSC members and selected agency and institutional people rather than operate as a standing committee. Depending on the subject and assignment, the appropriate people would then be organized by the Technical Committee chair for the particular task. The Fundraising Committee will focus on a few targeted grant sources and attempt to provide some funds for grant writing/administration tasks. Andrea Copping is the lead for the Nearshore Habitat Evaluation project. She described the progress of the contractor, Anchor Environmental, in bringing key data sets together. A next step is to pull a technical group together, including MRCs, to review the data sources. The meeting was adjourned at approximately 3:30 PM. The next meeting wi]] be held on July 27 in Friday. Meeting topics should be suggested to the Commission staff by July 16.