HomeMy WebLinkAboutNorthwest Straits (NWS) Marine Conserbation Initiative Senator Patty Murray fo- Co ?4, Board of County Commissioners
c �s coe o� 1820 Jefferson Street
p PO Box 1220
Port Townsend, WA 98368
`9S Kate Dean,District I Heidi Eisenhour,District 2 Greg Brotherton,District 3
III NG
March 28, 2022
Senator Patty Murray
154 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington DC, 20510
Dear Senator Murray,
We are writing to urge you to seek federal support to fully fund the Northwest Straits (NWS) Marine
Conservation Initiative at$3 million for fiscal year 2023. The Initiative's leadership and conservation work
are critical to the health of marine resources in the northern Puget Sound region. The NWS Initiative
provides technical assistance, coordination, and base funding to seven county-based Marine Resources
Committees (MRC), including the Jefferson County MRC. The work of MRCs helps to protect and restore
our valuable marine resources and nearshore environment. Our county, like others, faces ongoing
pressures from population growth, climate change, and habitat degradation, making the contributions of
MRCs more important than ever.
MRCs are made up of local volunteers who prioritize and lead restoration, monitoring and education
projects and serve as advisors to local elected officials, including the Jefferson County Board of County
Commissioners. The Jefferson MRC plays a unique role by broadly representing and convening a diverse
array of perspectives from Tribal, commercial, recreational, and environmental interests, to achieve
consensus-driven marine conservation. In addition to its advisory role,the Jefferson MRC engages community
volunteers in marine stewardship projects across East Jefferson County, including:
• Rain garden installation and stewardship at 18 locations, to intercept and filter polluted
stormwater flowing toward our nearshore and marine environments.
• Native Olympia oyster (Ostrea lurida) population restoration and expansion in Discovery Bay.
• Protection of>100 acres of critical eelgrass meadows and shellfish beds through establishment
and maintenance of voluntary no-anchor zones.
• Forage fish surveys to monitor surf smelt and sand lance spawning at three sites, in
contribution to regional long-term data collection efforts.
• Kelp monitoring at North Beach, which helps to inform the status of bull kelp populations in the
region.
• Education and outreach to recreationalists, shoreline landowners, and boaters.
These projects meaningfully engage community volunteers and partners in hands-on stewardship projects
with tangible benefits for the marine environment and in citizen science, contributing to local and regional
data collection efforts and an improved understanding of our marine ecosystems. Project implementation
through the Jefferson MRC is a cost-effective way of contributing to recovery and protection of marine
resources that are important to our county residents, the local economy, and the international Salish Sea
marine ecosystem. Along with leveraged volunteer time and in-kind contributions, funding and support
through the NWS Initiative assures we can continue this local level approach to solving environmental
problems in our region.
We appreciate your ongoing commitment to the NWS Initiative and we hope that we can count on you to
see that this important work will continue to be funded.
Sincerely, 1 P-111
AAV,
Kate Dean eidi Eisenhour Gre: Brotherton
Commissioner District 1 Commissioner District 2 Commissioner District 3
2