Minutes
December 17, 2003
Members Present: Laura Arnold, Kelley Balcomb-Bartok, Brian Calvert,
Peter Fromm, Terrie Klinger,
Mary Masters, Jim Slocomb
Absent: Mike Bertrand, Tim Carpenter, David Hoopes,
David Loyd, Kevin Ranker, Kit Rawson,
Dennis Willows
Guests: Dr. Russel Barsh, Ray Bigler, Mark Billington,
Ken Brown, Shannon Davis, Robyn du Pré,
Jody Kennedy, Kari Koski, Rich Osborne
Chair, Jim Slocomb, called the meeting to order
at 8:30 a.m. in the Community Room at Islanders' Bank, Friday
Harbor and welcomed Laura Arnold as a new MRC member. Laura will
be replacing Rich Osborne who has resigned from the committee.
Mary announced that she is proxy for Kit Rawson for today's meeting
and Jim said he was authorized to vote as proxy for David Loyd
and David Hoopes today. Jim said that yesterday the BOCC unanimously
supported the county-wide Marine Stewardship Area proposal; the
Board also signed the resolution to ban Atlantic salmon netpen
aquaculture in San Juan County and Shannon said the BOCC want
to find a way to codify the ban.
Jim welcomed Robyn du Pré who introduced
herself as the new Local Liaison to San Juan and Island Counties
from the Puget Sound Action Team, Office of the Governor (www.psat.wa.gov).
Robyn explained that her task is to help local area residents
do what they can to steward shared natural resources. PSAT can
also offer technical resources and other support out of its Bellingham
office. Robyn's contact info is:
rdupre@psat.wa.gov
phone: 800-54-SOUND
Minutes:
Minutes of the 12/3/03 meeting were unanimously approved as read.
Funding Issues:
Shannon Davis gave an update on the MRC Coordinator position:
no interview has been scheduled yet. Shannon said that office
space is available for the MRC in a building shared with Brendan
Cowan, the new Coordinator of the SJC Office of Emergency Management;
Shannon pointed out that rent/utilities, phone, and other office
costs would come out of the 2004 administrative budget. A computer
and printer have already been purchased.
Motion: Kelley moved, and Terrie seconded, that funds of approximately
$5000/year be authorized for the MRC Coordinator's office as described
above, to come out of the $10,000
general support fund from the County. Motion passed unanimously.
Marine Stewardship Area:
Jim said there will be a signing party on January 13th at 11:30
a.m. in the BOCC Hearing Room of the SJC resolution to establish
a county-wide Marine Stewardship Area. Members were asked to help
build the guest list and to email suggestions to Jim or to Lil
Hamel in the BOCC office. The committee also applauded the recent
statement of support for the MSA from the Port of Harbor Commissioners.
Jim noted that the BOCC also received Mike Sato's letter from
the Puget Sound and Strait coalition, with an extensive list of
supporters for San Juan County's MSA.
Guest speaker:
Oyster Restoration: Dr. Russel Barsh added his congratulations
to San Juan County for the MSA. Russel said he will relay the
good news this week to the Samish Tribal Council. He reported
that the Puget Sound Restoration Fund has received a NOAA grant
to do more native oyster restoration; several tribes (the Samish,
the Skykomish Nation, Tswassen Island, Jamestown Clallam), are
partnering with the Skagit County MRC, Washington state, and the
City of Anacortes to form one of the five native oyster restoration
groups actively involved now in oyster restoration in the Sound.
Russel said that the grant will allow for expanded efforts in
Fidalgo Bay since there are enough seed oysters for several bays;
he suggested that the project could be a bridge to share experience
and to get a similar project started in the San Juan Islands,
if locals are interested. The grant will also support technical
work of advanced ecological mapping, site selection, dealing with
substrate conditions, and site monitoring. Russel said that one
possible site could be Garrison Bay on San Juan Island, which
historically had lots of shellfish and does not seem to have the
eelgrass dieoff/silting problem as severely as Mitchell Bay. Russel
will send habitat characterization and life cycle information
for the native oyster to Jim. Several tribes and other MRC's are
involved in the restoration project.
The first experimental oyster reef will be built
in Fidalgo Bay next summer with NWSC funding; the 1/4 acre substrate,
a mix of rock and shells, will run from low intertidal to high
subtidal and will provide an opportunity to research which parts
of the reef develop most successfully over time. Russel said that
DNR has been particularly encouraging of the project and are willing
to start thinking about leasing or trading to create access to
land for expanded shellfish restoration; DNR is working with The
Nature Conservancy now to try to come up with a working framework.
Russel explained that logging, hardening of surfaces,
rapid siltation, and changes in salinity are among the reasons
that native oysters are not found now in Garrison Bay and other
sites. Rich added that the construction clearing for Blazing Tree
Ranch in the early 1970's put about six inches of mud siltation
all over Mitchell Bay. Terrie said that overharvest of native
oysters eliminated so many in the early part of the century that
they could not come back.
Russel said that a main objective of the project is to re-establish
ecosystem functioning, restoring natural biological processes
by reintroducing a very important, habitat-building species...which
makes native oysters particularly interesting. Part of the work
is to see how community structure develops. If successful, and
we have naturally self-sustaining oyster reefs, he said, then
people could recreationally harvest native oysters...which is
the second project objective. He added that state regulations
would have to be changed to allow harvest, with one size limit
set for Pacific oysters and one for natives (and teach people
how to tell the difference); by current law, native oysters are
excluded from harvest since their size is below the legal take
limit.
An intensely shared interest of all the partners,
Russel said, is that the restoration area in Fidalgo Bay be a
really good addition to the marine park, trails, and recreational
opportunities around the city of Anacortes, allowing public access
and potential native oyster harvest. The project has expanded
to include not only city of Anacortes property, but tribal and
DNR lands. Area refineries and the County Land Bank are also talking
about joining in the restoration effort and private lands could
later be brought in as good oyster sites. About one-third of the
area around Fidalgo Bay had historical native oyster beaches.
Salmon habitat: Russel discussed another possible
collaboration with the MRC. The Army Corps of Engineers was able
to save a $75,000 joint project with the Samish Nation, a co-funded
stream-by-stream evaluation of potential salmonid habitat in the
San Juan Islands starting January 1st; he said that the biggest
interest is in re-establishing salmonid diversity (e.g. small
spawning populations of chum, silvers, cutthroat). Russel added
that the hope is to look at island streams that were ethno-historically
known to have had resident salmon and those that seem to have
channels that could support such life; a goal is to examine what
could be done at modest cause to restore fish passage in those
streams. The project will also look at the history of watersheds
in the San Juan Islands (intermittent streams, low flow, small
individual "insults") that threatened the ecosystem
and loss of salmonid diversity.
All of these man-made barriers to restoration can
be fixed, Russel said, by re-culverting, for example, and providing
better drainage systems. The project will start out in 2004 with
about 12 streams, (6 on Orcas); it will map the watershed, look
at water quality, changes in hydrology and habitat conditions,
and determine what it will cost to reverse the insults to the
system. With success, more streams could be added in 2005. Jim
said that the Town of Friday Harbor has 100 years of rainwater
data to help develop a hydrology model; a long series of rainfall
data is also available at a Lopez Island farm. Laura said it would
be important to feed the information that developed from the project
to the County's watershed plan and to the SJC Conservation District
that could work with private property owners to address some of
the corrective issues on a voluntary basis. Russel said the success
of the project is entirely dependent on the involvement, from
the beginning, of property owners and other residents who agree
they'd like to see fish back in the system. He added that Deer
Harbor has been extensively studied with a lot of work done by
the research partners and locals; most resistance is over potential
cost to private landowners. Russel said there could be resources
available if the community wants it.
Robyn duPré said there is some emerging research
on in- and out-migration of juvenile salmon in pocket estuaries
and the issue is more complex than previously thought; she added
that small streams are very important to salmon. Russel said that
the Skagit System Coop and NWSC tribal money are funding the research
which indicates that adult salmon utilize the same areas and the
evolutionary implications are exciting. He reported that in August
there was the first evidence of returning sockeye feeding on the
west side of San Juan Island in old reefnet sites. In a small
weekend pilot study, there was dramatic evidence that most of
the fish netted had eaten in their last twelve hours, feeding
on nearshore insects and copepods. There is now a general call
for support, ideas, partnership, and funding ($20-30,000) to expand
the study next summer, with more stomach content studies, to identify
six " great reefnet" bays where sockeye may be feeding.
If the hypothesis proves to be right, then a whole new dimension
of habitat issues will evolve in the San Juans (adult feeding
migratory patterns). Jim suggested that Russel rough out a proposal
for MRC review.
Creosote project: Ken Brown said that he has been
working on cleaning beaches for 10+ years, including rounding
up creosoted logs. He spoke about Deer Harbor Restoration Project's
interest in creosoted logs removal; Skagit and Whatcom counties
have had success in similar projects. Ken said the most important
issue is getting such logs off the beaches to prevent further
leaching. With disposal costs prohibitive, the group is negotiating
an experiment on Orcas Island to detoxify the logs using micro-remediation
(native oyster mushroom culture to remove up to 95% of pollutants
over 4 to 5 months, breaking down the chemicals without toxifying
the organism itself).
There was discussion about potential ramifications
of creosoted logs storage and disposal or remediation. Ken will
be working with the County's Hazardous Waste Project on the issue.
Ken can be reached at 376-2208.
New/Old Business: Committee members thanked and
congratulated Jim Slocomb for his incredibly well done chairmanship
of the MRC this past year.
The meeting was adjourned at 10:00 a.m.
Submitted by Helen Venada
