FY 2000 proposal 20057

Section 1. Administrative

Project location

Reasonable and Prudent Alternatives (RPAs)

Section 2. Past accomplishments

Section 3. Relationships to other projects

Section 4. Budget for Planning and Design phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Planning and Design phase

Section 5. Budget for Construction and Implementation phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Construction and Implementation phase

Section 6. Budget for Operations and Maintenance phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Operations and Maintenance phase

Section 7. Budget for Monitoring and Evaluation phase

Task-based budget

Outyear objectives-based budget

Outyear budgets for Monitoring and Evaluation phase

Section 8. Estimated budget summary

Itemized budget

Total estimated budget

Cost sharing

Other budget explanation

Schedule Constraints: streamflow conditions for field sampling

Reviews and recommendations

This information was not provided on the original proposals, but was generated during the review process.

Comment:

Comments: A fundamental premise of this proposal is that stream food resources and habitat availability are key factors to the decline in salmonid populations in the Basin, as focused on how terrestrial (riparian) diversity influences stream communities. The proposers seek to examine primary and secondary food web linkages between various successional stages of riparian vegetation and stream-dwelling juvenile salmonids. The primary focus is the contribution of plant and insect litter. Analysis of historic patterns in riparian vegetation changes will be extrapolated to reconstruct changes in riparian habitat structure, diversity, density and extent over time. An admirable goal of the proposal is also to expand the scope of the study beyond reach or site specific phenomena to include connections with historical, watershed and regional processes; although the exact mechanisms for doing this are not obvious beyond upstream and downstream effects. The ultimate goal is to provide information useful in riparian restoration.

This proposal addresses a relatively ignored aspect of stream ecology, e.g., the comparative contribution of "fall-out" or litter insects to stream productivity, and its relationship to riparian vegetation composition and structure. In and of itself, this aspect would be worthy of support. There are a few unanswered questions, such as how they propose to separate the effects of riparian structure on stream temperatures and solar incidence from plant and litter fall. There are a plethora of questions and hypotheses, but no real description about how the various answers and products are going to be integrated; in this respect, a modeling component would definitely strengthen the project. The study is also concentrated in just the Umatilla and Imnaha basins, and one criticism is that applicability of these results beyond the eastern Oregon portion of the Basin (e.g., to upper Snake watersheds, eastern Washington, etc.) will be tenuous; inclusion or ultimate validation in other ecosystems would be desirable.

The proposal' is explicitly related to NWPPC FWP sections that addresses both the health and integrity of the Columbia River Basin and the rebuilding of upriver populations. It also approaches habitat analysis from a whole watershed perspective, and addresses critical uncertainties and tests important hypotheses. The project is well justified and progresses from previous work funded by the FWP, although it appears to be somewhat isolated from other high-watershed research within the Program. There are points of collaboration with other research projects, some of which are part of the FWP. Much of this appears to be in the form of interest and courtesy transfer of information, and there are no evident interdependencies or other strong links between research programs.

Objectives are specific, given in the form of research questions and associated hypotheses. Components of the project design are reasonable and defensible, although complex in the hypotheses being addressed and linkages among diffuse components. The project would benefit from simple modeling approaches to sort out different independent factors, etc. Methods are well described mostly in sufficient detail. There is some vagueness regarding the size of study reaches. Reviewers have a question about where the information to "reconstruct riparian community succession " is coming from. Proposers say they will analyze time series of aerial photographs of riparian zones in different areas; reviewers assume these are available on the proposed study streams. Proposers, in their description of invertebrate sampling, propose to make visual counts of large-bodied aquatic invertebrates using a water scope along 5 transects; reviewers do not see this as providing additional information not present in Serber samples.

OSU facilities and personnel are likely the most qualified and capable within the region. This proposal includes good use of a conceptual model. This proposal is unique among riparian restoration as it takes an analytical approach to understanding functional relationships between riparian habitat and restoration activities. The proposal would benefit from incorporation of modeling to address and separate the effects of temperature, solar incidence, and succession.

Comment:

Comment:

Comment:

Clarify the link to real time management activities.

Budget appears excessive.

Comment:

Comment:

Comment:

There are two groups of projects that the Council considered for funding. First, the ISRP recommended projects for funding that were rated as either tier 2 or tier 3 by CBFWA (the "elevated projects"). Two law enforcement projects were added to this "elevated" list because they did not receive a funding recommendation from CBFWA, but were rated as "fund" by the ISRP. The second group of projects are those that the ISRP identified in its report as "innovative" and offering promising new techniques or approaches (the "innovative projects").

All of the projects that the ISRP found to be "innovative" (and also meeting the scientific review standards) were included in first list of "elevated" projects by the ISRP. The Council itself did not combine the project lists.

In past reports, the ISRP has expressed concern that new and innovative project proposals were not receiving sufficient attention in the funding process. Two years ago, the Council created a targeted request for proposals process for certain areas of interest that had not otherwise received funding recommendations, and a relatively small amount of funding was provided for qualifying projects. The Fiscal Year 2000 solicitation for proposals indicated that an "innovative proposal fund" would be established to support new initiatives of this type.

However, no criteria were specified for "innovative" proposals and most new projects were not proposed as "innovative." The Council requested that the ISRP prioritize the list of "elevated" projects (42 total). The Council also asked the ISRP to consider four specific criteria in its rankings. They were asked to determine if the project: 1) dealt with an unimplemented program area; 2) improves existing projects; 3) has systemwide significance; and 4) advances critical watershed assessment work. The ISRP ranked the projects from 1 to 42 based on their assessment of the overall worth of each project and indicated which of the criteria were met by each. The Council reviewed the ranked list of 42 projects, and determined that it would not recommend funding for all of them. The Council established $2 million as a planning target for funding projects on this list. In order to bring discipline to the selection process, the Council decided what type of projects it wanted to recommend the limiting funding for. The Council determined that it wished to focus on research-oriented projects that the ISRP found to be innovative, and also met two or more of the four criteria identified above (as determined by the ISRP). At the February 1, 2000 work session meeting in Portland, the Council recommended possible funding for eleven projects from the list of 42 elevated projects. Those projects are:

20045, 20057, 20034, 20102, 20106, 9803500, 20064, 20006, 20067, 20076, and 20054.

Review of the ISRP rankings shows that only these projects were identified by the ISRP as fulfilling an unimplemented program area and having systemwide significance. These 11 projects were mainly in the upper half of the overall ranking; the lowest-ranked project on the list ranks 24 out of 42. All 11 projects are research-oriented and, by definition, fulfill part of our current fish and wildlife program and have importance for the system as a whole. The Council found that this seems a reasonable subset of projects to be funded as "innovative."

The Council has previously indicated its desire to cover all of the initial costs for "innovative" projects at the time they are selected, allowing a new competition for funding of innovative projects to be held each year without creating a burden on future years' budgets. Unfortunately, the proposed budgets for these eleven projects, over the next four years, would exceed $8 million. (The budgets for the first four projects alone would exceed $4 million.) Rather than fully fund a few projects, the Council's proposal is to provide initial funding for preliminary research, prototyping, and proof of concept for all 11 projects. Specifically, the proposal is to offer each project $200,000 (or the amount initially requested by the sponsor if that amount is less than $200,000), for a total of $2,119,000. After completion of the initial work and a final report on that work, project sponsors would be free to seek additional funding as a part of the regular project selection process.

While $200,000 is much less than the sum requested for most of these projects, it is still a substantial amount by the standards of most research grants and should lead to meaningful results. This approach also allows us to gain further information on the value of research before making a large, long-term investment.

Project sponsors designated to receive this funding are being asked to prepare a revised plan of work reflecting the reduced funding. The revised plan would be reviewed by Council staff and the chairman of the ISRP to assure that the revised plan still represents valuable research that is consistent with the proposal originally reviewed by the ISRP. In summary, the staff proposal is as follows:

• Fund only the 11 projects identified by the ISRP meeting as both fulfilling an unimplemented area of the Council program and having systemwide significance.
• Offer each of these 11 projects $200,000 (or the amount requested if less than $200,000).
• Review by ISRP chair and Council staff of a revised plan for each project to assure that proposed work is valuable research consistent with the original proposal.
• Require final report to be submitted before project can apply for additional funding.
• Projects funded within this project category may not reapply in subsequent years for funding under the "innovative" category, which the Council expects to explicitly develop for future project solicitations but may apply for additional funding within the regular project selection process

After the Council and ISRP representatives review the revised plans for the eleven projects noted above, and confirm that valuable innovative research can be conducted and reported under the funding and other conditions discussed above, the Council will advise Bonneville under separate cover of its final recommendations for these projects. The Council anticipates that it can provide final recommendations for these projects to Bonneville in late March. Bonneville should refer to that separate letter on this issue for the final Council recommendations on these projects.

Note: Unless the context indicates otherwise, "fund" means that the Council would recommend to the Bonneville Power Administration that a project be funded. The Council's fish and wildlife program is established by statute for implementation by Bonneville, and the Council itself does not directly fund fish and wildlife mitigation. However, in recent years, Bonneville has followed the Council recommendations closely.

Comment: