Note: Powerpoint presentations referred to in these minutes may be accessed on the Council’s website at http://water.usgs.gov/wicp/acwi/monitoring. Attachments identified in these notes are available in hard copy by request only.
Welcome
Gail Mallard and Chuck Spooner welcomed members and guests to New England. Two new Council members were acknowledged – Mary Skopec and Leslie McGeorge. Chuck stated that the Council has the highest visibility that it has ever had—a tremendous successful Conference in San Jose; California. The National Monitoring Network has been getting good reviews. Most people are impressed by the quality and the short period of time that the network was designed. The theme of this meeting is thinking about where we want to be in the next couple of years. As we think about the future with new members, think about the Council’s focus of activity. Many want to be associated with what we do. How do we engage others and do things as a bigger force than just the people in this room. A recently published report from Heinz entitled “Filling the Gaps: Priority Data Needs and Key Management Challenges for National Reporting on Ecosystem Condition." emphasizes the importance of monitoring and the continuing needs for more good monitoring information. ACTION ITEM: Judy to get copies for distribution to Council members. (Sent on September 6, 2006.)
Results of Fifth National Monitoring Conference
Jeff Schloss made presentation (see pp.presentation #1). Linda Green mentioned that only 88 people filled out the evaluation out of more than 800 at the conference. Greatest need in terms of volunteer monitoring is funding staff time. Jim Laine reported that folks are interested in regional volunteer monitoring conferences. Some of the comments from participants showed concern about late registrations and keeping to a cutoff date. The format of Thursday’s agenda was very positive--many more people attended this year’s Thursday events. It would be nice to post a summary of reviews of the conference. Joe Kerski, USGS, from Denver, CO, sent a nice commentary of his views of the conference. Barry Long mentioned that reports from people at his agency said that it was the best professional conference that they have ever attended. Toni mentioned that NAWQA people were very impressed with the quality of the conference. Interactions with other professionals was excellent.
Update of Briefings of National Monitoring Network
Gail presented a presentation of the NMN briefings. (see pp presention #7) ACWI requested two new recommendations: formation of a small interagency staff to coordinate next steps and one or more pilot studies to test concepts and further develop design. ACWI formally accepted the report in April 2006. Two ACWI members abstained but all others voted in favor. Many presentations have been made on the Network design. In April it was submitted to the Council for Environmental Quality (CEQ), and presentations made to the National Science and Technology Committee (NSTC), Subcommittee on Water Availability and Quality (SWAQ), and Joint Subcommittee on Ocean Sciences and Technology; Subcommittee on Integrated Management of Ocean Resources (SIMOR). Other groups provided presentations and briefings were U.S. Group on Earth Observations, Ocean Research and Resources Advisory Panel; Interagency Committee on Ocean Science and Resource Management Integration; Federal agencies, EPA, NOAA, USGS, and DOI. For all of these groups there have been combinations of Chuck, Gail, and Jawed representing NOAA, EPA, and USGS. So we are all speaking as one. It helps for the Departmental level to know that these three agencies are reinforcing each other. Toni Johnson mentioned that a couple of the presentations could be put on the Council’s website.
A plenary presentation and four sessions at the National Monitoring Conference focused on the Network. These sessions were well attended. The liveliest dialog was on the river discussions. There have been very positive comments from conference attendees. Next step is to appoint interagency coordination staff; finalize list of core analytes; select pilot areas, and work on issues such as data comparability, management, and access. Pilot areas suggested are Gulf of Maine, Delaware Bay, Southern California Coastal Water Research Program, Pacific Northwest, Florida ( Gulf of Mexico). After pilots are named, we will conduct inventory of ongoing monitoring in pilot area and identify resources needed to fill the gaps. It is really difficult to know how much it will cost because the level of monitoring already ongoing is different in different parts of the country. Coming up with ways to calculate the cost is difficult. Chuck mentioned that in all the presentations on the Network the question is what is next. This is different than the past where reports can be put on the shelf and ignored. The question that people at OMB and the agencies are asking is where will the money come from. Progress on next steps is likely to be slow…well into September. Yet, it is a very positive process. The Council should leave here knowing that it is slow motion but positive action on the NMN. Everyone associated with the Council made a commitment of staying with this process of working on the NMN.
Update of National Ground Water Monitoring
Mary Ambrose handed out three handouts, mission statement, ground-water levels and quality monitoring for an initiative on ground-water monitoring network. David Wunsch said there was an ad hoc meeting for those interested in a ground-water monitoring network as a special session at the Fifth National Monitoring Conference in San Jose last May, 2006. It could be that there is a need for this to be a subject for study under the ACWI. Bob Schreiber, American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) chaired that meeting looking at the state of ground-water knowledge that indicated a vast need for intensive data collection and clearing house of ground-water information. Bob Hirsch was in attendance. Bob Hirsch is definitely interested as well as Bill Cunningham, Deputy Chief, Office of Ground Water, USGS. National Ground Water Association (NGWA) offered to serve as Executive Secretary for this group. Toni Johnson will give update as to where it is going from here. An ad hoc steering committee should be developed as a group under ACWI. Bob Schreiber is going to take this back to ASCE to determine their level of participation. A non- federal co-chair will be appointed to work with Bill Cunningham. USGS, NGA, and ASCE will work together to make additional contacts for people to serve on the ad hoc committee—need about seven people. October 4 is scheduled for the ACWI web-ex presentation where further updates on this project will be made. Chuck Spooner said that this is a good way for needs of ground water to be promoted.
Proposals for 2008 National Monitoring Conference
Potential locations—two possibilities are Philadelphia and Baltimore. Eric Vowinkel made presentation on information and proposal for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (see Eric’s pp #3.) Many agencies in Pennsylvania and New Jersey are aware of the proposed conference site and on board for support. The Pennsylvania Convention Center (PCC) is in the center of the city; rail connection with Philly airport and convention center. The PCC proposed three venues with different cost estimates. (See attachment 1, options and convention center floor plan.) Proposed estimates include a sliding scale of rental costs based on food purchases for conference. Eric indicated that the one negative aspect is that Philadelphia is a union city—costs will double if set up is done on a Sunday (the usual time we have booth setup). Hotel attached to the convention center is the Philadelphia Marriott. There is no hold on rooms right now and will have to verify if they will provide government per diem. Contract would need to be signed by October.
Judy gave presentation on proposal from Baltimore Convention Center. See attached spreadsheets showing total costs for facilities, meals, and also proposed hotels—(more than 1000 rooms are available at government rate). Hotels are being held as well as space at the Baltimore Convention Center. No cost increase for BCC facilities if contract is signed by end of October. The Maryland Water Monitoring Council is interested in being a local sponsor and participating in the 2008 conference. Mike Koterba, USGS, detailed to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration gave a presentation and indicated the support available from the Chesapeake Bay Observing System. (See Attachment 4). Agencies included in the CBOS are Federal, State, academic, industry and non-governmental. Mike is an Interim Director of CBOS. Detailed discussions took place with questions for both Eric and Judy regarding the proposals. After discussion, there was a vote, with Philadelphia getting the majority of votes. There are, however, some questions that will need to be resolved before the final decision is made.
Council and Work Groups Restructure Plans
Chuck distributed a one-page summary of Council’s Terms of Reference. (Attachment 3.) Also included in the attachment an excerpt from the Strategy for Improving Water-Quality Monitoring in the United States from the Interagency Task for on Monitoring (ITFM). Council needs to write a report that links strategy to accomplishments in monitoring since the strategy was prepared. What we do here and at the next meeting emphasizes improving monitoring in the United States. See how the other ACWI groups play into this such as a ground-water group being initiated. How do they relate to one another. Toni Johnson said, in my opinion the actual ITFM report was done and represented the concensus at that time. It is referred to less and less. There is not anyone out there measuring the Council against that strategy. Consider preparing some kind of brief document that lets people know what the Council has accomplished and how it relates to that strategy and what plans are for the next 2 years. That would be a part of our old work plan. We can very easily recraft our Terms of Reference (TOR). Don Dycus said that it has been quite a while since anyone has read the TOR or strategy of ITFM. We are most likely following a different strategy today then what was envisioned when first written. It makes sense and is appropriate to do a revised strategy. We have chosen not to tell Federal agencies what to do and this was in the ITFM strategy. What we are leading to this afternoon and tomorrow is setting a strategy to move forward and address some of the things that came out of the 2006 Conference; the ongoing work with the NMN, the 2008 Conference, efforts the work groups may have had underway that were sidetracked by the NMN and the 2006 conference. The issue is whether the Council work groups are well structured to fit the tasks at hand. We probably need a conference group, a network group, a methods board group. What others are needed to accomplish our plans for the next 2 years.
Methods and Data Comparability Board Activities
Eric Vowinkel gave an update on Methods Board (MB) activities. (See pp #4.) Summary—MB Work groups are NEMI and WQDE. Special projects are the NMN and biological assessments (Wadeable Streams). Steve Wendelken is the new EPA Co-Chair of MB. Steve has a lot of catching up to do and many things to do in his job at EPA (new position). Eric and Steve met twice this past year and had one all-day web-ex conference call. A main focus for the MB is to keep working on NEMI. Franceska Wilde, USGS, will be working on field methods. ACTION ITEM: Judy Griffin will have new WQDE Report mailed to Council members when received. Possible new topics, event monitoring, real time monitoring, standard monitoring of practice. We have acquired about five new members. The web page was recently updated and is more easily accessible to what we are doing and more easily read. The WQDE Report is available online at http://acwi.gov/methods/pubs/wdqe_pubs/wqde_trno3.pdf. The MB has been involved with the report of the NMN and wrote chapter 4 of the report.
Potential Work Products:
See Gail Mallard’s handout (Attachment #5). Potential work products are:
Council members discussed various ideas for restructuring Council and work groups.
Work Group Plenary
C&O
Jim Laine reported and stated that the group would keep the original name. The group came up with these major tasks:
WIS Work Group
Curtis Cude reported for WIS. Interacting with the two givens. NMN. Basic recommendation was to maintain a smaller steering council to get into the various workgroups of the NMN. The Conference Planning Committee (CPC)—communication and outreach as well as the conference. Supporting Councils and other ongoing communications. Team approach might work well there; with a group specifically committed to working on the CPC. The MB—possibly expanding the scope to data analysis. This is a question mark. The WCI—recommend folks with that work group fold into the other work groups or teams. We looked at the work products and made recommendations:
WCI
Gail Mallard reported. Thinking about a structure for the Council that would allow us to get all of this list done. We proposed four groups:
Group A—(C&O)
2008 conference
Support for State and Regional Councils
Group B
Council’s role in the NMN—continuation of the NMN Steering Committee; recruitment of members; develop criteria for the pilot studies; inventories; finalize the list of analytes; wetlands design, ground-water design, some responsibility for data management; responsibility for data interpretation; context for data interpretation a minimum set of questions to be answered on a regular basis. Task group thinking about optimization—develop pilot studies.
Group C
Focused on water information; data exchange networks, interact with IOOS group and comparability of monitoring data; event monitoring, continuous monitoring, comparability of data.
Low priority:
Redraft TOR
Standards of practice for monitoring; this is similar to comparability of data
We see that there is a group that needs to orchestrate those activities, Gail was describing Group B. Lots of people in the pilot areas that would like to help us with all of those tasks. We don’t think that we have the knowledge on current Council structure for wetlands network.
Don Dycus commented on how to fill the remaining needs from NMN between groups B&C. What is the most appropriate way to handle NMN and keep it moving forward. What is the best way to do that. WIS said a small NMN steering committee to identify needs and be fulfilled in the other work groups as appropriate.
NMN Steering Committee was all Council members—we did not come up with the design for estuaries. Hands-on work same as NMN Steering Committee.
Council Business Meeting/Reports
NMN
Gail Mallard made presentation on NMN future plans. (pp presentation #7). ACTION ITEM: Gail will send document to Ami Mitchell to distribute to Council.
C&O Work Group
Jim Laine presented report for the C&O Work Group. David Tucker will be a Co-Chair along with Val Connor. Jeff and David will be conference liaisons for the 2008 conference. We would like representatives from the other work groups to assist or volunteer for the CPC. WIS might need to send more than one representative to cover each of their major work topics. Barry Long indicated that he would work with the CPC.
Leads for the following work tasks are:
Discussion took place on how to pick a facilitator for the 2008 conference. Jeff, Dave, Eric, and Chuck will work for an outline for logistics and what the conference needs in order to recruit a facilitator in the next 2 months. We should have an announcement of who that facilitator should be. The theme for the conference will be “Monitoring: Keystone for understanding our Waters.” (If the conference takes place in Pennsylvania.)
WIS Work Group
Curtis Cude presented for the new work group keeping the same name. A list of tasks were discussed. Current topics for work for the next 2 years are:
Program Development and Network Design
Data Management and Access
Data Analysis and Interpretation
Curtis described new organizational structure for WIS. (See Attachment 6 which is current organizational structure and future organizational structure for WIS.)
Membership:
We have a number of vacancies to fulfill. Region 6, Region 3, and Region 1. In Region 3, we have a candidate from Maryland. There may also be a candidate from Pennsylvania or Virginia. Other vacancies are Volunteer Monitoring, Tribal. We will attempt to find several of these groups to serve as alternates and find someone to come to a specific meeting. We need to help them with their outreach activities. Process in place for obtaining a volunteer monitoring representative. We will be getting recommendations from Linda Green, Alice Mayio, and Eleanor Ely. Linda volunteered to be the Alternate moving down from Representative. Jeff Schloss has indicated that he would continue on as the NALMS representative. AMWA has sent us a nomination from Virginia Beach replacing David Denig-Chakroff. AWWA has a vacancy…we have a number of candidates to call. Other vacancies are Agriculture (non-Government). Federal membership includes two vacancies. Gail indicated that there is a group called GEMI (Global Environmental Management Initiative). The companies that belong to this are Con-Agra, Dupont, (for example). We might contact this group to see if there is any interest in water issues. All the big companies are listed in this organization. It might be something worth pursuing.
Mike Koterba thanked us for being able to be here, would like to assist with Conference.
We will seek alternates through Council member recommendations and EPA Regional Monitoring Coordinators.
Council unanimously agreed to the restructuring of the NWQMC work groups as follows:
C&O remains; MDCB remains; WCI collapsed into WIS. Plus NMN Steering Committee. Cannot set up an NMN Work Group in Council until have more commitment regarding NMN, probably in the fall.
Future Meetings
South Florida Water Management District will work with Council to host fall meeting in Florida, scheduled for October 30-November 2. NALMS meeting is week of Nov 5-10.
Spring 2007—Week of March 12—will try to schedule meeting at National Wetlands Center in Lafayette, LA. (Jane Caffrey to check on contact for a potential meeting space.) (Alternate meeting site might be San Antonio, Texas.)
Summer 2007—In July at potential visit to 2008 Conference site. Invite local people to come to meeting and participate in Conference.
Conference Co-Chairs, Chuck, Eric, Jawed. Really need a non-Federal co-chair, from PA or nearby—if Philadelphia is confirmed. Leslie McGeorge volunteering to assist, but cannot be a co-chair per se.
Judith B. Griffin
Executive Secretary, NWQMC
Attendees:
Toni Johnson
Jim Laine
Linda Green
Fred Leslie
David Wunsch
Chuck Spooner
Gail Mallard
Leslie McGeorge
Jawed Hameedi
Mary Skopec
Mary Ambrose
Jane Caffrey
Jim Cox
Curtis Cude
David Tucker
Eric Vowinkel
Donna Myers
Barry Long
Don Dycus
Judy Griffin
Tricia Burke, SFWMD
Peter Tennant
Dan Radulescu
Jeff Schloss
Carlton Hunt, Battelle
Tracy Stenner, Battelle
Mike Koterba, USGS
U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological
Survey
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Wednesday, 08-Aug-2007 15:03:49 EDT