Members ATtendance

X	UI: Larry Kirkland, Facilities Engineer		WSU:
X	UI: Jay Becker (Chair), Assistant Director, Utilities and Engineering		WSU: Pete Grigas, Facilities Planning
	Moscow: Tom Scallorn, Water Dept. Superintendent	X	Pullman: Mark Workman, (Vice Chair) Dir. Public Works
X	Moscow: Steve Busch, City Council Member	X	Pullman: Art Garro
	Latah County: Loreca Stauber, County Commissioner		Whitman County: Jerry Finch, County Commissioner
X	Latah County: Tom Townsend, citizen		Whitman County: Mark Bordsen, County Planner

VISITORS

Bryony Hansen (Golder Associates Inc., CD’A), Scott King (King Groundwater Science), Joanna Latham (UI Grad Student), Eddie Teasdale (UI Grad Student)

1. Call to Order AND APPROVAL of September 20, 2001 Minutes

Jay Becker (Chair) called the meeting to order at 2:40 PM. Minutes were approved as presented.
Since several visitors were present, Jay asked for introductions.

2. Idaho Grant – Becker reviewed the grant proposal to the State.

a. Status - Kirkland reiterated what had been stated previously in the newspaper, that the legislative money has been retracted by IDWR to help pay for the 1.5% holdback. Roy Mink was told by Norm Young of IDWR that the retraction is just temporary and money should be back in the budget next year. Representative Gary Young was going to talk to Karl Dreher, director of IDWR, about not taking all the funds. Representative Tom Trail and Senator Gary Schroeder have also written letters to Karl Dreher & IDWR requesting that only a portion of the grant be taken so that PBAC could at least continue at a slower pace.

b. How propose to proceed - Kirkland suggested that PBAC try immediately for a small grant to do an expanded water quality study for the proposed drainage well recharge project. He has talked to Roy Mink about this. The RFP for the small grant projects will go out shortly. There will be a matching portion that PBAC will have to provide. Committee members reacted positively. Kirkland said he would keep PBAC informed as the grant proposal proceeded. Kirkland said PBAC should also consider making a similar try for a small grant to get started on the Moscow Mt water supply and quality study and the John Bush study of potential recharge areas between Moscow and Moscow Mt.
In the meantime PBAC should take advantage of the time available between now and when funds become available for the next step to educate the Palouse Basin constituency on the various options and deal with the concerns that have been raised.

3. New Grant Applications - The following are matching grant proposals that PBAC could apply for to help bridge the gap between now and when the State money might be restored. Kirkland proposed that PBAC consider applying to IDWRRI for the three small grants mentioned above and to USGS for the larger three year grant. The RFPs for all the grants will be out shortly. Kirkland promised to keep the Committee appraised of options.
a. Water Quality Inventory Project – Kirkland reported that Idaho DEQ has supplied a box full of data on water quality measurements from area wells that needs to be reviewed and synthesized into something usable. In addition the PBAC library has data from various other studies that need to be summarized and compared also. Using a small grant from IDWRRI this summary could be done in a year or less or the scope could be expanded to include taking additional samples and putting all the data into a computer model for the basin. The latter could be done as a master’s thesis. By addressing the water quality now PBAC will address the touchy water chemistry and microbiology issue largely separate from the pilot drainage well recharge project. Once the well drilling project starts we do not want it stopped in the middle by an objection which has not been addressed. Since water chemistry and microbiology was only a small part of the proposed pilot drainage well recharge project, addressing these issue in a separate project should allow more flexibility in the actual pilot project when the IDWR monies come available.

b. Moscow Mountain Water Collection Project –
This was originally proposed to start with the State grant funds this year and then be completed in a future year. It is a study of runoff in the various drainages by time of year and the associated water quality to determine how much water could be environmentally, legally and economically diverted and treated either for direct use or for recharge to one of the aquifers. Again a small scale IWRRI project is proposed to review the previous works dealing with this topic, to set up the plan for gathering the necessary data to complete the project and then start the actual collection of runoff flows and quality data.

c. Moscow Mountain Front Recharge Areas –
This project would be supervised by John Bush. A graduate student would review all the wells along the Moscow Mountain front to determine the best infiltration areas between Moscow Mt and Moscow. This could be the beginning of several projects that lead to actual use of Moscow Mountain winter season water for recharging one or more of the aquifers. This projects also has considerable potential as an IWRRI small scale project.

d. USGS regional application – This would be an updated version of a grant proposal Dale Ralston put together two years ago. We plan to revise that proposal and resubmit it. It would pick up from where the OK project will finish and cover some areas not covered by the OK research such as legal issues. Jim Osiensky and Kent Keller would be invited to make input and participate. Roy Mink thinks that it has a good chance of success. It would be a three year study for about $300,000. This grant calls for 1:1 matching. Since this will follow the OK project, PBAC could use a portion of the continuation of these funds for the match. The rest could be in-kind matching.

4. EXECUTIVE SECRETARY POSITION – Becker said he had handed out resumes for three persons and would get the executive committee together in the coming week to do interviews. He hoped to have a new executive secretary hired by the next meeting.

5. PBAC FUNDING DISCUSSION –
Kirkland reviewed the current funding format whereby basic PBAC expenses are covered by shares or membership fees and agreements between the major entities on surcharges are used for funding research projects. He proposed that PBAC consider a new funding format whereby the entities continue to fund basic PBAC expenses by shares as is currently done but all other expenses be paid on the basis of a charge for how much Grande Ronde water the entity pumps each year. PBAC is not to the point of funding major projects yet but the need for research and pilot project dollars continues to increase. If the majority of the support for recharge and supplemental water projects comes from a fee for Grande Ronde water pumped, this increases the incentive for reducing pumping from the Grande Ronde aquifer system, which is needed, and decreases the burden for those who undertake measures to reduce their use of Grande Ronde water.
Second, PBAC needs to accumulate some matching funds to take advantage of potential grants, such as the USGS grant which requires a 1 to 1 match and the WRRI small grants which require a 2:1 matching of which a considerable amount can be overhead and in-kind.
Third, PBAC needs to talk about how to encourage the major entities to build the coming increases into future budgets of the cities and universities. Now is the time to talk about including budget increases for a year to three years out.
Further out PBAC needs to start accumulating funds for one or more major projects to actually accomplish the stabilizing of the Grande Ronde aquifer system water levels. Such projects are not likely to be cheap. The entities will not likely be able to pull the funds together on short order.

6. OLD BUSINESS

a. Renewal of Intergovernmental Agreement -
This continues to be in process. In the process of routing it to the six agencies for signatures, several additional technical changes were needed to meet state and county requirements. Becker will check with WSU for any more needed changes and Moscow and Latah County will work out the needed changes for Idaho code.

b. Palouse Basin WRIA –
Kirkland talked to Rob Buchert of the Palouse Conservation District about where things are in the application for planning money with Washington DOE for the Palouse Basin Water Resource Inventory Area (WRIA). The PCD is almost ready to put in the Planning grant application to WA DOE. They need to collect a few more letters of participation and support and then they can turn in the application. Rob thought there was an excellent chance for getting the funding. Rob said he expecting PBAC to take a more active role in the planning and evaluation stages. He was hoping that Whitman County or Pullman would take the lead in the WRIA after the initial funding. Rob expects to get a consultant to help with both the planning stage and the evaluation stage.

Bryony Hansen said her work on the Little and Middle Spokane River basin WRIAs with Golder Associates went very well and resulted in beneficial results.

7. REPORTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS

a. Exposure in the Communities – Workman gave an update on the Pullman Waste Water Treatment Plant. They are working with DOE on their new plant permit. In discussion, DOE has suggested that Pullman look at use-based criteria, and not just stay with the present regulatory based criteria. This flowed right into some discussion on the WRIA update, and also touched on the present regulatory issues that the City of Moscow is dealing with on their new Waste Water Treatment Plant. Basically, this is going in the right direction, getting the two States and two sets of Regulators poised to look at common use-based issues.

8. NEW BUSINESS

a. Bryony Hansen related her company’s experience with the Ellensburg groundwater basin ASR (Aquifer Storage and Recover) work done for the City of Yakima. Golder Associates did a water chemistry characterization comparing high flow waters from the Naches River, that would be treated and then injected into the Ellensburg basin for storage until needed. CFCs (Chloroflorocarbons) were used as a signature compound for tracking recent recharge of ground water into the basin. Based on the Golder study, Washington DOE approved a pilot scale project for doing further evaluation of the feasibility of the ASR. Bryony said she would talk to several people in Golder about making a presentation on the Yakima project to PBAC and other interested parties.

b. Scott King of King Groundwater Science informed the Committee that Washington Governor Locke has made reform of water policy a top legislative issue for the coming session. He has four areas that he wants to give special attention to:

1. Stream flows

2. Water for growing communities

3. Use it or lose it policies (relinquishment of water rights)

4. Funding for water-storage projects and drinking water systems.

Various white papers have been submitted and can be seen at http://www.wa.gov/water2002/white_papers.html

9. NEXT MEETING DATE AND ADJOURNMENT

Thursday, November 15, 2001 at 2:30 pm

McClure Hall Room 411

The meeting was adjourned by consensus.

Respectfully Submitted,

Larry Kirkland

Note: these minutes are submitted in draft form and have not yet been approved by the Committee.