February Workshop Details

Hi Everyone

In case you weren’t there for the Advisory Committee Meeting on October 12^th, or in case you don’t remember me, I’ll just go ahead and give a brief introduction. My name is Beverly Saunders. I am a Masters student in Aquatic Resources at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas.

I have been researching stakeholder based basin management for the past two years, and I am now working with y’all to help prioritize and evaluate the feasibility of the Water Management Projects that have been and will be proposed as a part of the Critical Area Resource Plan for the Marsh and Rock Creek watershed. This work will be my thesis and will also help determine which projects are implemented in the future. I gave a presentation in October on what I was planning on doing. If you would like to see the full presentation you see it here.  For now though, I will just give a quick and dirty summary:

I will essentially be hosting a working lunch workshop for the Marsh and Rock Creek Basin Stakeholders (you guys :) ) which will be taking place on Wednesday, February 15^th, 2012, from 9 -3 at the Ag. Center. In this workshop we will be using what are known as the “ILBM pillars” to evaluate the feasibility of the management suggestions given in the meeting on January 11^th. These pillars include policy, financing, information, institutions, stakeholder participation and technology and they will form the basis of how we discuss and evaluate each of the project.

PLEASE NOTE: It is very important that all stakeholders are represented at this workshop so that a consensus can be reached and so that everyone’s opinion and knowledge of the watershed can be utilized. Otherwise the conclusions may not be correct or implementable. In short, in order to talk about what needs to happen, everyone who has a stake in the watershed and its management needs to be a part of the discussion.

For a more comprehensive summary of the project please see my thesis proposal here.

I had a couple people ask me for some references on ILBM. The best one I can provide is available here. This is a very large file so please be aware that the download may take a little while. Also keep in mind that even though ILBM stands for Integrated Lake Basin Management… the framework is useful for all watersheds (and has been used in river basins before). Page 64-68 speaks specifically about the process I am using in this thesis project (although in less detail than my thesis proposal will provide).

If you have any more questions please email me at bs1432@txstate.edu. Also, I will be moving to Gettysburg area in January and will stay until the completion of the project, so please feel free to approach me at the meeting in January or to set up a meeting at any time if you have any questions. Thanks so much for your time and patience... I know this was a longer blog than normal.  

Sincerely Beverly =)