1. Watershed Planning Perspectives from an Outsider Alan Miller, P.E. Administrator Hayden Lake Irrigation District

2. Idaho Perspectives

3. Rathdrum Prairie Comprehensive Aquifer Management Plan Sponsor: Idaho Water Resource Board Purpose: Provide reliable source of water projecting 50 years. Process: established Advisory Committee –Plan drafted over 1 year period –Currently open for public comment –Future Adoption and Implementation

4. RP CAMP Findings Idaho – –Stable water supply for 50 year planning horizon –Anticipate stable water quality There are existing pockets of Arsenic Washington – –Current issues regarding timing and location –Study to appropriate water from northern reaches of the aquifer

5. RP CAMP Unknowns Climate –Is this aquifer system a storage type or flow through type? How would climate change affect the aquifer system? Projections call for wetter warmer winters, earlier runoff and reduced summer precipitation. Forest Practices –Removal of vegetative cover may move the hydrograph to earlier runoff and reduced soil storage. Lake Coeur d’Alene –Change in the lake from aerobic to anaerobic could release metals from the lake bottom sediments

6. Washington Perspectives

7. Aquifer Planning in Washington Washington Planning –Watershed Planning Act (RCW 90.82) Water Resource Inventory Area (WIRA) –WIRA 55/57 Middle Spokane River completed 2005 Identify Future Water Needs Determine if Sufficient Water Exists Identify Management Strategies to Achieve Needs WIRA 55/57 –Currently in the implementation stage

8. The Region Wide Approach

9. Compare and Contrast Planning in both states recognizes –Need for adequate water supplies –Change in historical use –Agriculture to Suburban / Urban Residential Use Planning differs in each state –Idaho is ground water focus Planning is top down but local based –Washington is Spokane River focus Planning is bottom Up

10. Human Dimension Why Plan? –To avoid something Differences in planning and focus –Requires understanding of others perspective Political –Washington tends to follow perspective found west of the Cascades –Idaho tends to follow perspective found in the dryer southern portion

11. Human Dimension How do we begin managing the aquifer system on a cooperative region wide basis? –we recognize the resource as a shared resource not an owned resource as western water law would imply –An approach that is interdependent, not independent –Our challenges ahead will be people based, not water based. Not due to growth, but due to attitudes and approach

12. The Other Reason to Plan

13. Thank you