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<br />Rita reported that progress is being made on a d atabase of water education groups , with help <br />from Re a gan Waskom. She told the group that the Colorado Water Congress was looking at <br />ways to make the almanac available to more people tha n just the membership, perhaps online. <br />With all of the activities underway, integration of education efforts is slowly but surely <br />beginning to happen. The working group hopes to have a kick - off event when the website is <br />ready to be unveiled. <br /> <br />Veva McCa ig from CWCB reported that the Board plans to launch a public awareness research <br />study in July. The study will feature a statewide survey focused on ascertaining the public’s <br />perception of water throughout the state. The Board hopes the findings will hel p address barriers <br />to engaging the public in dialogue about water, suggest strategies for increasing public <br />involvement, and help the state understand the level of knowledge the general public has about <br />water. <br /> <br />Eric Kuhn commented that a similar survey w as done by the Northern Colorado Water <br />Conservation District right after the 2000 drought, and revealed that very few people knew even <br />basic facts about water. Veva added that another possible outcome of the study could be a <br />statewide messaging campaign, providing a perspective on valuing and thinking about water as a <br />statewide resource. <br /> <br />Water Supply Reserve Account <br /> <br />th <br /> <br />Rick Brown provided a review of the water activities approved by the CWCB at the March 14 <br />Board meeting for funding under Senate Bill 17 9, referencing the staff memo provided to the <br />Board and passed out to IBCC members prior to the start of the meeting. T he memo d etails how <br />staff reviewed each application. Staff checked the applications for completeness, eligibility <br />req uirements accordin g to statute, threshold criteria , and eligibility of the entity proposed to <br />receive the grant . They t hen looked at how each application met the criteria developed jointly by <br />the IBCC and the CWCB . Staff made recommendations to the Board on this basis. O ther tables <br />provided show total dollar amount requested by each basin – the total of all applications was <br />$4.2 m illion . The Colo rado River b asin had the most requests, and a total of $ 2.1 million <br />requested . Two basins did not submit requests – North Plat te and Gunnison. <br /> <br />The main issues with the first round of applications included completeness of the applications <br />and threshold criteria. The t hreshold criteria help ensure that the proposed activity fits into <br />broader water needs. Some applications were i ncomplete, or did not conform to state statute. <br />Examples of items inadvertently left off of applications include a description of the activity, a <br />description of the process Roundtables used to review applications, a description of how a <br />Roundtable came to a decision about each application ( i.e. the Roundtable held a meeting, X <br />number of people attended , how the issue was addressed, and how the application for water <br />activity was approved and when it was not unanimously supported ) . <br /> <br />Rick Brown said that CW CB helped applicants demonstrate how they met threshold criteria. He <br />also raised the issue of Section 104 and said that this statute can be interpreted in two ways. One <br />, <br />interpretation would require a pplications for WRSA money to be linked to a completed needs <br /> 3 <br />