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ii " II " ,I II " . . Western States Water Council Water Resources Committee Minutes Sheridan, Wyoming October 5, 2006 USGS COOPERATIVE WATER PROGRAM Ward Staubitz, Cooperative Water Program Coordinator for the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), provided all update on the streamgaging program. In particular, he highlighted the USGS' response to the recommendations from a stakeholder meeting that was,held in Austin, Texas in January 2006. The USGS response document was contained under Tab R in the briefing book. The Cooperative Water Program (CWP) is one of the USGS' largest programs. USGS gets about $200 million per year for hydrologic investigations. < The CWP supports data collection activities and hydrologic investigations in each of the states. The program is managed by each ofthe Water Science Center directors in each state. The CWP funds about 4500 of the USGS' 7500 streamgages. Thus, it provides funding for a little under two-thirds of the total national streamgaging network. It also funds about 750 individual hydrologic investigations. The idea behind the stakeholder workshops is to engage USGS with their partners and customers nationally to talk about the opportunities of the Coop Program, and also some of the challenges. As many of you know, some of the challenges involve funding - keeping funding for both the USGS and state matching funds for the streamgage program, and to provide a reasonable match for the hydrologic investigations as well. Twenty years ago, the CWP was generally a 50-50 match. Nationally, the figure is getting clm:er to a two-thirds match from cooperators and one-third match from the USGS appropriated funds. This has largely been the case throughout the country: It has been the result of relatively flat funding on USGS' side. This presents USGS with a number of challenges, and those are the challenges that were discussed in the stakeholder meeting. We appreciate the involvement ofa number of folks here in the room who partic:ipated in both the original workshop in Washington, D.C. a couple of years ago, and the second workshop in Austin, Texas. Next, Ward addressed some of the specific recommendations from the meetings which included: (1) Strengthening Partnerships with Stakeholders - One specific recommendation was to hold similar type stakeholder workshops on a regional basis, rather than a national basis. The issues vary from one part of the country to another, thus it would be helpful to reach out to the cooperators on a more regional basis. We worked with Peter Evans, of the Interstate Council on Water Policy (ICWP). He has helped with the stakeholder input process, and has become an advocate for the USGS and its water programs with Interior, the Office .of Management and Budget (OMB), and the Congress. Peter coordinated a letter from multiple organizations in support of funding, which got the attention of a number of people in Washington. He has been instrumental and very effective in highlighting the need to improve funding for both the [fully-federally funded] National Streamflow Information Program (NSIP) and the Coop Water Program. The USGS' goal is to hold two or three regional meetings per year on a continuous basis. Preliminary planning is going on for a May 2007 meeting in Sacramento, and there is interest in the Southeast, perhaps in Georgia. (2) Improve Program Funding - This something that we have worked on a day-to-day basis in Washington, at USGS Headquarters, to be sure that the Administration and Congress are aware of the importance of this program. The most effective method, however, to get improved funding comes to Washington from USGS ,I customers, the people who use the information, and the people who value the services that are provided by . the federal agencies. People like yourselves in west~rn states have a voice with the Administration and II I I 9