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all parties. State and federal entities authorized to manage California water must seek to balance and <br />distribute the benefits and impacts of water use. <br />Need for Consensus <br />Technical analysis can determine the impacts of existing and proposed water management schemes. <br />Over the years, a number of highly sophisticated analytical tools have been developed independently, not <br />only by the government agencies responsible for water management, but also by other interested parties. <br />As a result of dispersed authority for decision-making and of the independent efforts toward the <br />development of analytical techniques, there are no standard methods of analysis for evaluating proposed <br />decisions. <br />This lack of agreement concerning the appropriate data and techniques to use for decision support has <br />caused much difficulty in implementing regulatory changes. <br />Water Resources Management, Inc. (WRMI) and the Natural Heritage Institute (NHI) are working on the <br />Consensus Project, a cooperative effort between the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (USBR) and the U.S. <br />Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS). This project has begun to build broad-based support for a suite of <br />analytical tools and support data. The Consensus Project stems from the Central Valley Project <br />Improvement Act Section 3406(a). The CVPIA requires that the Secretary of the Interior ?... develop <br />readily useable and broadly available models and support data to evaluate the ecologic and hydrologic <br />effects of ... water facilities and systems ...? <br />The Consensus Project is aimed at building consensus on the types of analytical tools and other <br />techniques that may be developed, improved, and used to guide the future management of California's <br />water resources. Ultimately, the Consensus Project will pave the way for the development of a credible, <br />consistent set of tools to support regulatory and other management decisions in the Central Valley of <br />California. <br />The immediate goal of the project is to set specifications (and ultimately to design and implement) tools <br />that accomplish the following: <br />Ensure consistency of data and analysis <br />? <br />Enhance, through peer review, the credibility of the data and analytical tools in the system to all <br />? <br />stakeholders <br />Provide an effective mechanism for adding and improving data and analytical tools <br />? <br />Consensus Project Overview <br />To develop consensus, the Consensus Project first focuses on what measures are necessary to evaluate <br />the effectiveness of alternative management strategies. The measures include conformity with legal <br />requirements and other (practical) operational constraints that must be met by system operations and <br />modifications. The measures will also include the economic, social, and environmental benefits and <br />adverse impacts that affect those concerned with system operations. The benefits and impacts to be <br />maximized or minimized will be called operating objectives. Legal requirements usually specify <br />measurements that will determine whether the requirements have been met. However, benefits and <br />impacts often have no definite measures. Identifying legal requirements and potential ?performance <br />measures? for benefits and impacts is a crucial part of the Consensus Project. <br />2 <br />A275 01.09.95 1-19.2 Sheer <br />