SPWRAP Minutes Interim Board of Directors

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South Platte Water Related Activities Program, Inc. (SPWRAP) Meeting Minutes of the Interim Board of Directors September 21, 2006 1. Call to Order The Interim Board of Directors meeting was called to order by Vice-President Lisa Darling. 2. Minutes from the August 17, 2006 meeting of the Interim Board of Directors were approved. It was noted that the outreach letter and materials mailed out on 9-19-06 contained information inconsistent with the Board's discussions on August 17. Contrary to the outreach letter, Directors will not be elected at the first Annual Meeting of SPWRAP. Ted Kowalski provided an update on the agreements between the State and SPWRAP. The CWCB is encouraging DNR to sign the MoA with SPWRAP. Funding a FTE is still an issue with the MoA between DoW and SPWRAP. The State is determining if special authorization is needed to use the Species Conservation Trust Fund to pay far a FTE. If legislation is needed to use the Fund for a FTE, then the State would look to SPWRAP to support appropriate legislation. The State hopes to sign the MoAs in the next month ar two. Discussion ensued about whether an operational agreement under the DNR MoA could supplant the need for a MoA with DoW. Steve Sims noted that the DoW wants outside money that could be directed specifically to DoW activities associated with the Program. Steve Sims will talk with DoW (Grady McNei11) about the FTE issues and report back to the Board. 4. Steve Sims and Ted Kowalski reported on the status of the Program. a. The GC approved an extension of the Cooperative Agreement to the end of the year. Nebraska will make a decision on its participation in the Program by December 1. The 1" Nebraska Public Meeting in Gering occurred on 9-6-2006 and generally there was positive suppart for Nebraska to participate in the Program. The other Public Meetings are: September 22, 2006, 1:00pm, CDT, Fonner Park 4-H Building, Cafe, Grand Island October 10, 2006, 1:00pm, CDT, Embassy Suites, Lincoln b. It is unlikely that hearings on the Federal authorization legislation (SB-3611) will occur this Fall. Maybe hearings can be initiated during the "Lame Duck" session. Efforts are being made to increase the number of bill sponsors. c. The GC is working on getting a new executive director, establishing a land holding entity, and working on adaptive management details. 5. Austin Hamre (far Deb Freeman) reported on the transition from interim measures payments to SPWRAP membership payments. The Board agreed that until the Program is in place, entities should continue to make interim payments to the Feds, and then those payments will be deducted from their SPWRAP dues. The Feds (Mark Butler) are okay with this and confirm that all interim payments will be accounted for and acknowledged. 6. Steve Sims discussed that the streamlining of Program documents is moving forward. The template BA and recovery agreement have been approved, and the template BO is hoped to be approved soon. A question was asked about the compatibility of the template BO with other species (i.e. Bald Eagle, Preble Mouse, etc). The Board requested that the streamlined documents be made available at the Annual Meeting. 7. The Board requested that a tour of the Tamarack Project be set up.