Gunnison Basin Wild and Scenic Stakeholder Group Agenda, summary, and Eligible River Segments

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Sellers, Suzanne From: Newman, Brent Sent: Wednesday, December 08, 2010 9:10 AM To: Kowalski, Ted; Mitchell, Rebecca; Sellers, Suzanne; Bassi, Linda Subject: Wild and Scenic meeting - Delta 12/6 Good afternoon everyone, Here's my summary of the meeting in Delta, I will try to keep it as brief as possible, but a lot of information was passed along at this meeting. I felt like this meeting went much more smoothly than the last one I attended, and it sounds like it went ten times better than the last one Suzanne went to. They had a snack, they had a break in the middle, and discussions mainly stayed on subject. They began the meeting by going over their objectives, quickly. Ed from the BLM was their point man this time, and Barb was not in attendance. Ed is a good guy to have as point man because he does not get frustrated easily. Even when the stakeholders are railing on the BLM for one reason or another, he stays calm. To start, Ed went over the factors to be considered in the suitability evaluation and determination process, found on the second page of the agenda, which I've attached. Then the facilitator went over the "ground rules", basically telling people to be polite and open minded. She was very strict about following the agenda this time, making everyone stick to the schedule, which was a good thing. Then came the discussion of Monitor Creek. The point was to get as much information as possible out on the table, for the benefit of the BLM, and for the benefit of the stakeholders making suitability determinations. First BLM Ed gave an overview of the stream, mostly sticking to the report enclosed in the agenda. Then Jim Graziano, the landowner whose ranch is high up on this stream, gave a little speech: his ranch stores most of the water from upper Monitor, then irrigates and slowly releases into the stream. His point of view is that this irrigation, which has been going on for 100 years, he said (absolute decree, 1874 apparently), protects Monitor Creek and the unique vegetation presented as an ORV. He is also attempting to get a conservation easement as he said to "protect this area after he's gone". Some ranchers brought up grazing: apparently all the creeks discussed today have grazing permits in the area. The facilitator then asks what questions that the group wanted BLM to come back with at the next meeting. Jim Riddell asked why the ORVs identified for Roubideau creek, to which Monitor flows were not also given to Monitor. Such as— wildlife and recreational. This particular stakeholder is big on the recreational value of all three of these creeks. A representative of the CNHP was in attendance—a project of CSU that BLM includes in their eligibility analysis. I'm curious about this project: though BLM includes them in the eligibility, the representative said that her organization and BLM do not have the same data or agree on segments. Interesting fact: as included in the assessment, both Monitor and Potter are classified as G1 for this particular grouping of vegetation. By this woman's explanation, that means that there are only 3 other locations in the entire world where this grouping exists. I think the feeling of the room (myself included) was a little skeptical about this ratings system, especially when she sort of backtracked and said maybe it needed to be re-evaluated. If you guys have more questions about CNHP and their ratings, ask me, I think I understand it pretty well. CNHP lady also asked about weeds in the area, tamarisk, etc. The group took in all this info, asked some questions for BLM to answer, then moved on to Potter.