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<br />. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />SCOPE <br />The scope of the project included hiring a consulting firm, McLaughlin Water Engineers (MWE) <br />of Denver, Colorado, who then contacted representatives of 268 floodprone Colorado <br />communities and all 63 Colorado counties, as identified by the Colorado Water Conservation <br />Board. The contact method chosen was a needs survey requesting communities and water related <br />organizations to identifY and inventory their needs and identifY their successes in dealing with <br />watersheds, stream corridors and floodplains. <br /> <br />PROCESSES UTILIZED <br />The process involved forming a steering committee to provide an overview of the project; bring <br />an expanded level of expertise and perspective; provide direction and comment; endorse the study <br />findings; and provide recommendations to the CWCB, A survey questionnaire was created to <br />solicit information from 321 communities and 110 environmental and water related organization. <br /> <br />The findings from this survey and the associated follow up contacts with community <br />representatives were then used to create a computer based data base to analyze and identifY <br />problems and areas of needs. The findings served as the basis for recommended programs to <br />address those needs. <br /> <br />ASSESSMENT PROCESS <br /> <br />Survey Questionnaire Development <br />A needs survey, in the form of a seven page questionnaire containing 28 different areas for <br />response, was jointly developed by CWCB staff, the steering committee and MWE project staff, <br />to: 1) secure information regarding community profiles, pressing interests and values of stream <br />corridors, 2) solicit and identifY basin needs and programs from water organizations, 3) inventory <br />existing flood problems, 4) evaluate existing programs, 5) determine future needs, and 6) <br />formulate recommendations for consideration by the CWCB, <br /> <br />Follow up <br />The questionnaire was mailed on October 23, 1997 with a requested return date of November 14, <br />1997, The November 14th response rate for the communities was 10 percent, and 17 percent for <br />the counties. MWE staff and associates called those who had failed to return their questionnaires, <br />The were several reasons for the lack of response, including outdated addresses and phone <br />numbers, staff turnover, and demands of current work load, An intense effort of follow up phone <br />calls improved the response rate so by the end of December, 1997, nearly 40 percent of <br />communities and 44 percent of counties had sent in their survey questionnaire, In addition, 21 <br />percent of the organizations returned their questionnaires, <br /> <br />Data Base Development <br />A data base was designed to allow the results of the survey questionnaire responses to be entered <br />and subsequently queried for information. The data base allows nearly 4000 responses to be <br />further investigated and examined to aid in focusing the recommendations described in this report <br /> <br />3 <br />