Laserfiche WebLink
<br />OQ3J18 <br /> <br />3. Recreation - Gages solely providing flow and stage infonnation on recreation streams arc <br />not viewed as a high national or regional priority. Nonetheless, such a mission does accommodate <br />a large active constituency impacting local and state economies. Supporting this recreation and river <br />safety goal needs to be viewed as one which would either: I) nudge the installation of certain gages <br />over others, given that other water management or interest goals drive the need for the gage, or; 2) <br />justify maintaining existing gages within established national or intrastate networks. <br /> <br />Generally, support for gages which are solely intended to meet recreation purposes should <br />be the full responsibility of recreation agencies or interests, Addressing this need through <br />supplemental gage coverage is a state-discretionary decision made in concert with local recreation <br />groups, Consideration of using real-time, stage-only gages, fully funded by the recreation interests <br />is one manner to further meet this purpose at a lower unit cost. A suggested metric would be <br />locating a gage on rivers identified by river recreation affiliations, state and local tourism agencies <br />and the National Park Service, <br /> <br />4. Single Purpose Gages - In many cases, the above purposes represent a mix of federal, <br />state and local interests, allowing for use of the Co-Operative Program to provide installation and <br />maintenance of gages to meet those purposes, However, in some cases, streamflow monitoring is <br />a requirement of permit conditions or land management. These purposes tend to be narrow in focus <br />with no national or regional interest. In these cases, the gages should not be incorporated within the <br />NSIP or Co-Op Programs since these gages meet a single purpose serving a single user. Such <br />purposes include: <br /> <br />A, Monitoring of streamflows for NPDES permits, <br />B. Monitoring of streamflows as required by conditions within water or diversion rights or <br />permits. <br />C. Water resources within Federal Land holdings, <br /> <br />In all these cases, the responsibility for installing and maintaining the gage resides with the <br />user of the gage data such as the permit holder or the land managing agency, <br /> <br />ESTABLISHING RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE NATIONAL STREAMGAGING NETWORK <br /> <br />As indicated by the above discussion of streamgaging goals and purposes, a National network <br />of gages should be composed ofNSIP supported gages supporting federal interests and providing <br />the basic nationwide framework of sub-basin flow monitoring and federal interest and the Co- <br />Operative program meeting the state/local needs for water management while providing <br />supplemental watershed streamflow information, The balance between these two support programs <br />was the subject of considerable discussion at the 200 I workshops. <br />