| Doc. # 2008-
Issues Committee Meeting
Cayuga Lake Watershed Network
December 9, 2008
Keith Tidball’s home on Route 89 in Fayette (in Canoga Creek
subwatershed)
Present:Ruth Richardson (chair), John Mawdsley, Keith Tidball,
Brian Boerman, Roxy Johnston, Eric Reigel, Kris West (guest from
Finger Lakes Land Trust) and Joe McNamara (guest; local citizen
of Fayette in Canoga subwatershed; former dairy farmer).
Minutes:
There were two main agenda items for this meeting. Both focused
upon Seneca County. The first was hearing from Kris West about the
work she’s doing exploring land trust possibilities in Seneca
County. The second agenda item was to open discussions with citizens
of the Canoga Creek watershed specifically (and the northern end
of the lake more generally) to explore concerns of northern watershed
residents and the possibilities of establishing local subwatershed
monitoring groups as exist for Fall, Six Mile, Taughannock and Salmon
Creeks.
1. Kris West has been hired for a one year project to look at Seneca
County land trust possibilities. She started with strategic social
engagement – speaking to county reps and citizens about conservation
issues. Several protected lands already exist in the area including
Montezuma, FL National Forest, Junius Ponds, some low impact Ag
fields, and undeveloped waterfront. Her overall conclusion is that
in Seneca County, conservation easements make more sense (politically)
than land reclamation outright. She uses GIS overlays to highlight
forested areas that could serve as “cores” around which
easements would be explored. All easements would be voluntary (so
she’d be interested in hearing from anyone who knows conservation-minded
citizens in Seneca County). Several other discussion topics (for
context) came up: Heritage program (which deals with biological
diversity in NY State and is collaborative with Nature Conservancy);
areas they won’t go near: Army Depot and the trail around
the Seneca canal. Keith suggested that FLLT needs to give landowners
the big picture perspective of stewardship. This seems in line with
the ultimate “output” of Kris’ project: a brochure
(lots of pix) for the local citizenry that 1. makes the case for
conservation and 2. highlights tools (types of land protection options)
in the tool box.
2. Issues in the northern watershed. “Weeds” and how
to increase subwatershed monitoring were be the two main subjects
discussed. W.r.t. weeds, Eric pointed out that weeds have been thick
since the 70s. He made the argument that the trestle slowed water
flow leading to sediment settling out and forming more shallow water
which allowed the weeds to take off. We didn’t spend much
time discussing weeds beyond this. [It was decided at the subsequent
board meeting that the CLWN would work on a late winter symposium
on Weeds with Judy Pipher leading the effort but working with the
Issues Committee].
As for monitoring, there was much discussion of whether there was
enough interest in the Canoga watershed to form a monitoring group
and what the next steps would be in moving such a group forward.
Keith has put elements of such a volunteer monitoring group into
a SARE (formula funds) grant application that he submitted today.
Even without such funds, he and Joe (another Canoga watershed resident)
agreed that there were enough conservation minded watershed residents
that they could go forward without the SARE grant. Other names that
came up as possible volunteers were Roloson, VanRiper, Parks &
Shumway. Next steps are: to have a meeting of stakeholders to discuss
issues and perspectives. Roxy then brought up that Community Sciences
Institute puts on monitoring workshops and suggested that we pass
on to the local citizens when the next workshop will be held (need
to check with Steve Penningroth). [at the subsequent WRC-CU meeting
on 12/11 Steve P mentioned that the next CSI event will be a monitoring
symposium on Jan 22 at the Human services bldg on State St in Ithaca].
Some pertinent issues/characteristics of note for Canoga: it’s
main branch is 90% spring fed (Roxy mentioned that Todd Miller from
Ithaca USGS knows a lot about springs); Joe mentioned that the local
Trout Unlimited wants to maintain creek for brown &/or brook
trout (have permit from DEC). Roxy pointed out that the IO accepts
applications for help with erosion control and other bigger projects.
Suggested that Fayette send a representative to the next IO meeting.
The next meeting TBD. Ruth will be out of town for the Jan board
meeting (dates of travel: Jan 5-19).
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