Progress Report

CICEET Progress Report for the period 9/02/07 Through 3/01/08

Project Title: Building SWAMPs in Coastal Oregon Communities
Principal Investigator(s): Derek Godwin, Desiree Tullos, Tim Fiez
Project Start Date: 12/01/07 (Date when OSU Sponsored Programs completed process for setting up the grant)

Project Objectives for This Reporting Period
Objectives
1. Engage local decision-makers (planning department staff, planning groups, developers, elected officials, landowners and other stakeholders) by increasing awareness and understanding of the impact development practices have on stormwater and water quality.

2. Empower local planning departments, real estate developers and homebuilders to implement low impact development (LID) strategies ranging from site to landscape scale assessment, planning and implementation of LID practices.

3. Assist local governments in updating land use plans, creating stormwater plans, and developing incentive and regulatory programs that ensure the implementation of innovative and cost-effective low impact development practices.

4. Reduce the implementation costs (time and labor) related to designing new stormwater management practices and reviewing the related development plans.

Tasks to meet objectives
The following is a list of tasks with the original proposed completion dates: Outreach Education
1. Basic presentations ­ delivered locally as needed (on-going)
2. Train-the-trainer on GIS, Explorer and analytical tools (9/2007)
3. Train local communities on existing analytical and visualization tools (GIS, ISAT, NSPECT, etc.); as requested in pilot communities (3/2008)
4. Assistance on reviewing/updating/developing incentive and regulations for implementing LID practices (on-going)

Oregon Land Use Explorer
1. Phase 1 ­ develop portal web design, contribute statewide data, build mapping tool and land use reporting tool (2/2007)
2. Phase 2 ­ build county-based mapping tool, refine land use on county pages, perform outreach on tools, enhance with additional data (8/2007)

SWAMP development
1. Stormwater design algorithms completed (1/2008)
2. Integrated tool calculation and reporting verified (7/2008)
3. Interface completed offline (9/2008)
4. Interface functioning online (12/2008)

SWAMP and Land Use Explorer training
1. Training workshops (1-4/2009)
2. Application of tool (4-6/2009)

Progress on Tasks
Outreach Education
1. Basic presentations ­ SWAMP will eventually be the primary tool in helping communities design LID practices. Until it is created, we work with our agency partners to deliver a wide variety of programs in Western Oregon communities to increase awareness, knowledge and skills related to conducting LID practices.

  1. Two porous surfaces workshops were held in the Willamette Valley in January and March, 2008 (90 participants).
  2. An erosion control workshop was held in the City of Brookings (a pilot community) in the fall of 2007 (65 participants).
  3. A low impact development training was delivered in Coos Bay in partnership with the Southwest Oregon Community College (March, 2008).
  4. The Rogue Valley Council of Governments delivered a series of trainings on stormwater management in the Grants Pass area (pilot communities).
  5. Two rain garden workshops were delivered in the North Coast (Tillamook, Nehalem, Seaside areas) in the fall, 2007. We have several additional rain garden trainings scheduled for the spring and summer. We are working on a rain garden curriculum and publications that will complement the SWAMP project (expected to complete in September, 2008).

2. GIS and spatial analysis tools ­

  1. Trainings on the Oregon Explorer on-line tools have been delivered on campus and in a variety of communities to different audiences. The train-the-trainer programs are being planned for fall, 2008 ­ summer, 2009 in conjunction with the completion of the Land Use Explorer and Wildlife Explorer projects (see http://oregonexplorer.info/ to view the latest on-line tools).
  2. OSU Extension partnered with NOAA Coastal Services Center in delivering a 4-day ArcGIS and Coastal Applications course on the Coast in July, 2007 (25 participants). This was the basis for future advanced GIS workshops in Western Oregon.

3. Assistance in land use planning and code/ordinance review ­

  1. The Oregon Coastal Management Program has provided small grants to individual communities for the purpose of code/ordinance review to support LID practices and create/update stormwater management plans.
  2. Oregon Sea Grant and the Oregon Environmental Council completed two reports that provide suggestions for education, technical assistance and specific programs related to low impact development. The Oregon Sea Grant report is called Barriers and Opportunities for Low Impact Development: Case Studies from Three Oregon Communities (ORESU-W-06-002). It can be found at http://seagrant.oregonstate.edu/sgpubs/onlinepubs.html. The OEC report is called Stormwater Solutions: Turning Oregon’s Rain Back into a Resource. It can be found at http://www.oeconline.org/rivers.

Oregon Land Use Explorer ­ This project has completed phase 1 and 2 with the exception of the outreach education component. You can view the on-line resource at the Oregon Explorer website http://oregonexplorer.info/. The OSU library and Institute of Natural Resources have been conducting focus group sessions to review the portal and make suggestions for final revisions. They are planning to conduct outreach education in the fall, 2008 ­ summer, 2009.

SWAMP development and trainings ­ The development of the SWAMP has been delayed. We have completed our initial planning for the project and have hired a faculty member to create the tool. We are expecting to have a draft tool completed by September, 2008 in order to conduct focus group workshops in our pilot communities. These workshops will provide feedback that will guide the final development of the tool (expected to be complete by summer, 2009). Trainings will be delivered using SWAMP in summer or fall, 2009.

Difficulties
We did not have funds available to begin the project until December, 2007, due to the delay in funding from CICEET (approved in September) and the further delay from OSU’s Sponsored Programs. The primary consequence of this change in schedule was the inability to recruit a qualified student to work on the project. Recruiting typically occurs in the spring and early summer for the following school year. We had two failed searches to find a graduate student with the computer programming and GIS skills to work on the project. We decided to hire a faculty member to work on the project in order to meet our timelines as originally proposed. After planning with this faculty member and waiting for them to finish other projects, he was offered funding on a 3-year project and decided to not continue with our project. Since this time, we have secured another faculty member and have begun the initial planning process with him. He is beginning to work on the project and expects to have a draft SWAMP tool completed by the end of summer.

Outreach education efforts that complement the SWAMP tool are being delivered; however, we were expecting the SWAMP tool to be created first and serve as the primary design guidance for local jurisdictions and practitioners considering LID practices. Instead, we are developing and delivering education programs on how to design LID practices which will be included in SWAMP as it is developed. Even though this is different than planned, these efforts are raising awareness in many communities which may improve our success in providing outreach on SWAMP.

Data Generated to date
Not applicable.

Project Objectives for Next Reporting Period

Objectives
We will continue to work towards meeting our overall project objectives outlined above.

Work Plan to Meet Objectives
Our workplan has not changed significantly from the tasks outlined above but our expected completion dates have changed. We will focus on creating a draft SWAMP tool and plan the delivery of workshops in our pilot communities to test the tool. We expect to have a draft tool completed by the end of summer, 2008. We will be delivering workshops using this tool in September, 2008.

Expenditures
We have not spent money from this grant in this first reporting period. However, we are expecting to use the amount of money as proposed. We will not be hiring a graduate student to work on the project. We have hired a faculty member using the same amount of money as allocated to the student position. This will allow us to make significant progress on the project in a much shorter amount of time. We expect to complete the project according to the proposed timeline.

We will be hiring an outreach coordinator as planned in the grant. We did not want to start a person in this position until we were certain we had a person to work on the SWAMP tool. This person should begin working by the end of March.

What Else?
Please provide feedback on this report and let me know if you need more information.