Presentation to the Strategic Planning Committee of the Executive Council of PEI by a group of non-profit watershed management groups from northern central PEI.
Purpose: to inform the committee of the importance of the work of the Island’s watershed groups with the aim of ensuring that beverage container deposit money is used to secure the future of our work in the environment and the community.
Date: 14th January 2009
Making the presentation: Andrew Lush, Watershed Manager, Hunter-Clyde Watershed Group
Also in attendance: Rob Sharkie, Executive Director, Trout River Environmental Committee
Jennifer Roma, Friends of Covehead and Brackley Bay
Mike Willcock, Watershed Technician, Hunter-Clyde Watershed Group
Presentation format:
1. The good work that watershed groups have done with limited funds in the past.
2. The work that we are presently unable to do because of the lack of funds.
3. The increasing importance of the work we need to do in the future.
Part 1: The good work that watershed groups have done with limited funds in the past.
Watershed groups have become experts at stretching the funds available, achieving an enormous amount and making a real difference across the Island. Taking into account the ‘in kind’ contribution of volunteers, the government could not get better value for their money. For example, in 2007-2008 one group's project manager put in over 1500 volunteer hours to ensure the future of the watershed group.
We are grateful for the EDA/JFY and WMF funding that has been provided by the Provincial Government in previous years. Without this funding, we’re sure that many groups would not have started and that others would be much smaller and less capable than they now are. As well as paying for the majority of our labour costs, these dollars also act as seed money for groups to try to secure additional funds.
One typical watershed group has been able to offer summer jobs to around 26 kids over the past eight years. This is one of the most important aspects of our work – to get local youth into meaningful summer jobs, outside jobs with physical activity, which helps create the next generation of environmental stewards and gives them a sense of how all our activities affect the health of the watershed.
Watershed groups keep the J F Gaudet Tree Nursery busy, by planting thousands of trees each year. The Young Environmentalists tour the Island working with watershed crews, and volunteers as well as groups such as the Blue Heron Sea Cadets take part in watershed activities year on year.
To give you an idea of the kind of valuable work that we are doing, this year one of our watershed groups staffed a booth at a Canada Day event, planted over 1000 potted trees, built bat and swallow boxes, planted trees and designed a sign for a new community park, removed a beaver dam and carried out work to improve water flow on four properties, helped host a well-water nitrate testing clinic, researched the possibility of reopening a fish farm, started a riparian zone assessment with the PEI Soil and Crop Improvement Association, performed surface-water testing and analysis and built a GIS database of watershed related data.
The recreational fishery is enhanced by watershed groups, as are the inshore and offshore fisheries – after all there is only one food chain so all fisheries are related. This fact is supported by the large number of fishermen who have paid their membership fees to join some of our watershed groups over the years. The Wildlife Conservation Fund, which is funded by hunters, anglers and trappers, is a strong supporter of our work, often paying the entire wages of a summer student. This shows that our work is of direct benefit to sustaining wildlife populations.
Watershed groups have created or have been involved with the creation of a number of community parks and are often consulted when a new community project is in the planning stages. Many watershed volunteers are also members of community councils and other local groups, creating essential links and bringing important environmental considerations into the mix when decisions are made within our communities.
Part 2: The work that we are presently unable to do because of the lack of funds.
A quote from Jennifer Roma of Friends of Covehead and Brackley Bay:
While our watershed is in a good position to begin making changes, having the watershed management plan so near completion, there is still much funding that will be needed by us in order to actually implement the plan. This plan was developed by the communities of the Covehead-Brackley watershed and the goals include:
Improve and protect the quality of groundwater and surface water
Restore and protect fish and wildlife habitat
Promote and recognize good environmental stewardship
Implement and support ongoing education and awareness activities
Improve and support active living and recreational opportunities
Preserve sites of environmental and historical significance
In total we have 15 objectives and 73 specific strategies within these goals that are required in order to achieve what we have set out to do. Without an adequate amount of funding on a regular basis over the next number of years we will not be able to achieve our strategies. With the community now engaged, it would be a real shame to not capitalize on this position and move our plans forward.
The Hunter-Clyde Watershed Group, over the past 18 months, has started delivering an educational program to local schools. Due to the stop-start funding that is currently available, we are at risk of losing our excellent watershed technician, who designed and delivered that program. Funding for his position ran out in December and we can’t apply for more until the spring. I know that this lack of continuity is a real problem for many groups and having to re-train a succession of employees is a lot of work.
Part 3: The increasing importance of the work we need to do in the future.
Much good work has been done and watershed groups are strengthening their ties to the agriculture, fishing and tourism industries as well as to local municipalities and communities. These ‘watershed communities’ will continue to grow as watershed groups increase their organization and their knowledge of local issues. Without slow, steady growth, these relationships will suffer to the detriment of the whole community and the environment.
Surface-water quality issues will only continue to become more important as nitrate levels continue to rise, fish kills happen, anoxic events occur more often and siltation damage becomes more evident. Concerns over safe drinking water are becoming more prevalent and watershed groups will have an increasing role to play in monitoring and helping to remedy these problems.
Adequate on-going funding from a source such as beverage container deposits will allow watershed groups to plan for more than six months at a time. The repeated cycle of applying for funding creates problems with finding staff, not being able to start work early enough in the season and, sometimes, groups having to borrow money. Also, for those of us who volunteer on watershed group boards, secure funding would act as a recognition of all the hard work that these volunteers do, and perhaps prevent burn-out – which I’m sure happens in all groups.
With increasing public awareness of environmental issues, the government will gain much good publicity by following through with their promise to use beverage container deposit money to support our essential work in the environment. With tourism, farming and fishing being such a large part of our economy, this investment would easily be paid back.
In this time of economic reorganization, reinforcing the role of watershed groups will recognize the role that they have to play in the future. Securing ongoing funding through the Watershed Management Fund will enable this to be achieved.
Some of the most challenged areas of the province have barely been touched by watershed group activities. Support for these areas is crucial, and delays will result in further stream destruction, loss of biodiversity, increased risk to ground water and the tarnishing of PEI's public image. Eco-tourism, an increasing source of revenue for the Province, is intimately linked to the health of our watersheds.
Support for the ongoing work of watershed groups need not only be in the form of direct funding. There is a large multi-dimensional role that volunteers and staff need to perform well. Good working knowledge of several different subjects is required, including environmental regulations; government programs; administration skills; developing social marketing skills and using technology. The availability of training for these skills is crucial. The development of this training through workshops and courses (Holland College?) will be required in order to develop a high standard for watershed groups and to produce results.
The existing watershed coordinators play an essential role in the success that watershed groups have had in the past. Another indirect way to help watershed groups with their increasing workloads might be to fund more provincial staff, such as providing more coordinators and other specialists who can help us on a day-to-day practical basis.
The recent PEI Watershed Conference in November was well attended. It was decided to form an alliance although the exact form of the alliance was not decided. Many groups expressed a desire to share information and resources and have been encouraged by government to do so. It is the right time for watershed planning and management to be taken to the next level and in order to do that – it comes back down to the question of increased and continued funding.
The provincial government has been encouraging watershed groups to take on more tasks and, speaking for our own groups, we welcome the increased funding that has been made available over the past year. We have been encouraged to expand and cover more of the Province; for instance the Kensington North group has an area of 20,000 hectares which they have been asked to consider managing. We have similarly been encouraged to create forward-looking stewardship and management plans and we welcome the opportunity to implement these plans with the additional money that can be sourced from beverage container deposits.
We also believe that it is the right time for an advisory committee to be formed in order to provide input to the government on environmental policy. Watershed groups and other environmental groups could participate; we hope that the new watershed alliance will enable us to perform this role. Funding should be set aside to cover the travel and per diem costs of such a group. There are certainly many experts in the various groups who would welcome the opportunity to provide input in their field of expertise.
Thankyou.
Here is a letter sent to members of the committee in March:
Hunter-Clyde Watershed Group
RR # 2 Hunter River
PEI C0A 1N0
http://hcwg.editme.com
Hon. Carolyn Bertram MLA
P.O. Box 2890
Charlottetown
PE C1A 8C5
30th March 2009
Dear Minister Bertram,
At this time of year, when provincial budgets are being decided, I would like to remind you of the importance of allocating increased funding to the Watershed Management Fund, including directing some of the beverage container deposit money for this purpose.
Our watershed group, like many others, has been expanding its operations with welcome encouragement from government. We are undertaking more educational programs, more environmental monitoring, increased cooperation with municipalities, larger environmental restoration programs and we are providing more employment opportunities for Islanders.
As you are aware, the benefits of funding watershed groups are many, and probably provide among the best return on investment of any funded program. In return for $80,500 of provincial funding, this year our project will provide one full-time position, one 60% position and four summer positions, as well as all the materials and equipment that we need for the year.
In light of our increased duties and workload, this budget represents an increase over last year. I would urge you to look at the combined requests from all watershed groups and support these requests with adequate funding. Our budgets have been assembled as integrated plan, and suffer greatly from receiving proportional cuts, as is evident by the fact that our group almost lost its technician (Mike Willcock) when our funds ran out and he took another job. I would be pleased to forward you our detailed budget spreadsheet if you would like to see it.
Yours sincerely,
Andrew Lush
Watershed Manager
Hunter-Clyde Watershed Group
andrew@treesintrust.com
(902) 964-2272
cc. Hon. George Webster
Cynthia Dunsford MLA
Jim Young, DEEF