Minutes for Non-Tidal Workgroup Conference Call January 9, 2008 1:00-3:00 pm Attendance: Scott Phillips, USGS Rick Hoffman, VADEQ John Wirtz, WVDEP Katie Foreman, UMCES/CBPO Tami Huber, ICPRB/CBPO Sherm Garrison, MDNR Ed Reilly, NY DEC Peter Tango, USGS/CBPO Jacob Goodwin, CRC/CBPO Charlie Poukish, MDE Mary Ellen Ley, USGS/CBPO Joel Blomquist, USGS Ken Hyer, USGS Bill Romano, MDNR Molly Pulket, PADEP 1:00 Introductions and Announcements, review and update on action items from 12/12/2007 meeting (S.Phillips): The new MASC fellow Jacob Goodwin, (Jake), was introduced. He joined CBPO on 1/7/09 and is a graduate student at Johns Hopkins for Environmental Science and Policy. Jake's background has been in oyster research and for the past 5 years he has worked at the University of Maryland. All action items from last meeting were met. 1:15 Outcomes and Next Steps from MASC review of the Benthic Macroinvertebrate Impairment Indicator (K. Foreman and S. Phillips) • Scott, Katie, and John presented six map options that were developed by the NTWG at the MASC assessment workshop on Dec. 18-19th, 2007. Comments on the maps and suggestions were made by the MASC. o Present the suggestions from MASC review, o Discuss revised map and new bar chart indicator, o Review and discuss updated materials (tables, text, map, etc.). The presentation on watershed health indicators from the MASC meeting was briefly summarized and the suggestions that came from the discussion at the MASC meeting were discussed. The map 5 option for depicting benthic macroinvertebrate impairments was determined to be the best indicator for watershed health at the MASC meeting. MASC suggested map 5 (showing impaired line segments as well as pie charts indicating % impaired, % not assessed, and % not impaired for wadeable and non-wadeable streams in each state) be included in the Annual Bay Health and Restoration Report along with an area weighted bar chart that presented a summary of % impaired, % not assessed, and % not impaired for all states combined. Visual discrepancies for the percent impaired portion of map 5 for Virginia were discussed in terms of comparing the visual red portion outlining impaired streams to the accompanying data in the pie chart. Scale was thought to be the cause of the discrepancy. The idea of using another color, green, to point out unimpaired streams on the map was brought up but that option had already been tried and cluttered the map. The Benthic Macroinvertebrate Community Health Bar Chart (BMC) was reviewed. Group members agreed that there should be one overall goal and not two goals, as is currently depicted in the BMC. The group agreed that the overall goal was to have 100% of the benthic macroinvertebrate communities in the non-tidal tributaries to the Chesapeake Bay be unimpaired. This idea would create a "one bar, one goal" chart that would be consistent with other figures in the Annual Bay Health and Restoration ------- Report. With this goal in mind, the workgroup decided the (BMC) chart should be changed to show one bar with 43% unimpaired waters. It was suggested to run this idea by some workgroup members not present. It was restated that 2006 data is sufficient for the charts and that data from previous years could not be retrofitted to the indicator due to inconsistencies in methodology from year to year within many states. ACTION: Katie will reformat BMC to a "one bar, one goal" chart. More specifically, only one "not impaired" bar rather than the current three: "not impaired, not assessed, and impaired." Percentages in the text for the BMC should be included. ACTION: John will add a caveat to map and text in regards to the lack of data from DC. ACTION: Katie will take text, map, and chart to communications department for review and have it ready by February meeting. 2:00 Discuss the NTWG activities in the year ahead (S. Phillips) • Review 2007 workplan and make suggestions for changes for 2008 workplan. This workplan will be discussed and updated further at the February workgroup meeting. • Discuss possible topics and presenters at the MASC non-tidal workshop on May 7-8th. The 2007 work plan was discussed and ideas were brought forward for 2008 although priorities were not set. Below is a summary of this discussion: The final version of the 2006 status report will be available on the workgroup website. States will present the status of their non-tidal water quality monitoring network for 2007 at the meeting in February. Field and lab procedures in MD, VA, and PA were assessed last year. There are many guideline and reformatting issues that must be completed before there will be a gold standard for everyone. Field crews were not all evaluated and more help will be needed from USGS to do so. Tami is working on technical issues with the non-tidal database. Constructing a database of site characteristics was not completed in 2007. It was determined that database site characteristics should be compiled as a way to begin to evaluate the representativeness of the monitoring network. A possibility for the 2008 work plan included a non-tidal website but time commitments for this must be assessed before a decision is made. Workgroup members agreed that it was important to develop other watershed health indicators. The STAC assessment of non-tidal indicators report, which will be sent out to the workgroup, may provide ideas for other indicators. The workgroup discussed load indicators and the possibility of working with Gary Shenk on this. Factors affecting delivery and trends of nutrients and sediment report is undergoing technical review and awaiting final approval. The 2006 annual water quality status and trends assessment was released in November but members of the workgroup mentioned an update is needed for 2007. The workgroup requested updates and a draft be sent via a website link. The idea of improving the delivery and format of water quality data and trend results was discussed among the workgroup and redesigning and updating the RIM website was mentioned. The idea of a water quality database ------- website was mentioned and workgroup members emphasized the importance of interlinking websites. The workgroup discussed interaction with other CBP workgroups to assess water quality trends and the website COAST was suggested as a useful tool. Continuous monitoring was brought up by members of the workgroup. There are currently 4 continuous monitoring units deployed in Virginia. Members of the workgroup discussed the idea of using regressions to show the correlation between turbidity and suspended sediment. Specifically, Ken Hyer, may provide more insight on this at the meeting in May. ACTION: Katie will upload the final 2006 non-tidal network status report to the workgroup website. ACTION: Katie will send out email to states with a list of what 2007 network site updates they need to present in February. ACTION: Sherm Garrison will send info to Mary Ellen and try to get someone from region 3 to give a presentation in May about the National Wadeable Streams Survey. ACTION: Peter will email Larry Merrill about speaking to the workgroup about the National Wadeable Streams Survey. ACTION: Scott will send the STAC report to the workgroup for possible indicator ideas. ACTION: Scott will send workgroup a link to updated version of "The Factors Affecting Delivery and Trends of Nutrients and Sediment Report". ACTION: Scott will send presentation of COAST to workgroup members. ACTION: Katie will put together a draft of the 2008 workplan based on workgroup discussion. Topics were discussed for the MASC non-tidal workgroup May 7-8th workshop. The workshop will have a total of three to four sessions. Possible ideas for those sessions were as follows: new approaches to explaining water quality change, indicators, representativeness of the network (targeted monitoring, effectiveness, modeling), and interpretation techniques. Details will be discussed further at the next meeting. 2:45 Update on the non-tidal database (T. Huber) The Non-tidal Database was discussed during the 2007 workplan discussion. Data for the trend update is not complete. Developments of data submission procedures, for the database, as well as development tools for retrieval are presently being worked on. 3:00 concluding remarks and adjourn Next meeting: Wednesday February 13, 2008. 10:00 AM - 3:00 PM ------- Location: USGS Baltimore, Maryland District Office 5522 Research Park Drive Baltimore, MD 21228 ------- |