EEPOC Meeting

Minutes

12/12/00

Present: Lynn Leopold, Jerry Codner, Karin Harjes, Sharon Anderson , Sephra Albert

Slide Show : Municipal boards are the intended audience. Because there may be new Board members we should assume no or minimal prior knowledge. The slide show needs to be interesting, covering concepts people can relate to at the same time it provides information and inspires further involvement. All in 10 mins! Sharon was very pleased by the number of IO members who said they would take the slide show to their municipality. The combination of IO members, Sharon and Sylvia will try to get to as many Boards as possible before the May meetings.

An outline prepared by Karin Harjes was reviewed. She will work with Sharon to flush it out more and look for appropriate images to illustrate/support the concepts. Karin and Sharon will try to view a slide show created for municipal boards in the Keuka Lake watershed. Suggestions: start general, move to specifics and end with a summary of key points. Use action photos with people doing things helpful and harmful to the watershed.

Timeline: Relevant dates such as when to mail “watershed-wide” post cards were discussed and added. Sharon will amend the timeline.

Publicity: the mailing of the watershed wide post cards was discussed and members decided it is worth the expense of doing 2 mailings, one for each set of meetings. A similar process of using rural routes and excluding Ithaca will be used. Radio interviews, TV, newspaper, flyers, etc will also be used.

Jerry is willing to draft an article/Op-Ed piece once the strategies become available. Lynn would look for someone she knows that might be willing to write an article. Once we have some strategies to review it will be possible to target people with expertise/interest in specific areas. The publicity push will start after the new year.

Alternative Name for Management Plan: S haron reported Dave Zorn’s concern with using “framework”. Manual, Reference, Handbook, Strategies were all discussed, as was a word(s) to follow Water Quality (protection, improvement, stewardship, conservation). The preferred combination was Water Quality Protection Plan feeling that protection encompasses any needed improvements. Sharon will contact Dave Zorn and also the Technical Committee to get their reaction.

Content of the Plan: there was a good, general discussion about what we think the plan will be and what we thought would be useful (something practical and user-friendly). The Landscaping for Erosion Control was cited as a good example of the type of document that would be of value. (See note after end of minutes.)

Drafts of the Plan will appear on a separate Web site. A list serve will be used to alert members of the IO and its committees and professional of the drafts as they become available and of deadlines for comments. All of these key individuals are encouraged to have their comments in before the February meetings.

Next EPPOC meeting will be January 18, 4:30 at Cornell Cooperative Extension, Room C

Submitted by Sharon Anderson

POST-MEETING UPDATE: Sharon spoke with D. Zorn after the meeting. He envisions the whole document to be 50-100 pages. It will focus on the top 15 issues identified in the municipal ranking process. Each issue will have a page or 2 describing the issue and why it is a concern followed by possible strategies for addressing that issue that would be relevant to the watershed. Since the level of detail is limited, some sections may have references, specific implementation recommends, who is responsible and identified funding sources. The plan will then move on to discussion of the next issue.

When practical, the lower ranked items will be rolled into of the priority issues or they may be covered briefly.

Dave is supportive of the suggested name Water Quality Protection Plan and agreed I should email it to all Tech Committee members for their comments.