Activity Report for the Period 12/12/2016 – 12/23/2016

East Multnomah Soil and Water Conservation District
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
ACTIVITIES
Jay Udelhoven
Completed:
  • Jay is on vacation until 12/29 and unable to submit a report.
FINANCE & OPERATIONS
ACTIVITIES
Program Supervision / Finance & Budget Lissa Adams
Completed:
  • Finalized VALIC plan termination letter and distributed to all plan participants. Invited Jack Schafroth from OSGP to present to staff regarding transferring funds to OSGP plan.
  • Prepared November financial reports. Prepared Budget vs. Actual reports and reviewed budget performance YTD.
  • Helped staff with several desktop and file recovery issues.
Planned:
  • Prepare draft FY17-18 budget calendar and worksheets.
Office Management Jed Arnold
Completed:
  • Contacted qualified applicants and setup interviews for the vacant Land Legacy position.
  • I attended a tour of the Multnomah Grange along with Jay and Scot to evaluate the facility for use for EMSWCD functions. We concluded the building was overall a promising location, but would require some basic ADA improvements in order be suitable for regular use by the district.
  • I've been working with our insurance broker to resolve some enrollment issues with our health insurers.
Planned:
  • I hope to post the Urban Lands Conservationist position by COB on Friday, however I will begin the advertising "push" for that position in early January.
  • I will be working with Scot to reconfigure and reorganize some of the space in our conference rooms to make them more efficient and easily usable as separate rooms.
  • I'm hoping to spend a significant chunk of the last week of December working on catching up with some board and committee meeting related tasks that have been put on the back burner during an unexpectedly hectic end of 2016.
Facilities Management Scot Wood
Completed:
  • With all of the snow and ice as of late, the main thing I've been concentrating on is keeping the sidewalks clear.
  • I'm still building prop house tables.
Planned:
  • I will be working with Bill at the Multnomah Grange to get contractors in to bid the work the District is willing to fund.
  • I will still be building prop house tables!
Marketing & Media Alex Woolery
Completed:
  • Continued plant sale development: tested store with Urban Lands team, worked through majority of issues and requests, still working on navigation/flow, user interface improvements, product details, minor bugs.
  • Upgraded development server hosting to address plant sale testing capacity issues, and worked with Lissa to select more powerful hosting plan for the public website.
  • Updated Wordpress version and plugins; updated events manager plugin and worked with Katie to test an alternative method of sending event confirmation emails. I'm happy to report the new email push method works much better.
  • Updated several parts of the website related to job, grant or program applications. Began a mini-campaign to get more people subscribed to our emails and added a related front page post.
Planned:
  • Continue working on plant sale development and final testing.
  • Migrate the public website to a new, more powerful business hosting platform.
  • Work on history project.
Information Technology Lissa Adams,
Jed Arnold,
Alex Woolery
Completed:
  • Lissa and Alex: second meeting with a potential IT service contractor.
Planned:
  • Jed and Lissa will respond to staff IT issues and questions as needed.
RURAL LANDS
ACTIVITIES
Program Management Julie DiLeone
Completed:
  • Julie is on vacation until 12/28 and unable to submit a report.
Rural Water Quality Aaron
Completed:
  • Worked with construction contractor of the stream crossings at Headwaters Farm to complete punch list of final items, including clean up.
  • Attended the Oct IJC meeting.
  • Chelsea and I led a tour of the stream crossings at Headwaters Farm to neighbors on the North Fork of Johnson Creek.
  • Completed a draft of my Annual Performance Review form.
Planned:
  • Schedule my Annual Performance Review.
  • Complete draft of Workplan.
StreamCare Lucas Nipp
Completed:
  • Lucas is on vacation until 1/3 and unable to submit a report.
Technical Assistance Jeremy Baker
Completed:
  • Submitted draft Headwaters Farm Plan for review.
  • Completed survey at Headwaters farm. The northern easement has been delineated and well marked. We also received the survey review for the drainage areas we'll be addressing in the coming year. I'm meeting with Rowan to discuss treatment and management options to get a final design for installation. I still need to take a few field measurements.
  • Met with a landowner to review and discuss a bid to convert sprinkler to drip irrigation system. We also discussed time frames and installation strategies moving forward.
Planned:
  • Attempting to create a breakout session for Connect 2017 focused on river and reservior management for flood control.
  • Field measeurements at Headwaters to complete inventory for treating drainage issues.
  • Drafting conservation plan and CLIP application for Ekstrom drip conversion project.
Weed Management Chris Aldassy
Completed:
  • Site monitoring for ivy/survey for loosestrife at McCord Creek Delta, where we will soon have crews doing some cutting work in prep for next spring control and subsequent planting.
  • I've been editing the Weed Free implementation plan.
  • With Jon and Chelsea's help, we created and mailed a 'New Years' greeting card to some of the landowners we work with.
Planned:
  • Project monitoring for last seasons ivy control.
  • Jon and I will be contacting landowners and doing control for Daphne laureola in the Buck Creek and Bridal Veil Watersheds.
  • I'll be editing the Weed Free Implementation Plan with hopes of having a second draft available for Rural Lands staff to review.
Weed Management Jon Wagner
Completed:
  • Jon is on vacation until 12/28 and unable to submit a report.
Outreach & Education Chelsea White-Brainard
Completed:
  • Helped Jon with water quality sampling in Beaver and Johnson Creeks 12/13.
  • As a member of the 4 County CWMA (Cooperative Weed Management Area) Steering Committee, finalized and approved CWMA Mangement Plan and annual workplans for all four committees. Ironed out details of the upcoming Pull Together.
  • Finalized CLIP sign design.
Planned:
  • Work with Chris and Jon to get New Year's card sent out to landowners associated with our weed removal projects and water quality sampling.
  • Begin research and planning of Dianna Pope Natural Area signage.
  • Work with Katie to clean and organize the basement.
URBAN LANDS
ACTIVITIES
Program Management Kathy Shearin
Completed:
  • Green Team Meeting.
  • Plant Sale meeting.
  • Met with Suzanne, Katie and DigIn to discuss potential PIC application.
  • Climate Change SWAT meeting with Andrew, Julie, Rowan and Scot.
  • Green Team Meeting to discuss possible use of contractor to facilitate internal Climate Change Planning effort.
Outreach & Education Angela Previdelli
Completed:
  • CONNECT Conference coordination - reached out to potential speakers. Asked EMSWCD staff to also help find speakers.
  • Plant Sale coordination - meetings, t-shirt design and production, counting labels, reviewing website content, plant descriptions.
  • Equity Team - lead team meetings, attended Intertwin Cohort meeting, reviewed Urban Lands position description.
Planned:
  • Continued Plant Sale coordination - updating presentations and materials, and starting volunteer recruitment.
  • Continued CONNECT Conference coordination - securing speakers, filling out Speaker Forms, and scheduling their presentations.
Outreach & Education Katie Meckes
Completed:
  • Posted 22 spring workshops to website, opened registration and sent confirmation checklists and fliers to workshop hosts.
  • Completed round one of basement organization with Scot and Chelsea.
  • Prepared draft of "Happy New Year: Plant Sale is Coming" email announcement.
  • Finished two rounds of plant sale testing.
Planned:
  • Begin outreach for spring workshops.
  • Inventory all outreach supplies with Chelsea & develop a plan for storage.
  • Continue with final phases of plant sale testing.
CONSERVATION LEGACY
ACTIVITIES
Program Management Andrew Brown
Completed:
  • Pursued distribution of Land Legacy Program manager position annoucement, to list-serves, organisations and potential candidates.
  • Follow-ed in existing Land Legacy projects, and identified one potential new opportuity.
  • Tested online grants application system and ensure live deployment was opertating smoothly.
  • Worked on EMSWCD database issues, and worked on developing authoritative GIS layers with other program staff.
Planned:
  • Process Land Legacy Program manager applications.
  • Prepare for and host School and community garden stakeholder meeting.
  • Prepare for and facilitate meetings to idetifiy opportunities for incorporating climate change into EMSWCD's programmatic offering.
Grants Suzanne Easton
Completed:
  • Suzanne is on vacation until 12/28 and unable to submit a report.
Headwaters Farm Rowan Steele
Completed:
  • Conducting end or season meeting with incubator farmers.
  • Updating the Farmer's Manual.
  • Met with Land Access Subcommittee to discuss initial opportunities for increasing land opportunities for beginning farmers.
Planned:
  • Fourth Quarter invoices.
  • Green Team meeting for second portion of the EMSWCD climate change SWOT analysis.
  • Headwaters Farm off-season projects: prophouse buildout, pallet racking order, electrical options for new facilities, and permitting for access points of Orient Drive.