Activity Report for the Period 2/13/2017 – 2/24/2017

East Multnomah Soil and Water Conservation District
Sections:
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
ACTIVITIES
Jay Udelhoven
Completed:
  • Boards/Committees: Reached out to contacts east of Portland regarding associate board director positions.
  • External Engagement: Attended Multnomah County Farm Bureau Meeting.
  • Policies/Planning/Budgeting: Drafted position statements on policy issues; attended meeting with the Tax Supervising and Conservation Commission regarding FY17-18 budgeting; reviewed draft program budgets for FY17-18.
  • Program Implementation: Assisted with native plant sale; met with another soil and water conservation district in Willamette Valley to discuss rural water quality issues; reviewed PIC grant applications.
  • Supervision/Leadership: Met with staff and management team during 1x1s, team meeting, and all staff meeting.
Planned:
  • Boards/Committees: Prepare for and host board meeting; meet with associate board director applicants.
  • External Engagement: Attend Tualatin Soil & Water Conservation District business planning meeting to present East Multnomah's experience developing and implementing programs with tax base.
  • Policies/Planning/Budgeting: Continue working on position statements on policy issues for board consideration; continue revision of personnel policies.
  • Program Implementation: Meet with representatives of the West Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District to discuss representation on the Linnton Interagency Mitigation Bank Review Team; attend PIC Grant Review Committee meeting to assist with evaluation of PIC grant applications.
  • Supervision/Leadership: Meet with staff and management team during 1x1s, team meeting, and all staff meeting.
FINANCE & OPERATIONS
ACTIVITIES
Program Supervision / Finance & Budget Lissa Adams
Completed:
  • Continued working on FY17-18 budget in preparation for initial budget committee meeting on March 6; finalized budget notice language and worked with Jed and Alex to publish budget committee meeting notices in newspaper and on website.
  • Attended a scintillating seminar on government finance and recent accounting rule changes; attended Slough Celebration; met with Equity Team to continue discussing path forward for an organizational equity plan.
  • Met with an IT vendor to discuss contracted IT services and a proposal will be forthcoming; did some troubleshooting for a network outage to get our internet and network services back up and running.
Planned:
  • Put finishing touches on first draft of FY17-18 budget for board packet next week.
  • Work with Equity Team to draft a proposal for moving forward with equity work that will feed into the strategic planning to happen in first half of FY17-18.
  • Continue soliciting IT proposals for possible new IT contractor.
Office Management Jed Arnold
Completed:
  • Plant Sale prep, Plant Sale day, Plant Sale clean-up. Lots of Plant Sale related activities!
  • I have been working with several vendors to try and find the most cost-effective way for the district to continue to use Microsoft and Adobe software now that both companies are switching to costly subscription-based licensing.
  • I have been coordinating with Associate Director applicants to arrange for initial informal meetings/interviews.
Planned:
  • Continue work with multiple vendors on bids to replace the office's dated phone system.
  • I will be scrubbing names and other personal information from applications and doing other follow up after the Senior Conservationist position closes.
  • I will be working with our insurance broker to align the renewal dates for all of our employee policies.
Facilities Management Scot Wood
Completed:
  • Scot is out of the office until 2/17 and unable to submit a report.
Marketing & Media Alex Woolery
Completed:
  • Plant sale: order and stock checking, final preparations and logistics, refunds, set up and played music during pickup day, managed program materials booth and talked to visitors about our programs, took photos and video, worked with staff to rebuild customer orders that had not been successfully placed. All in all a great day, roughly 10,900 native plants went to new homes!
  • Media: worked with Angela to help KOIN TV staff set up and stage native planting shoot on site in EMSWCD demonstration yard. Spoke with Gresham Outlook reporter about invasive weeds article, will work with Urban Lands staff to coordinate possible linked workshop and Gresham campaign.
  • Promoted spring workshops with ad, campaign email with Katie, additional posts promoting individual workshops. Designed and printed several hundred new workshop fliers.
  • Several updates to the website: new front page posts, Board and Committee updates and press releases, updates to About, Grants, Native Plants sections, fixed broken or outdated links.
Planned:
  • Final plant sale post-processing: documenting and processing refunds and no-show orders.
  • Work on infographics and posters for several different outputs: a grantee infographic, a new equity team poster, and a composting toilet infographic.
  • Continue working on first draft District materials such as event display panel, brochure, new nametags, and other standard elements.
Information Technology Lissa Adams,
Jed Arnold,
Alex Woolery
Completed:
  • Lissa, Jed and Alex met with a potential IT services vendor.
  • Lissa resolved some network outage issues.
  • Alex ran some updates and installations on a couple laptops and tablets for playing streaming music during plant sale week.
Planned:
  • Jed and Lissa will respond to staff IT issues and questions as needed.
RURAL LANDS
ACTIVITIES
Program Management Julie DiLeone
Completed:
  • Finished draft Rural Lands budget.
  • Assessment of ODA's Strategic Implementation Area in upper Johnson Creek to identify suggested improvements.
  • Helping prepare suggested changes to CLIP for March Board meeting.
Planned:
  • Attend Sandy River Basin Watershed Council's climate adaptation workshop.
  • Attend Lower Columbia Estuary Partnership's presentation of data on cold water refugia.
  • Review OWEB small grant applications.
Rural Water Quality Aaron Guffey
Completed:
  • Presented findings to the Inter Jurisdictional Committee for Johnson Creek from the nursery growers research study that gathered perspectives regarding soil erosion.
  • Researched statistics and data regarding national and regional soil erosion rates to include in an educational component of outreach to nurseries.
  • Led a tour for partners of the Headwaters Farm stream crossing replacements.
  • Attended a meeting led by Andrew to discuss GIS data organization and best practices.
Planned:
  • Develop tools and protocols for the erosion prevention initiative.
StreamCare Lucas Nipp
Completed:
  • I have been overseeing a crew installing bare root trees and shrubs on StreamCare sites. We have installed almost 39,000 plants on 24 sites, including planting out the areas around the Headwaters culverts.
  • I did a site visit with an ODFW employee to a property that graduated from StreamCare and is interested in getting into ODFW's Riparian Lands Tax Incentive Program. The program lowers a landowners taxes if they agree to manage the riparian area properly. ODFW approves of moving forward with enrolling the property.
  • I oversaw a contract crew to install 2,225 plants, the vast majority forbs, into over 8000 square feet of ground at Headwaters Farm. Rowan had the area mulched nearly immediately after the plantings to deter weed growth.
  • I oversaw a contract crew to install a hedgerow at Oxbow Farm along Oxbow Road. Over 4000 trees and shrubs were also installed in the forested portion of the farm for forest enhancement.
Planned:
  • I will be the MC at the Columbia Gorge CWMA Invasive Species and Exotic Species Workshop next week.
  • I will be finishing the Dianna Pope Natural Area Site Management Plan and getting it ready for presentation to the Land Legacy Committee in April.
  • I will be drafting a riparian management plan for a landowner who will be enrolling in the ODFW Riparian Lands Tax Incentive Program.
Technical Assistance Jeremy Baker
Completed:
  • Assisted with Plant Sale set up and with checking orders on the day of the sale.
  • Met with new landowner to discuss possilbe CLIP application to convert sprinkler irrigation over to drip irrigation and incorporate rainwater harvesting into the managment system.
  • Finalized and submitted OWEB grant focused on irrigation system upgrades.
Planned:
  • Met with CLIP team to review Rural Lands CLIP application and discuss potential changes to CLIP program management and cost-share limits.
  • Preparing documentation for and OWEB grant for a landowner converting sprinkler irrigation to micro-spray.
  • Working with Rowan on developing alternatives to the drainage issues at Headwaters. We're also discussing the location and size of a potential aerated compost system.
Weed Management Chris Aldassy
Completed:
  • Ivy monitoring and control along Trout Creek, and along Bell Road.
  • Jon, Andrew and I sat down with large printed maps of the District's Rural areas and began to delineate areas based different factors such as weed species coverage, topography, ownership, and other factors that would help us create "map unit areas" regarding the weeds work which will help us with monitoring, reporting, and planning our work.
  • Assisted Jon with water quality sampling and a wildlife survey at the DPNA.
Planned:
  • Attending the CWMA annual event: The Pull Together, and the Columbia Gorge CWMA invasive species workshop.
  • Planting native trees and shrubs at restoration sites in the gorge and in Corbett.
  • Complete breaking up rural lands into weed management "map unit areas."
Weed Management Jon Wagner
Completed:
  • Chris and I worked with Andrew to create management units for weeds. I entered water quality data.
  • Chris and I planted plant sale leftovers. I used the Wisdom workforce to pull Ivy. Chris and I conducted monthly water quality sampling and wildlife surveys.
  • I attended the Pull-Together and took comic notes.
Planned:
  • We will continue ivy control efforts and plant the remaining plant sale leftovers.
  • I will attend the annual invasive weed workshop.
Outreach & Education Chelsea White-Brainard
Completed:
  • Attended the 4-County CWMA (Cooperative Weed Mangement Area) Pull Together.
  • Helped with Plant Sale.
  • Sorted plants for StreamCare sites.
Planned:
  • Begin promotion of rural spring workshops.
  • Begin designing outreach strategies for erosion prevention campaign.
  • Plan outreach strategy for Agricultural water quality focus area.
URBAN LANDS
ACTIVITIES
Program Management Kathy Shearin
Completed:
  • Plant sale was a great success - Thank you everyone!!!
  • Attended 4-County CWMA's Annual Pull Together Conference.
Planned:
  • Work on crafting a comment letter to the City of Troutdale regarding proposed changes to their development code.
  • Reviewing urban PIC applications.
  • Review applications for Senior Conservationist position.
  • Responding to a few technical assistance requests.
Outreach & Education Angela Previdelli
Completed:
  • Plant Sale! Lead staff and groups of volunteers in prep and pickup day.
  • Final coordination of Connect speaker sessions.
  • Update Naturescaped Yard Tour documents for 2017.
  • Reviewed PIC grant applications and provided feedback to Suzanne.
Planned:
  • Yard Tour Coordination - Begin outreach for hosts and volunteers.
  • Review Urban Lands Senior Conservation applications and rank candidates.
  • Attend meeting with Sandy River Basin Watershed Council to discuss outreach for Mount Hood Community College demonstration project.
Outreach & Education Katie Meckes
Completed:
  • Worked with Angela to lead volunteer shifts to package over 730 plant sale orders in just three days!
  • Plant Sale pick-up day was a success! We provided over 10,000 native plants to approximately 750 happy customers!
  • Started planning for Yard Tour.
  • Workshop administration - managed participant registrations and wait lists, conducted general workshop outreach and promotion.
  • Reviewed 2 PIC Grant Applications.
Planned:
  • Prepare for Yard Tour Host & Volunteer recruitment efforts.
  • Continue workshop administration tasks including outreach, registration management, database and attendance tasks.
  • Angela and I will meet with Sara from Sandy River Basin Watershed Council to discuss how we can work together to support outreach for the Mt. Hood Community College stormwater retrofit project.
  • Internship planning.
CONSERVATION LEGACY
ACTIVITIES
Program Management Andrew Brown
Completed:
  • Pursued the Land Legacy Program Manager position recruitment. Worked on the active ag property acquisition with landowner.
  • Reviewed 2017 PIC grant applications.
  • Finalized initial 2017-18 program budgets.
Planned:
  • Finalizing Land Legacy Program Manager position selection and appointment. Follow-up on potential ag property acquisition projects.
  • Prepare for and assist with the 2017 PIC review committee meeting.
  • Work on EMSWCD climate change response plan.
  • Work on authoritative GIS data for Headwaters, weeds, and StreamCare programs.
Grants Suzanne Easton
Completed:
  • Continued involvement in Land Legacy hiring process.
  • Met with Equity Team to consider Center for Equity and Inclusion proposal for EMSWCD training and planning assistance.
  • Reviewed and processed SPACE grants for March board meeting.
  • Continued review and scoring of PIC applications. Preparation for review meeting.
Planned:
  • Prepare for and host PIC Review Committee meeting on March 1.
  • Follow up to PIC review meeting to finalize funding allocations and recommendations to Board for April.
  • Attend Intertwine Project Leaders meeting March 9.
  • Assist in preparation of equity training proposal to Board.
  • Process new SPACE grants approved by Board.
Headwaters Farm Rowan Steele
Completed:
  • Attended and presented at a Food Safety Training hosted by Oregon State University Extension Service.
  • Helped prep for plant sale and attended the Small Farm Conference.
  • On the Farm: First prophouse fully operational (expanded germination chamber, bottom heat on, water running, ventilation and circulation airflow on), dealt with theft of fire wood from the Dianna Pope Natural Area, and facilitated the mulching of the newly planted pollinator habitat.
Planned:
  • Configuring irrigation in the new prophouse and doing prep-work for electrical install.
  • Hosting a Headwaters Incubator Program record keeping cohort meeting with Tanya Murry, from Oregon Tilth and offering one of two tractor trainings.
  • Other projects: revisiting the Headwaters Farm 5-Year Plan, red-flag reviewing several Partners in Conservation grants, developing a waiver for children at the farm, and establishing a recreational immunity maintenance checklist.