2023 Fall Meeting
Northwest Community Forest Coalition
Photo: Suter Creek, Tributary to Eagle Creek in Estacada, Oregon
Our Fall Quarterly Meeting brought a renewed focus to management approaches surrounding water quality, stream health, and riparian habitats.
Photo: Clackamas County SWCD Staff introducing the Eagle Creek Community Forest
The NWCFC Fall 2023 Quarterly featured community forest practitioners, funders, and policy makers and the materials around what forest management can look like as it prioritized water quality and riparian health as one of the numerous co-benefits of community forest management, as well as the resources available to support this work. Presentations and materials covered include:
Montesano City Forest: Balancing Active Management with Riparian Set Asides.
Eagle Creek Community Forest: Process, Goals, and Management
Funding Opportunities; Federal and State.
A Panel on Forest Management for Water Quality and Storage, Wildlife Habitat, and Forest Restoration featuring Boneyard Ridge, Nason Ridge, and Stewart Mountain.
You can view the the timing and details for each session and the related materials below.
Meeting Materials
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Montesano City Forest
Comprised of over 5,400 acres in the City of Montesano’s Watershed, John Bull presented the approach to managing the Montesano City Forest to provide benefits to the local economy, wildlife, and residents. These include timber harvest, recreational access, and wildlife and riparian health.
The Montesano City Forest has been in City Ownership since 1931 and revenue from the forest offsets expenses from the water district.
You can view the presentation from 0:17:36 - 01:04:00 in the Meeting Recording.
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Eagle Creek Community Forest
Mitsu Iwasaki, Regional Director with Trust for Public Land, Owen Wozniak, with Land Trust Alliance, and Jason Faucera, with Clackamas Soil and Water Conservation District Each spoke to the goals and motivation around the creation of the Eagle Creek Community Forest.
The Eagle Creek Community Forest played host to this quarterly meeting, and you can view the presentations from 01:04:30 - 02:06:30 in the recording here.
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Current and Upcoming Forest Service Funding
Lisa Romano and Candice Washington, representing the US Forest Service spoke to the funding opportunities currently available through the Forest Service. Significant funding is online through the Inflation Reduction Act.
Specific opportunities which were highlighted included:
Community Forest and Open Space Program
Urban and Community Forestry Program
Landscape Scale Restoration Program
View each of these updates in the recording - taking place between 02:07:00 - 02:26:50 - On.
See additional material highlighting federal investments through the IRA Below
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Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board Funding
Renee Davis with Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board introduced their suite of funding opportunities for both land acquisition and management. The broader list of funding opportunities through OWEB include:
View the full list of opportunities at the page linked below.
You can view the presentation from 2:40:20 - 2:49:50 in the meeting recording.
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Washington RCO Funding
Ben Donatelle, Natural Resources Policy Specialist with Washington RCO member spoke to the current and upcoming funding opportunities available through the Washington RCO Program. These include:
Trails-Nonhighway and Off-Road Vehicle Activities Program
Salmon Recovery and Puget Sound Acquisition and Restoration
A full list of opportunities is included at the page linked below.
Vanessa Kritzer with Washington Association of Land Trusts also shared an opportunity for partners to support RCO’s Community Forest Program
You can view the presentation from 2:27:00 - 2:40:00 in the meeting recording.
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Practitioner Panel: Water Quality and Habitat
To close the meeting, staff working with the Stewart Mountain Community Forest, The Nason Ridge Community Forest, and Boneyard Ridge each spoke to how they implement forest management of their reflecting around water quality and habitat protection intentions.
Alex Jeffers with Whatcom Land Trust/ Stewart Mountain Spoke from 2:54:45 - 3:06:05 in the meeting recording
Erin McKay with Chelan DNR/ Nason Ridge CF spoke from 3:06:10 - 3:19:56
Morgan deMoll with North Coast Land Conservancy/ Boneyard Ridge spoke from 3:20:00 - 3:28:56 in the meeting recording.
View the full meeting recording in the link below.
The Coalition Visited Eagle Creek Community Forest - Read about the visit and learn about some of the goals for the property moving forward below.
Photo: Clackamas County SWCD Staff introducing highlighting forest management practices taking place on the ECCF property.
A blog post post covering the visit to the Eagle Creek Community Forest is available at the link below!
Save the Date for NWCFC Forum!
Taking place May 7 - 9, 2024, NWCFC will be visiting Enterprise, Oregon and Wallowa East Moraine.
More details to come in the coming months.