Irrigation Leader November/December 2019 by Water Strategies

VOLUME 10 ISSUE 10

november/december 2019

Wendy Christensen of the Bureau of Reclamation: Working Together on the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

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CONTENTS NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2019 Volume 10 Issue 10

Reclamation’s Role in Developing the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

5 T he Impressive Yakima Basin Integrated Plan By Kris Polly 6 R eclamation’s Role in Developing the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan 12 T he Power of Coordination: Senator Judy Warnick on the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan 16 Staying at the Table: Representative Bruce Chandler on the History of the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan 22 C ory Wright: Ensuring Water for Kittitas County

26 T he Yakima Basin Integrated Plan as Seen From Kennewick Irrigation District By Dean Dennis THE INNOVATORS 30 W hooshh’s Innovative Fish

Passage Solution—Save Water, Save Fish

32 D eveloping WeedResistant Concrete 34 I mproving Fish Passage With the Flexi Baffle WOMEN IN WATER 36 A llison Britain, Inaugural Recipient of the Women in Water Scholarship

38 CLASSIFIEDS

Do you have a story idea for an upcoming issue? Contact our editor-in-chief, Kris Polly, at kris.polly@waterstrategies.com.

4 | IRRIGATION LEADER

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STAFF: Kris Polly, Editor-in-Chief Joshua Dill, Managing Editor Tyler Young, Writer Stephanie Biddle, Graphic Designer Eliza Moreno, Web Designer SUBMISSIONS: Irrigation Leader welcomes manuscript, photography, and art submissions. However, the right to edit or deny publishing submissions is reserved. Submissions are returned only upon request. For more information, please contact our office at (202) 698-0690 or irrigation.leader@waterstrategies.com. ADVERTISING: Irrigation Leader accepts one-quarter, half-page, and full-page ads. For more information on rates and placement, please contact Kris Polly at (703) 517-3962 or irrigation.leader@waterstrategies.com. CIRCULATION: Irrigation Leader is distributed to irrigation district managers and boards of directors in the 17 western states, Bureau of Reclamation officials, members of Congress and committee staff, and advertising sponsors. For address corrections or additions, please contact our managing editor, Joshua Dill, at joshua.dill@waterstrategies.com. Copyright © 2019 Water Strategies LLC. Irrigation Leader relies on the excellent contributions of a variety of natural resources professionals who provide content for the magazine. However, the views and opinions expressed by these contributors are solely those of the original contributor and do not necessarily represent or reflect the policies or positions of Irrigation Leader magazine, its editors, or Water Strategies LLC. The acceptance and use of advertisements in Irrigation Leader do not constitute a representation or warranty by Water Strategies LLC or Irrigation Leader magazine regarding the products, services, claims, or companies advertised. /IrrigationLeader

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COVER PHOTO:

Wendy Christensen, Bureau of Reclamation YRBWEP Manager. Photo courtesy of Dan Church.

PHOTO COURTESY OF DAN CHURCH.

Coming soon in Irrigation Leader: January: The Managers Issue February: Water/Electric Consolidation

Irrigation Leader is published 10 times a year with combined issues for July/August and November/December by

The Impressive Yakima Basin Integrated Plan By Kris Polly

he Yakima Basin Integrated Plan (YBIP) is an impressive feat of coordination and cooperation. Its basic aim is simple—to guarantee enough water for people, fish, and agriculture—but behind that simple summary there are many parties, many interests, and a lot of history. With the leadership of the Bureau of Reclamation and the Washington Department of Ecology and the support and input of the Washington State Legislature, the counties of central Washington, the irrigation districts and irrigated farmers of the Yakima basin, Native American tribes, and environmental and citizen groups, the YBIP has moved forward and now promises to ensure the future of the Yakima basin for generations to come. In our cover interview, Wendy Christensen, Reclamation’s Yakima River Basin Water Enhancement Project coordinator, explains the history of Reclamation’s work on the YBIP and highlights the importance of the stakeholders’ workgroup that, for the last 10 years, has provided input and feedback on the YBIP plans. We also speak with Senator Judy Warnick and Representative Bruce Chandler of the Washington State legislature, whose extensive experience with central Washington water issues has helped bring the YBIP where it is today. Cory Wright, commissioner of Kittitas County, and Dean Dennis, president of Kennewick Irrigation District’s

board of directors, provide local-level viewpoints on their support for the development and implementation of the YBIP. In our Innovators section, we highlight Whooshh Innovations’s fish passage technology, which can send fish through a tube over a dam in seconds using pneumatic pressure—a solution so ingenious that videos of it went viral on the Internet earlier this year. Craig Gyselinck of QuincyColumbia Basin Irrigation District has embarked on a project to develop weed-resistant concrete. Finally, we speak with Shane Scott, whose company sells the Flexi Baffle, an easily installed product that turns any culvert into a fish ladder. We also interview Allison Britain, the inaugural recipient of the Women in Water scholarship, about her passion for water law. There are many interests and parties in the Yakima basin, and like all neighbors, they sometimes have conflicts. Yet through patient cooperation and a willingness to collaborate, they have created something admirable and impressive. It is an accomplishment we can all look up to. IL Kris Polly is editor-in-chief of Irrigation Leader magazine and president of Water Strategies LLC, a government relations firm he began in February 2009 for the purpose of representing and guiding water, power, and agricultural entities in their dealings with Congress, the Bureau of Reclamation, and other federal government agencies. He may be contacted at kris.polly@waterstrategies.com.

Is your irrigation district hiring? Irrigation Leader magazine runs job listings for irrigation districts, free of charge, on our website and in print. To see a full list of current openings, visit http://irrigationleadermagazine.com/job-board/. To submit an ad, please email Irrigation Leader Managing Editor Joshua Dill at joshua.dill@waterstrategies.com.

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Reclamation’s Role in Developing the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

Radial Gates at the Cle Elum dam.

Kris Polly: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position. Wendy Christensen: I’ve worked for Reclamation for 29 years. I began at the Technical Service Center in

6 | IRRIGATION LEADER

Denver, Colorado, and worked there for about a year in an engineering rotation program that had a field detail in Yakima, Washington. I really enjoyed being out in the field, seeing where water gets delivered and how everything works. A lot of construction was going on at the time. I spent 17 years at the Umatilla-Yakima construction office in Yakima, Washington, and was primarily involved in working on design and construction management. When the Umatilla-Yakima construction office was moved to the Pacific Northwest Regional Office in Boise, Idaho, I was asked to transfer to the Upper Columbia Area Office in Yakima, where I started working on large water resource planning studies under the former area manager, Jerry Kelso. We were working on a Yakima basin storage feasibility study with the Washington State Department of Ecology, where I met Derek Sandison. The storage feasibility study focused on water storage and delivery alternatives for Yakima Project irrigators. I credit Jerry and Derek for convening the YRBWEP Workgroup. Several others, including Ron Van Gundy of Roza Irrigation District and Phil Ridgon of the Yakama Nation, also had a hand in making it work.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE BUREAU OF RECLAMATION.

s the federal agency responsible for the Yakima and Columbia Basin irrigation projects in central Washington State, the Bureau of Reclamation plays a key role in implementing the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan (YBIP). For decades, Reclamation has been seeking ways to increase water supplies and storage in the basin. Since 2009, Reclamation has participated in bringing together a diverse group of stakeholders, including state and federal agencies, irrigation districts, the Yakama Nation, and environmental groups, to collaborate on the congressionally authorized Yakima River Basin Water Enhancement Project (YRBWEP). In this interview, Wendy Christensen, Reclamation’s YRBWEP manager, speaks with Irrigation Leader Editorin-Chief Kris Polly about Reclamation’s role in developing and implementing the YBIP.

Kris Polly: What was the role of Reclamation in conceiving of and developing the YBIP? Wendy Christensen: Significant droughts that began in the late 1970s were the impetus for the YRBWEP. It had become apparent that a solution to the water shortage problem would require a comprehensive basinwide plan, not just additional storage. Kris Polly: What is unique about the role of Reclamation as a federal agency in developing and implementing the YBIP? Wendy Christensen: The Yakima Field Office manages the Yakima Project, including water storage and management activities. The YBIP emerged from collaboration between Reclamation and Ecology that focused primarily on ecosystem restoration that could also provide potential solutions to irrigation water supply. At a time when Ecology and Reclamation were working on large water resource projects, we began to understand the need to develop a comprehensive water plan for the future. Since 1945, when a judge ruled that irrigation districts that were built as part of the Yakima Project would get a proratable share of their water supply, we’ve been looking for additional storage. Reclamation manages 1 million acre-feet of storage, supplies 2.3 million acre-feet through efficiencies, and also draws from the snowpack that we call our sixth reservoir. Still, in a drought year, we are unable to meet everyone’s needs. The planning activities that began in YRBWEP Phases I and II eventually evolved into the YBIP, also known as YRBWEP Phase III. When the workgroup was assembled, Reclamation and Ecology invited the entities and water resource managers most affected by drought-year supplies: the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, federal, state and local government agencies, irrigation districts, and environmental groups.

Wendy Christensen: Not necessarily. The John Dingell Jr. Conservation, Management and Recreation Act passed in March 2019 authorized participating proratable irrigation entities in the Yakima River basin to finance, construct, operate, and maintain the Kachess Drought Relief Pumping Plant. We are currently working with Roza Irrigation District, the Wapato Irrigation Project, Kennewick Irrigation District, and Kittitas Reclamation District—the proratable entities—to determine what that storage would look like, but the pumping plant would not be owned by Reclamation. Kris Polly: Is Reclamation the main source of funding for the plan as a whole? Wendy Christensen: I would say that Ecology is the main funding source. State legislation passed in 2013 stated that the State of Washington would fund 50 percent of the YBIP and the remaining 50 percent would be funded by federal, local, and private entities. The state has contributed more than $200 million to date. Reclamation has contributed approximately $150 million, which has been used for the Cle Elum Fish Passage and Reintroduction Project and ongoing YRBWEP Phase II activities, such as habitat restoration, tributary enhancement, and water conservation. Kris Polly: What is needed to make the YBIP a success?

Kris Polly: Would you say that Reclamation guides the cooperation of the other stakeholders? Wendy Christensen: Reclamation is the lead entity for the federal government, and Ecology is the lead entity for the State of Washington. We combine our roles as sponsors of the YBIP to facilitate the workgroup and define what can be done through the YRBWEP legislation. The workgroup provides an opportunity for Reclamation and Ecology to better educate the affected interests on engineering, economic, environmental, and legal factors that influence our decisions on comprehensive solutions as they are identified. Many of these workgroup entities, by virtue of their mission, are already immersed in activities associated with implementing the YBIP. Kris Polly: Would Reclamation be the entity to oversee any new storage infrastructure?

Participants at a YRBWEP workgroup session.

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The Lake Kachess reservoir under drought conditions in 2015.

A sockeye salmon.

Phil Rigdon, the superintendent of the Yakama Nation Department of Natural Resources, speaks at a YRBWEP workgroup meeting.

Wendy Christensen: Adequate funding is important, as is continued basinwide support. This plan is based on the relationships that we’ve developed over the last 10 years. I’ve always been amazed by this workgroup. We really have great participation.

in the Yakima River basin. The hope is that fish species will recover to the point that they are self-sustaining.

Kris Polly: How long has the group been meeting?

Wendy Christensen: For a comprehensive ecosystem restoration project, it is important to stay focused and avoid the trap of starting over on projects that have already been studied. It is also important that all necessary interested parties are involved in a cooperative, idea-sharing structure that stays well informed about the engineering, economic, and social realities of complex projects. It’s also important that the people representing the various interests are committed to solving the issues. What is needed is an effective way to educate participants to become knowledgeable about the issues and then keep them involved by building relationships and making sustained progress on projects. Success breeds success. IL

Wendy Christensen: We just celebrated our 10-year anniversary. Our first meeting was in June 2009. Kris Polly: What kind of official status does the workgroup have?

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Wendy Christensen is the Yakima River Basin Water Enhancement Project manager for the Bureau of Reclamation. She can be contacted at gchristensen@usbr.gov. For more information on the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan, visit www.usbr.gov/pn/programs/ yrbwep/2011integratedplan/index.html.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE BUREAU OF RECLAMATION AND DAN CHURCH.

Wendy Christensen: It’s a grassroots workgroup. Reclamation and Ecology do things like prepare environmental impact statements, engineering designs, and technical reports, but we get feedback and input from the workgroup. Over the years, we’ve built up trust and have worked in a spirit of collaboration and coordination. There are many projects being implemented in the Yakima River basin because this workgroup has come together and stayed together. About 33 habitat projects and 24 agricultural conservation projects have been implemented since 2013. That is significant, because before the YBIP, only a few projects were getting done. One of the purposes of the new legislation is to have self-sustaining, harvestable populations of fisheries

Kris Polly: What lessons has Reclamation learned from this process that can be applied to future projects in other regions?

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The Power of Coordination: Senator Judy Warnick on the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

Lake Cle Elum.

he simplest way to describe the aims of the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan (YBIP) is to say that it ensures water for people, fish, and agriculture. However, the means it employs to pursue that goal are diverse. They include dam improvements, water conveyance, and even the preservation of tracts of land for conservation and recreation, like the Teanaway Community Forest. In this interview, Washington State Senator Judy Warnick tells Irrigation Leader Managing Editor Joshua Dill about her role in developing the YBIP and how she sees it making a difference in her central Washington district. Joshua Dill: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position.

12 | IRRIGATION LEADER

in our district. Because of my background in farming and because my district is primarily dependent on agriculture, I asked to serve on the agricultural committee. I have been in either the House or Senate agriculture committees my entire term. Joshua Dill: Where is your district, and how is it affected by the YBIP? Judy Warnick: My district starts in Kittitas County, at the top of the Cascade Mountains, the range that bisects our state, and goes all the way across to Spokane County. It’s a long district that covers two full counties and parts of two more counties and three congressional districts. Lincoln County, in the east of my district, has little irrigation at this point. We are working through another major program, the Columbia Basin Project, to get surface water for the farmers there. Right now, they rely on wells that are depleting the Odessa aquifer. We’re working to find money to get surface water from the Columbia River to them. There’s enough water in the Columbia River for more to be taken out without harming existing users, wildlife, or fish. Kittitas County, in the west of my district, contains the headwaters of the Yakima River. That’s why I got involved in the YBIP—to protect the river and keep irrigation in the Yakima basin viable. About a year after I was elected, in 2007–2008 the Washington State Department of Ecology imposed a moratorium on drilling-permit-exempt domestic wells in the Kittitas County area because of the lack of water. It’s been a difficult few years for finding solutions for water for domestic wells, irrigation, and fish. Joshua Dill: What was your role in developing and passing the YBIP?

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ABHINABA BASU AND ROBERT ASHWORTH.

Judy Warnick: I grew up on a dairy farm with 55 milking cows, which was an average size for the time. Northeast Washington, where I grew up, had no irrigation of any real significance. It wasn’t until I got married and moved to the Columbia basin that I learned about how important irrigation was. The agricultural land in the Columbia basin is dependent on water because it was developed out of sage brush. In fact, the farm that my husband and I now live on and farm or lease out was sage brush when my in-laws bought it back in the 1960s. I never thought I would be in the Washington State Senate. When I was a teenager, I met U.S. Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson. I was very impressed with him. I realized that he was just a regular person who made a big difference in Washington State with his work in the United States Senate. Later on, I was very involved in trade associations, farm associations, 4H, the Future Farmers of America, and business associations. I took a chance and ran for office in 2006 and was elected to the Washington State House of Representatives. I spent 8 years there before running for a position in the Washington State Senate that had opened

Lake Keechelus, seen from the Iron Horse Trail.

Judy Warnick: When I was serving on the Capital Budget Committee in the House, I was the committee’s ranking member, representing the Republican caucus, and I worked closely with other stakeholders on the YBIP. The Capital Budget Committee was asked to fund some of the projects and infrastructure for the YBIP. What impressed me the most and made me interested in making the plan work was the variety of people who came and presented the application for funds to the Capital Budget Committee. There were representatives of the tribes, representatives of the irrigation districts, representatives of local governments, farmers, people from the American Rivers Association, and conservationists and environmentalists. I was impressed by their willingness to sit down and speak with people from a wide variety of backgrounds who represented a wide variety of interests. Urban Eberhardt, who was one of the key people who made the plan work, told me, “We were able to bring people together who wouldn’t even talk to each other at the beginning of this process. Now we feel comfortable sitting down and having a beer with each other.” That brought me some real hope as a representative from the upper Yakima basin. In conjunction with the tribes and the federal government, we’ve been able to get more fish introduced to some of the lakes and headwaters of the Yakima basin, which include Lake Cle Elum, Lake Keechelus, and Lake Kachess. The small dam at Lake Cle Elum has been changed and upgraded. Salmon have been introduced to the lake, and the dam has been reengineered so that fish can both get out of the lake and get back up again to spawn. That was done in conjunction with the Yakama Nation and other tribes farther north. It’s been enlightening to see what coordination can do, how it can help people and fish, and how people can get together and coordinate to do things that they couldn’t do by themselves.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE OFFICE OF JUDY WARNICK.

Joshua Dill: What can you tell me about the development of public awareness and support for the YBIP? Judy Warnick: It took many years to plan the YBIP. It was not done in one budget session. It took time for the organizations to get together and talk to each other to coordinate the implementation of the plan, even before requesting funding from the legislature. Public awareness of the YBIP increased when the legislature held meetings and tours to study it, especially during its first year of public funding. The public also became more aware of the YBIP as more public land became available for recreational use and forest conservation. Public awareness was heightened especially by the establishment of the Teanaway Community Forest because it was a tangible project that benefited people directly. The community forest was developed on a large tract of land that had been selectively logged. The timber company that owned the property wanted to sell it because it would not be able to harvest more timber in the near future. The company’s plan was to sell parcels for housing development. However, we worked with environmentalists and recreationists to find a way for the state to use YBIP funds to purchase it for other uses. That

property is now called the Teanaway Community Forest. It is the first community forest that Washington State has developed. It’s been turned into a recreation area that people can use for a variety of purposes; there are also still grazing opportunities for cattle there. There is even a pack of wolves in the more remote sections of the forest. The Teanaway area contains much of the headwaters of the Yakima River. It is comanaged by the Washington State Department of Natural Resources and the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife. Joshua Dill: What is necessary now to make sure that the YBIP is a success? Judy Warnick: I’m hoping that we can continue to help the federal government understand the need for it to do its part, especially with infrastructure for irrigation systems. Our farmers do a great job and our districts do a great job in helping to support those particular systems. Roza Irrigation District is the main district at the headwaters of the Yakima River and covers Yakima County. We have to continue to work with the irrigation districts, farmers, and developers to address potential changes in water needs and uses. In the legislature, we look at the at the budget every year through Ecology’s budget asks. It is funded and overseen through Ecology’s Office of Columbia River because the Yakima flows into the Columbia. Joshua Dill: What lessons has the legislature learned from the YBIP that can be applied to water issues elsewhere in the state? Judy Warnick: I hope we have learned that working together is much easier than trying to do it individually. We have a strong tribal interest in this state. The members of Indian tribes are active politically, and at least two of our elected officials—a senator and a member of the House—are tribal members. We need to be able to talk to them, and we need to do it outside of the courtroom. I use the YBIP as an example of what to do. Through it, we have successfully developed good programs for all the different interests in the basin. My advice would be to sit down, take your time, do it right, and talk to the legislators and the governor’s office about the budget. I really think the YBIP has been a success, but we need to keep its goals in mind because we don’t want to see it changed or not funded. It will take a while for all the projects to occur. Things like the Teanaway Community Forest will take a while to make it on their own. Hopefully, most of the projects we’ve been funding will be successful as well. IL

Judy Warnick is a Washington State senator. She can be contacted at judy.warnick@leg.wa.gov or at (360) 786-7624.

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Staying at the Table: Representative Bruce Chandler on the History of the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

The Yakima River near Union Gap, Washington.

ashington State Representative Bruce Chandler, whose 15th district is located in Yakima County, has extensive experience working with the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan (YBIP). He supported the passage of the 2013 bill that set the stage for the plan as it exists today. In this interview with Irrigation Leader Managing Editor Joshua Dill, Representative Chandler discusses the origin and development of the YBIP, its current status, and how the state legislature can help make it a success. Joshua Dill: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position.

16 | IRRIGATION LEADER

Joshua Dill: What were the main legislative landmarks that brought the YBIP to its current state? Bruce Chandler: For the most part, the YBIP came out of litigation and objections, primarily from the Yakama Nation, regarding water for fish. There is a federal court case on the topic. The YBIP was an attempt to respond to those issues. I don’t think that anyone in the county or the basin really believed that it was going to work out. One of the things that did help it move forward was that the legislature, just a couple of years before, had managed to come to an agreement authorizing the support of a work group developing a plan for the Walla Walla basin in the southeastern corner of Washington State. That actually has had similar constituencies, but on much smaller scale. That success encouraged the people involved with the Yakima basin. I think it helped inspire a resolution that seriously addressed each party’s highest concerns.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE OFFICE OF BRUCE CHANDLER.

Bruce Chandler: I was hired as a laborer in an orchard up in Chelan County in north-central Washington in 1978–79. Since then, I’ve been in the fruit business. I had been living in the Puget Sound region, so it was quite a change. Over the years, I worked for several different orchards and became a manager of several orchards in north-central Washington. I submitted a bid to an orchard in Yakima County that had been defaulted back to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. For some reason, I was the only one who submitted a bid, so I got the orchard. That kept me nervous for years afterward! I’ve been in the fruit business for about 36 years. It’s been a great life and has been really good for my family. As my time in the

industry continued, it was only natural that I start paying more attention to politics and government and how they affect agriculture. Some people that I respected encouraged me to run when Jim Honeyford decided to move to the Washington State Senate. I was persuaded to go on the ballot and ended up being elected to the state legislature. Now I’ve been there for 21 years.

Hops under cultivation near Union Gap, Washington.

Joshua Dill: What was the process by which the plan was passed? Was there broad agreement about the content of the plan, or was there conflict? Bruce Chandler: I believe that it was passed by the legislature by a wide margin. It had gone through extensive hearings after the plan had been agreed upon, and all the people who had negotiated it had signed on to it. The fact that both the Yakama Nation and the agricultural groups endorsed it was fundamental for its getting through the legislature. It was expected that there would be a standoff forever. I appreciate the courage of everyone who has been willing to hang in there and get this concluded. Joshua Dill: What is the current status of the YBIP? Bruce Chandler: A lot of progress has been made. One thing that has not been addressed yet is the plan’s call for additional water storage. People are anxiously waiting to see if that will happen. The irrigators in particular felt that that was a key part of the plan. That is the last remaining component to make progress on. Now the question is exactly where that water storage is located and how it’s going to be allocated. Joshua Dill: Would legislative action be necessary for the construction of that storage to move forward? Bruce Chandler: I think the state will have to support it. The Yakima basin is a federal basin governed by the Bureau of Reclamation, so there’s always got to be a partnership among the federal government, the state government, and local governments and the Yakama Nation. The real challenge is finding the place to put the water and making it accessible for different interests. Joshua Dill: What is necessary now on the part of the state legislature to make sure that the plan is a success?

Hyatt Vineyards, near Zillah, Washington.

Bruce Chandler: Probably the most constructive thing it can do is encourage people to stay at the table and encourage constituents to keep faith in the process. If those two things occur, we will be able to find a solution. It may not be perfect, but at least it’ll be one that works. Joshua Dill: What will be the effects of the YBIP on your district? Bruce Chandler: I think it will make the management of water and the movement of water from one part of the basin to another more efficient and more predictable. The most important thing for both cities and municipalities and for agriculture is to be able to have confidence that water is going to be there in the future. Joshua Dill: What is your vision for the future? Bruce Chandler: This basin is one of the best agricultural production regions in the country, and I anticipate that it will continue to be so. People are continuing to come and start new lives in this area. It is an open question how much land continues to be used for agriculture, but that can’t happen unless there is water available. Water is necessary to ensure that agriculture can continue to be an important part not just of the economy but of the way of life of communities in the Yakima basin. IL

Bruce Chandler is a member of the Washington State House of Representatives. He can be contacted at bruce.chandler@leg.wa.gov.

IRRIGATIONLEADERMAGAZINE.COM

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A m e r i c a ’ s V e g e t a t i o n M a n a g e m e n t S p e c i a l i s t s SM

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Cory Wright: Ensuring Water for Kittitas County

22 | IRRIGATION LEADER

Joshua Dill: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position. Cory Wright: I am the sixth generation of my family to live in the Kittitas Valley. We were some of the original settlers. My great-grandfather played a major role in Washington, DC, in building the Kittitas Reclamation District back in the 1920s and 1930s. I graduated from Ellensburg High School and Central Washington University, but I had always had the desire to go to sea and work in the maritime industry. I enrolled in California Maritime Academy in Vallejo, California, and had a 20-year career in the maritime industry, which took me all over the world. Eventually, my

PHOTO COURTESY OF KITTITAS COUNTY.

ittitas County in central Washington contains many of the headwaters of the Yakima River, as well as three of the basin’s five major water storage facilities. As in the rest of the basin, Kittitas County’s main water issues relate to providing sufficient water for crops, people, and fish. By promoting water marketing, funding water storage infrastructure, and establishing the Teanaway Community Forest, the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan ( YBIP) is helping solve that problem. In this interview, Kittitas County Commissioner Cory Wright speaks with Irrigation Leader Managing Editor Joshua Dill about the county’s role in planning, funding, and implementing the YBIP.

family and I moved back to Kittitas County in 2012. My wife and I both have family in Ellensburg. I was driving back and forth to Seattle, but my heart was always here, and in 2018, when my predecessor Paul Jewell resigned for a job with the Washington State Association of Counties, I went for the appointment and got it. I am now a county commissioner for Kittitas County and was assigned the water duties that Paul had previously executed. He was instrumental in putting together the YBIP. I had big shoes to fill and had to get up to speed quickly, but it’s been a great experience and I’ve tried to contribute as much as I can in as short a time as possible. Joshua Dill: Please tell us about the county and its top water issues. Cory Wright: The county is at the headwaters of the Yakima River and contains three of the five major storage facilities for irrigation in the basin. Historically, snowpack has been considered the sixth storage facility. Our major issues are simply trying to provide enough water and making sure that a basin that is already overallocated has enough water for both irrigating crops and ensuring that there is enough in-stream flow for fish to survive. We’ve also had to be the state’s leader in managing groundwater pumping versus surface water rights. In Washington State, we have permitexempt wells. For many years, our residents established wells and were able to pump water out for domestic use. However, in the late 2000s, a suit was brought against the county because the wells were affecting surface water. In response, we not only created a water bank, which the county did by purchasing surface water rights to offset groundwater use, but were also an early player in the development of the YBIP. We are making sure that we have enough storage to fulfill all the needs of our agricultural and recreational users and provide for the historic uses of the Yakama Nation for the purposes of fish restoration. Joshua Dill: How will the YBIP address some of the water issues that your county has? Cory Wright: First off, the building of new storage is a gigantic part of the YBIP. We are at the headwaters of the Yakima, where the storage lies. By expanding storage facilities, we are addressing the agricultural needs of the next century as well as adapting to forecasted changes in winter precipitation from snow to rain. Another element of the YBIP is water marketing. Water is valued based on its place and its time. We need an agile water market that can adjust to the needs of users. This year, for the first time, we used our forward-mitigation water bank, which refers the surface water rights purchased by the county to offset domestic development over the next 20–40 years. We recognized that this water, while currently not needed on a permanent basis, could be leased out for

a single year to provide emergency relief to growers at the end of the season while providing revenue that will be used by our water bank program to purchase additional surface water rights. We held an auction for blocks of water and sold multiple units to local growers. This year is the first time that’s ever been done, and it was successful. The Washington State Department of Ecology was very excited about it. It was a sort of test run, and we learned a lot of lessons. Instead of creating a long, drawn-out process that takes so long that at the end the user no longer needs the water, we wanted to make sure that we could get this done ahead of time. We’re doing a lot of habitat restoration, and not only for fish and riparian-area renewal. We’re also purchasing floodplains along the river, which has both habitat and economic benefits. The county recently concluded an agreement to reroute the river to more of its natural state rather than fighting it. This purchase will also allow us to provide new areas for our major local agricultural food processor, Twin City Foods. Our local wastewater plant couldn’t handle the quantity of its wastewater effluent, so it has used it instead to irrigate a crop circle in this area and grow hay. We’re going to be able to expand that through this floodplain acquisition and bring corn production back to this local facility. Joshua Dill: Will any major water storage infrastructure projects be required in your county? Cory Wright: Yes, there are two that are ongoing right now. The first one is at Lake Cle Elum, where they’re putting in the largest fish helix structure in the nation. It’s a $100 million project. They’ve also raised the gates there to expand the lake by 14,400 acre-feet. That water is going to be purely be for in-stream flow for fish. That plan has been in place for quite a while. That project has the potential to produce an annual run of several hundred thousand sockeye salmon, which would be amazing for our upper-county economy. As far as agricultural storage farther up on Lake Kachess, we are in the process of preparing for the building of the Kachess Drought Relief Pumping Plant, which is going to provide our junior prorated districts access to previously unavailable water by pumping it below the dam during drought years. It’s important to note that this water will be for emergency use only. During a drought year, those districts will only get enough water from this project to bring them up to 70 percent of their allocations. Further, because it’s going to have to be pumped, they’ll also have to pay for power, making it expensive water. There are environmental reviews going on right now, and the county’s interested in making sure that the effects on the residents up there are mitigated. This project is going to supply our needs for many years to come. Another project is the Wymer Reservoir, which will be brand-new storage located on currently private land in southern Kittitas County. The reservoir will be around IRRIGATIONLEADERMAGAZINE.COM

| 23

160,000 acre-feet. The original plan was to pump the water for the reservoir from the river, but there have been new ideas about how to tunnel to use gravity flow, which would obviously be more economical. The family that owns the land really wants to see it available for future storage, but it also wants to maintain a working cattle ranch around it. The family members are longtime ranchers here, so it’s important to ensure that we’re able to preserve their use while getting this important facility built. Joshua Dill: Where does the funding for infrastructure projects like the ones you mentioned come from? Do the county and the state share the costs? Cory Wright: The county hasn’t contributed much funding toward the major infrastructure projects, as we simply don’t have the budget, although we’ve been actively supporting them. The drought relief pumping plant is actually a publicprivate partnership, one of the first of its kind. Roza Irrigation District is footing the bill for it to ensure that its growers have water for their high-value crops, including cherries, apricots, and hops. It’s a several-billion-dollar industry. We have worked to leverage county funds to support smaller projects while building stakeholder groups for larger projects. For example, the floodplain acquisition mentioned earlier was partially funded with county money but also partially funded with YBIP funds as well as state Floodplains by Design funds. We’re an important part of the process: Not only do we help shore up support, but we are also an entity that can work with local landowners who may otherwise be skeptical of organizations from outside this area. The YBIP is built on trust and relationships. Another huge benefit of the YBIP for the county was the acquisition of the Teanaway Community Forest, which consists of 50,000 acres of formerly private timberland that was purchased by the state as part of the 2013 YBIP initial legislation authorization. The forest serves multiple missions, including the protection of riparian habitat, recreation, and active timber management. It is overseen by an advisory committee of local, state, and tribal entities. The Teanaway Community Forest has proved to be a great benefit to Kittitas County for recreational tourism, and we are looking forward to the future as new trail connections are made between it and our urban areas.

Cory Wright: I felt a little bit like the rookie quarterback winning the Super Bowl. I was part of the contingent that traveled to Washington, DC, last year and helped to close the deal with our congressional contingent to get the funding in place as part of the lands bill last year. My predecessor, Paul Jewell, traveled there multiple times and

24 | IRRIGATION LEADER

Joshua Dill: How did federal, state, and county-level entities work together to develop the YBIP? Cory Wright: From junior water districts to federal agencies, we all have a voice at the table and are working together to make sure that this plan moves forward. As in any family, there are internal squabbles, but those happen at the dinner table, not out in the front yard. What keeps this partnership so strong is that we all recognize the importance of preserving philosophical unity. If we bring our potential disagreements into the public light, it only serves to undermine the entire process. We’re good at working out our differences within our group in a constructive fashion. Joshua Dill: What is necessary now to make sure that the YBIP is a success? Cory Wright: We need to continue to show what it does on a local level, and not just for irrigation. A potential annual fishery of 300,000 sockeye salmon returning to the upper Yakima River represents a massive economic opportunity for our area. While all parties in this process are great friends, we are especially proud of our relationship with the Yakama Nation. It has become a great partner for Kittitas County. We both recognize that neither one of us can move forward without the success of the other. We’ve honored that commitment over the years, and so have they. The YBIP is not just about keeping crops watered; it enables recreational opportunities, and it ensures that places like Salmon La Sac, a point in the Cle Elum River named for the historic salmon harvest conducted there by the Yakama Nation, are now seeing returning fish spawning for the first time in over 100 years. We need to tell that story. Our story has to continue to be that we’re all winning as a result of our collaboration through the YBIP. IL

Cory Wright is commissioner of Kittitas County. He can be contacted at cory.wright@co.kittitas.wa.us.

PHOTO COURTESY OF KITTITAS COUNTY.

Joshua Dill: You mentioned that your predecessor did a lot of work in developing and passing the YBIP. Did you also play a role in that?

came back more than once wondering if this was going to get done or not. But slow, steady pressure, combined with demonstrating the unity between parties that had previously been locked in conflict, eventually won the day. It was an easy job for me to step in when people had been working so well together for so long. I have also traveled to our state capitol several times to work on getting continued state funding for this. Again, with the relationships that Paul Jewell built, it was simply a matter of me stepping into his shoes and making sure that people understood that I shared the same sentiments and the same hopes for the county that Paul did.

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The Yakima Basin Integrated Plan as Seen From Kennewick Irrigation District By Dean Dennis

The Yakima River Canyon.

Great things have been accomplished under the YBIP, benefitting fish, families, and farms across the entire Yakima River basin. Most of the habitat projects are focused on the upper tributaries and main stem of the river above this point, where most of the spawning and rearing habitat for anadromous fish species occurs. Improving ecological conditions and providing fish passage where needed in the watershed,

26 | IRRIGATION LEADER

especially those actions that benefit reintroduced sockeye salmon and Endangered Species Act–listed steelhead and bull trout, will benefit everyone in the basin and region. With much of YBIP focus on the upper Yakima River, KID has been a strong proponent of fish restoration and enhancement projects in the lower river. KID provided direct financial support to the YBIP Lower River Smolt Survival Study to the tune of $30,000 for seven receivers that were needed to track tagged outmigrating smolts. The KID board of directors unanimously supported this action because we knew that it is critically important to the success of the YBIP to obtain accurate information regarding smolt outmigration in the lower river. In addition, KID has sent representatives three times to meet with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Washington, DC, to successfully advocate for section 1135 funding for assessment and implementation of the Bateman Island causeway removal project. The Bateman Island project would remove part of the causeway that links Bateman Island to the mainland, allowing flows from the Yakima River and the Columbia River to circulate around the island, improving conditions for salmonids as they move in and out of the Yakima River. Cold-water refugia are places in the Yakima River that contain cooler water inputs from springs, drains, and seepages that migrating salmon use for thermal relief as they migrate up the river.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT.

he Kennewick Irrigation District (KID) serves over 65,000 agricultural and residential customers across 20,201 acres (11,000 of agricultural land) in central Washington’s Tri-Cities area near the confluence of the Yakima and Columbia Rivers. The increasing population and development of the area and the droughts that have affected it over the past few years, especially in 2015, mean that KID’s water supplies have been put under pressure. KID, like other local irrigation districts, has an interest in increased water efficiency, higher flows, and more storage, all of which the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan (YBIP) aims to deliver. After retiring from the Navy, Dean Dennis worked at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and was elected to KID’s board of directors in 2013. He has since served for 1 year as vice president and for 2 years in his current role as president. In this article, Mr. Dennis tell us about the significance of the YBIP for KID and Washington State as a whole.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ABHINABA BASU AND KID.

So, when it comes to supporting the YBIP, we walk the talk. KID has also been working with basin stakeholders to ensure that the district and the lower river are not negatively affected by YBIP implementation. Through the Yakima River Basin Water Enhancement Project Act (YRBWEP), as amended, the YBIP should “do no harm” to existing irrigation water supplies. Section 1205 of YRBWEP requires that increases in in-stream target flows “shall not further diminish the amount of water that otherwise would have been delivered by an entity to its water users in years of water proration.” Section 1208 obligates the Bureau of Reclamation to “ensure that the irrigation water supply for the KID shall not be negatively affected by conservation, electrification or water exchange, or subordination pursuant to this title” and to replace “any reduction in [KID’s] irrigation water supply resulting from conservation measures adopted or implemented by other entities pursuant” to the law. While it is unknown to what extent additional water conservation pursued under the YBIP will affect the lower river downstream of the Parker Gage, up-basin conservation activities over the past 10 years have already had a negative affect on the lower river and KID’s water supply. Detailed modeling of the lower river that has only recently been undertaken by Reclamation shows harm to the KID water supply from up-basin conservation projects, including those in the YBIP. KID strongly believes that the solution necessary to maintain our water supplies is the electrification of the hydraulic pumps at Chandler, which deliver most of KID’s water supply to its main canal. Since these pumps are driven by water, they are not efficient during low-water years. Electrification will have the dual benefit of greatly increasing the reliability of KID’s water supply while leaving some additional flow in the bypass reach of the lower Yakima River where it may help to alleviate water quality issues and provide some benefits to fish. The pumps are owned and operated by Reclamation, and Congress authorized the conversion of the pumps to electricity in the

YRBWEP. KID is currently working with Reclamation, the Washington State Department of Ecology, and the Yakama Nation on Chandler. KID is also considering whether to participate in the surface storage projects of the YBIP. Up to 450,000 acre-feet of new surface storage is proposed under the YBIP, with much of that quantity to be available for irrigation diversion during a drought. However, storage projects are expensive,

A road runs along the Yakima River.

and it is currently not known whether water released from storage will be readily available to KID for diversion. KID is working with Reclamation and Ecology to answer these important questions. There is much to celebrate with the implementation of the YBIP, but there are still complex issues to resolve that are critical to the realization of the plan. KID will continue to engage its partners on those issues and help to fulfill the promise of the YBIP. IL

Dean Dennis is the president of KID’s board of directors. For more information, contact info@kid.org.

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Whooshh’s Innovative Fish Passage How Emrgy Water, is Disrupting Solution—Save Save Fishthe

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ish passage requirements can pose a challenge to dam owners and operators, including irrigation districts. Traditional fish passage installations like fish ladders can require a significant amount of time and money to install. To solve this problem, Whooshh Innovations has created a portable, modular, and technologically advanced fish passage system that accelerates fish through a tube up and over a dam in seconds. Its more advanced models can also scan the fish that pass through them and record their size, species, and other characteristics. In this interview, Michael Messina, Whooshh Innovations’ director of market development and business affairs, speaks with Irrigation Leader Managing Editor Joshua Dill about Whooshh Innovations’ fish passage technology and how it stands to benefit irrigation districts, dam owners, and the natural world.

A fish is moved by pneumatic pressure through a soft, flexible tube.

company’s founder, Vince Bryan, wound up pivoting toward developing the technology for moving live fish safely and efficiently over barriers like dams and saving water in the process. Joshua Dill: What problems were Whooshh’s fish passage products introduced to solve?

Mike Messina: The company has its roots in agriculture, interestingly enough. The technology was first developed to mechanically and automatically harvest tree fruit without damaging it. There were a couple of aha moments that helped underscore the need for this technology. A few years back, Whooshh employees were testing the agricultural equipment in orchards in Washington State and saw helicopters flying overhead with buckets. When they asked what the helicopters were doing, they were told that they were moving fish over the dam. The Whooshh employees knew that there must be a better way. The other aha moment came when Whooshh employees visited a citrus orchard two summers in a row. During the second summer, everything was dying because the water had been redirected due to conservation requirements. Based on these and other factors, our

Mike Messina: It solves a trifecta of problems. From the water resources benefit, a fish ladder requires 5–10 percent of the water that moves down a river or canal. Our system uses very little water. That means there is 5–10 percent more water that can be put toward irrigation or hydropower. On the environmental front, if fish migrating upriver encounter a dam or similar barrier that does not have a fish passage method, they can’t get to their spawning ground. Fish ladders and trap-and-haul operations are alternate methods of fish passage, but they’re difficult and stressful. Each fish, on average, carries 3,500–4,500 eggs, and it can be exhausting for them to spend many hours going up a fish ladder. Our product, by contrast, moves them over the dam in a 10-second glide. The more fish you can move upriver, the more successful spawning takes place. Finally, our systems are more

30 | IRRIGATION LEADER

Joshua Dill: Would you give us a basic idea of how the product works? Mike Messina: Our more advanced systems are fully automated and do not require any personnel. When fish swim into them, they trigger a sensor and the system wakes up, much as a laptop wakes up when you touch the keyboard. The fish slides in and is scanned. In about half a second, 18 rapid-fire images of it are taken. Based on these images, the system makes quick measurements of the length and girth of the fish and makes a sorting decision based on the measurements. The fish is sorted into a specific lane and accelerated into a soft, flexible tube, which is made of proprietary material that is misted every

PHOTOS COURTESY OF WHOOSHH INNOVATIONS.

Joshua Dill: Tell us about Whooshh as a company.

affordable for operators. They are modular and portable and typically cost 60–80 percent less than a fish ladder or a trap-and-haul operation. They are easy to install, which saves time as well as money. In our generation, we’ve seen technology advance quickly, but the technology for moving fish over dams or barriers has remained stagnant. Fish ladders or trucks are still being used just as they were 60 years ago. The technology is here, and it’s time we apply it to this process in a way that will benefit the natural world.

THE INNOVATORS 5 feet. The fish is then gently moved by pneumatic pressure behind it. The device does not move a column of water, just a fish, so it’s a simple operation that doesn’t involve large quantities of water. Sensors along the system control the fish’s speed as it glides forward and is deposited out the other end. Our scanners can provide much more sophisticated fishery data than other existing systems. At some dams, there are still people sitting in chairs with clickers in their hands trying to count how many fish go by or trying to determine what kinds of fish they were based on what they see through a murky viewing window. By contrast, our system can give exact counts and clear images of the fish in your waterway. Just knowing what is in your waterway can be important from a regulatory perspective. The system can also make sorting decisions that go beyond size. It can cull out invasive species and distinguish hatchery fish from wild fish. Not all your readers will need such an advanced system. We have small, portable, hand-fed systems as well. Some of our more portable systems just have a trap at the bottom where a person can hand-feed fish into the system and send them up and over the dam. If a smaller irrigation district normally has to divert or alter water flow at a certain time when there’s a fish run, our small, portable systems can help move those fish safely without really affecting the district. Joshua Dill: How far do the fish travel to get over a dam? Mike Messina: It varies from situation to situation. The longest we’ve done has been about 1,700 feet at the Cle Elum Dam in the Yakima basin district. Our system there was 185 feet high and 1,700 feet long and moved sockeye salmon up and over into the reservoir. On a system that long, the fish move at up to 25 feet per second. They are accelerated and then decelerated as they approach the end so that they are deposited more gently on the other side. Joshua Dill: Who are your clients? Mike Messina: Mostly dam owners. Interestingly enough, we were just consulting with by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in Canada. A recent landslide across the Fraser River in British Columbia has blocked the path of salmon migrating upriver, and the department is trying to find ways to move the salmon past it. It is talking to us about taking our systems there and helping out. There are other applications as well: Hatcheries and broodstock operations are using our systems to gently move fish from one place to another across facilities. Joshua Dill: How do you find new clients? Mike Messina: We work with dam owners, partner organizations, regulatory agencies, and nongovernmental organizations—basically any group that can help us help

fish safely pass to their spawning grounds. Interestingly, there is significant interest in the European market. There is a European Commission regulation called the Water Framework Directive, which mandates the provision of connected waterways for migratory species and water connectivity for better river basin management. There are many dams in Europe, and if an owner with 10 dams in their district is forced to put a fish ladder on each one, it could cost millions of euros. Our technology is being looked at seriously by owners in several countries because it’s both more effective for fish and more cost effective for them. Here in Washington, a variety of entities are working on the Yakima Basin Integrated Water Management Plan. The estimate for installing fish ladders on four large dams on the Yakima River was about $60 million per dam. Whooshh could provide passage on all the dams for less than the cost of one fish ladder. We can also produce superior data, including images and measurements of every fish that goes through the system. Joshua Dill: Have you been able to measure the results of your system on fishery health in rivers? Mike Messina: Yes. About 20 different independent studies have been completed. One in particular compared the energetics of tagged fish that moved up a fish ladder versus those that went through the Whooshh system. The fish that went through the Whooshh system had far more energy and went much farther upriver. That’s good for prespawning mortality rates and for fisheries and their overall restoration. Joshua Dill: What is your message for our readers? Mike Messina: When dams come up for relicensing today, there are almost always requirements for fish passage. That can require a large capital outlay. Adding a fish ladder to a dam that doesn’t currently have one can cost millions of dollars and a year or more of civil work and construction. A Whooshh system can be installed in a month or so, and it’s adaptable. Once a concrete ladder is in, there it stays. In some instances, we can even find ways for the system to pay for itself as an operating expense. Another advantage that is key for your readership is the water savings. Our system does not require you to spill water for a fish ladder. It is a way to accommodate the environmental benefit of moving fish safely upriver without expending your water, which as any irrigation district knows, is a valuable resource. IL

Michael Messina is director of market development and business affairs at Whooshh Innovations. He can be contacted at mike.messina@whooshh.com or at (206) 947-0353. IRRIGATIONLEADERMAGAZINE.COM

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THE INNOVATORS

Developing Weed-Resistant Concrete applying these products. We also have to pay for all the safety equipment, the training, and the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permits from the State of Washington. There are a lot of costs involved in all that. Currently, we’re using Bureau of Reclamation programs such as WaterSMART to line a lot of unlined canals and to repair and replace our aging infrastructure. I came up with the idea of inventing a new kind of concrete that we can use to line and repair our canals to reduce the amount of pesticides that we use in our district. We want to create a product that is environmentally friendly and fiscally responsible that also fits into our system improvement program. A canal being lined with concrete in Quincy-Columbia Basin’s system.

ny irrigation district with open canals has to deal with weeds, algae, and moss. Removing these obstacles to water flow can be expensive, time-consuming, and environmentally hazardous. This is the problem that Craig Gyselinck, environmental assistant manager at Washington’s QuincyColumbia Basin Irrigation District, is seeking to solve with his research into weed-resistant concrete. In this interview, Mr. Gyselinck speaks with Irrigation Leader Managing Editor Joshua Dill about the research grant he recently received and what he aims to accomplish with it. Joshua Dill: Please tell us about your background and how you came to be in your current position.

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Craig Gyselinck: We’re located in central Washington. We serve water to a little over 255,000 acres of farmland. We have about 2,000 miles of flowing waterways, which include canals, laterals, drains, wasteways, and pipes. Joshua Dill: You recently received a grant to develop weed-resistant concrete. What is the problem that you are seeking to solve with this innovation? Craig Gyselinck: The majority of our waterways are open canals, not pipes, and we get quite a bit of weed, algae, and moss growth in them. Plants inside of canals take up capacity, meaning that they act like barriers to the water flowing downstream. That causes the water to stack up and rise in elevation. At our district, we spend around a million dollars a year in aquatic weed control using herbicides. Those are just the chemical costs. A lot of work goes into it, too. Our staff are out there

Craig Gyselinck: No. In this case, I reached out to Reclamation’s Technical Service Center in Denver, because I knew that it had some of the world’s experts on concrete—Reclamation has got a lot of canals and dams. I told them the idea, and they said that it sounded great, but that they’d need some money to work with me. I partnered with them and applied for a science and technology grant through Reclamation. We received a little over $200,000 to cover 3 years of research. I also reached out to partners including other irrigation districts and Reclamation offices and secured an additional $150,000, mostly in in-kind work, to help with this project. Joshua Dill: How would the weedresistant concrete work? Craig Gyselinck: There are a lot of unknowns at this point, but what we’re looking at is finding a product that we can incorporate into the mortar of the concrete. Perhaps we can put copper in the concrete when we mix it up. It might have some weed- and algae-resistant properties. The product could also fight

PHOTOS COURTESY OF CRAIG GYSELINCK.

Craig Gyselinck: I am the environmental assistant manager for the Quincy-Columbia Basin Irrigation District. I have a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and a master’s of business administration. I worked for about 3 years at a small environmental laboratory before moving on to a job as water quality manager at the irrigation district.

Joshua Dill: For those who might not know about it, would you give an overview of Quincy-Columbia Basin Irrigation District?

Joshua Dill: Was this grant also from the WaterSMART program?

THE INNOVATORS

Moss and algae in Quincy-Columbia Basin’s canals.

invasive species. We have some biologists on board, and they’re interested in how the work we’re doing might relate to quagga mussels. There’s a lot of research that needs to be done. Joshua Dill: You mentioned that this would be used to patch existing canals. Would it also be used to build new canals? Craig Gyselinck: That’s correct. It would be used to replace broken concrete panels in any of our water delivery structures. It would also be used to line new canals and to build and repair structures such as check gates and turnouts. Joshua Dill: Are there examples of similar technologies that have already proven successful? Craig Gyselinck: We just started this 3-year project, and the first task that we’re working on is a literature review. We’re trying to find out if there has been any work in this field already, but we’re not finding a lot specifically for this idea. There has been some work done with coatings that would be painted onto the surface of the concrete, but we’ve decided not to pursue that route, because the coatings that are available are incredibly expensive and don’t last for long periods of time, so they need constant upkeep and maintenance. Joshua Dill: How would you keep your product more affordable? Craig Gyselinck: The products that we’re looking at mixing into the concrete, such as copper and perhaps zinc, are cheap. The cost of adding them to the concrete would be minimal. The other big question is whether adding something to the concrete affects its structural soundness. Is it safe? Is it going to collapse or last 50 years? That’s where Reclamation’s Technical Service Center will come into play. It has the tools to do concrete analysis and testing. Joshua Dill: What work are you doing to make sure that the product is environmentally friendly?

Craig Gyselinck: The project will include an analysis of environmental impact. Leaching is something we specifically talked about when we designed this project. Overall, we are not concerned about that, because any small effect would be much smaller than that of the herbicides that are currently being used. Right now, we use about 60,000 pounds of copper every year in our irrigation canals to control aquatic weeds. If we find that copper is successful in this new product, it would be a significantly smaller amount than we are using in our weed programs now. Joshua Dill: What advice do you have for other agencies or districts that are looking to apply for grants? Craig Gyselinck: My advice for other agencies looking to apply for grants is to reach out and use the resources around them. There’s a lot of available funding that people don’t know about and that doesn’t really get taken advantage of. At Quincy, we have been incredibly successful in getting grants. I attribute that to developing sound partnerships and becoming aware of available grants and working with the staff of those grant-giving agencies to provide the materials necessary for a successful application. Before going into this project, I went out and got support from the Washington State Water Resources Association and the Oregon and Idaho Water Associations. I also got a lot of support from irrigation districts on the West Coast. I plan to present our findings as we develop them and to keep all those individuals and organizations informed as we go through this process. I don’t believe that this grant would have been as successful without all the support we received from our partners. IL

Craig Gyselinck is environmental assistant manager for the QuincyColumbia Basin Irrigation District. He can be contacted at cgyselinck@qcbid.org.

IRRIGATIONLEADERMAGAZINE.COM

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THE INNOVATORS

Improving Fish Passage With the Flexi Baffle

fforts to improve fish passage in ecosystems like the Yakima River basin typically focus on large dams that block fish in a particularly obvious way. However, thousands of culverts in the small tributaries that feed a river system can block salmon and other fish from their spawning grounds, too. One solution for this problem is the Flexi Baffle, a New Zealand–developed product that allows fish to pass through culverts without reducing the capacity of the culvert. In North America, the Flexi Baffle is supplied by S. Scott & Associates, LLC, a natural resource consulting firm. In this interview, Shane Scott, the owner of S. Scott & Associates, speaks with Irrigation Leader Editor-in-Chief Kris Polly about the advantages of the Flexi Baffle. Kris Polly: Please tell us about your background. Shane Scott: After college, I worked for a small engineering consulting firm in Port Orchard, Washington, that designed fish hatcheries and fish passage systems and conducted natural resource assessments. When I started working at Tacoma Power in 1994, I worked on utility-related natural resource issues, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission relicensing, and supporting the engineering staff. I also did a short stint at the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, where I worked in the director’s office, addressing Columbia River hydro policy issues. In 2003, I moved the family down to Vancouver, Washington, where I worked in a similar capacity for the Public Power Council, which is an association of public utilities that purchase power from the Bonneville Power Administration. In 2006, I started my own natural resource consulting business, S. Scott & Associates. I still work on an advisory basis with the Public Power Council and consult on other natural resource issues for utilities, irrigators, municipal water groups, and other water users. Our work has expanded into marketing, sales, and manufacturing in the last few years. Kris Polly: Please explain the significance of fish passage in culverts in Washington State.

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a bridge. However, that is often an expensive fix that requires engineering, construction, and permitting, and it takes a couple of years even on a good timeline. There’s just not enough time and money to replace all of them. Kris Polly: What is the engineering solution to that problem? Shane Scott: I met a manufacturer in New Zealand who developed a flexible weir that can be installed in a culvert to modify its hydrology to improve fish passage by creating a fish ladder inside the culvert. The flexibility of the weir is important. In the past, solid weirs were installed or retrofitted in culverts and bedrock, sticks, and logs would get caught in these weirs, blocking fish passage and maybe even blocking the water altogether and causing flooding. The Flexi Baffle, on the other hand, is made of a flexible polymer material that folds over in high water and allows water and debris to pass through. When the flow drops, the Flexi Baffle pops back up and forms the pools that create a fish ladder through the culvert. The Flexi Baffle preserves the hydraulic capacity of the culvert and improves habitat connectivity in a watershed, not only for fish but for other aquatic creatures such as amphibians, crustaceans, and insects. It is made of nontoxic materials and doesn’t create any environmentally harmful microplastic byproducts. Kris Polly: How is the Flexi Baffle physically connected to the culvert? Shane Scott: There are a couple of different ways to connect the Flexi Baffle to the culvert, depending on its composition. If you have a concrete culvert, you use a sleeve screw to attach

PHOTOS COURTESY OF S. SCOTT AND ASSOCIATES.

Shane Scott: A recent Supreme Court case requires the State of Washington to protect salmon habitat. Part of that involves improving fish passage at barriers, including road culverts. Habitat surveys found that there are over 7,000 culverts in Washington State that could present at least a partial barrier to fish passage. Similar surveys all over North America have identified tens of thousands of similar fish passage barriers. Culverts are typically sized to pass water under roads or driveways. Not a lot of thought is put into their role in fish passage. During high water events, the water velocity through culverts is often so high that it blocks fish from swimming upstream. During low water, there’s not enough water in the culvert for fish to swim upstream. The best way to fix the culvert is to replace it with another adequately sized culvert or

Water flows over a series of Flexi Baffles inside a culvert, creating a viable passage for fish.

THE INNOVATORS the baffle. You predrill a hole, put the sleeve bolt through the baffle, and then set it and tighten the bolts down. For metal, aluminum, or high-density polyethylene plastic culverts, you can use self-tapping screws to install the Flexi Baffle. If your culvert is in poor condition, you can actually mount the Flexi Baffles on a section of pipe, like a three-quarter section of pipe, and then install that in your culvert. You’ll secure that baffletype assembly to the more competent pipe section above the corrosion line. A good crew can outfit a large culvert in a couple of hours. The installation is really straightforward. Anyone who can use common hand tools can install the Flexi Baffle. Two people can install baffles in a 50-foot culvert in 2 hours. Kris Polly: How long have you been installing Flexi Baffles? Shane Scott: I became a licensee to the New Zealand company ATS Environmental for this product in 2019. We already have installations in New York, Oregon, Vermont, and British Columbia. In New Zealand, where Flexi Baffles were developed, ATS Environmental has been installing Flexi Baffles for about 10 years. It has about 1,000 installations, ranging from single baffles in small culverts to multiple-baffle systems in culverts up to a half-mile long. It has used the

Flexi Baffle to improve fish passage for a variety of species, including trout, eels, and even freshwater shrimp. Kris Polly: What is the process for installing a Flexi Baffle? Shane Scott: The first conversation would be about your conservation goals: What fish species or other aquatic organisms are you trying to conserve? We would collect the information on the physical characteristics of the culvert—its size, gradient, and composition—and develop a recommendation on Flexi Baffle size and spacing. Improving fish passage in a 50-foot culvert with the Flexi Baffle, depending on the size and gradient, would cost between $1,000 and $3,000. For labor, we estimate a team of two could install these Flexi Baffles in under 2 hours. IL

Shane Scott is the owner of S. Scott & Associates, LLC. He can be contacted at shane@sscottandassociates.com or at (360) 601-2391.

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| 35

WOMEN IN WATER

Allison Britain, Inaugural Recipient of the Women in Water Scholarship coming together as a community to help as many people as possible. In times of shortage, how is water allocated? What’s the fairest way to move forward? As I started to understand the ins and outs of that question, I found my passion and recognized it as one of the most pressing issues our society faces. Kris Polly: What did you learn about farmers and their interaction with the environment and water? Allison Britain with Women in Water Scholarship Fund board members Christine Arbogast, Cheryl Zittle, and Leslie James.

he newly established Women in Water Scholarship Fund aims to encourage young women to pursue careers in the water industry. It extends an annual scholarship of $5,000 to a young woman studying for a career in any field of water resources. In this interview, Allison Britain, the inaugural recipient of the Women in Water scholarship, speaks with Irrigation Leader Editor-inChief Kris Polly about what drew her into the water field and how the Women in Water scholarship will further her career in water. Kris Polly: Please tell us about your background. Allison Britain: I grew up in Issaquah, just outside of Seattle, Washington. I attended Penn State University and after graduating, returned back to Washington. I am now a thirdyear law student at Gonzaga University School of Law. Kris Polly: Why are you interested in water law?

36 | IRRIGATION LEADER

Kris Polly: Please tell us about the Women in Water Scholarship Fund and what it means to you to receive the award. Allison Britain: This summer, I was working at Halverson Northwest Law Group for Larry Martin, a prominent water law attorney in the Columbia basin. He pointed me to the Women in Water Scholarship Fund, and it immediately intrigued me. When I visited the website, I was encouraged to see female leaders in the exact field I was most interested in. I quickly read everyone’s bios and was inspired to see the different areas of water that these women are forging leadership paths in and to see how they came together to form a group to provide a voice for and to advocate for female leaders in the industry. I am honored to be the first recipient of the Women in Water scholarship. It helped significantly to pay off some of my student loans. Kris Polly: What is your philosophy on working on controversial water issues? Allison Britain: My personal philosophy is founded on collaboration. That’s the most fundamental part of how we move forward with solutions to water-related issues. Solutions to water issues can be win-win scenarios—it just takes creative strategizing and community participation. IL Allison Britain is a third-year law student at Gonzaga University. She can be contacted at abritain@lawschool.gonzaga.edu or (425) 802-9273.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF ALLISON BRITAIN.

Allison Britain: When I was a kid, my family moved to London for a couple of years. While I was there, there was a big push for environmental education. That was my first introduction to climate change. When we moved back to Washington, I started seeing that same environmental theme pop up in talk about conservation and the need for more water. That mindset fed into my Penn State education. I showed up at Penn State ready to save the world, but I realized how out of touch I was with agriculture, one of the biggest factors in any environment policy. Surrounded by an agricultural community unlike the community I grew up in, I quickly realized that I was out of place. I made it a mission to learn more about agriculture. I decided to major in a program called Community, Environment, and Development, which fell under the College of Agriculture. During summers, I came back to Washington and found the Snoqualmie Valley Preservation Alliance, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving the viability of the Snoqualmie Valley and helping farmers and other businesses in the area gain access to water. That’s when I really fell in love with water law. I found that the most important thing to people is access to resources and

Allison Britain: Farmers are the people most connected to our environment. They have a pressing need for water to grow the crops that sustain society, and they’re often overlooked by people who don’t have a connection to the farming environment. I think people can be out of touch with how our food gets to our grocery stores and where it comes from. Access to water is one of the biggest issues that farmers face in continuing production in the West.

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CLASSIFIEDS

Does your irrigation district have a job listing you would like to advertise in our pages? Irrigation Leader provides this service to irrigation districts free of charge.

E-MAIL: Kris Polly kris.polly@waterstrategies.com. KENNEWICK IRRIGATION DISTRICT: PUBLIC RELATIONS COORDINATOR Salary: $48,537 to $63,349 yearly range DESCRIPTION: Seeking a qualified person to fill an opening in the position of Public Relations Coordinator, to be responsible for planning, development, and implementing or social media and other media strategies; educational, promotional and media communications; webpage design and content; employee and public relations; and community outreach activities REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS: + Bachelor’s Degree in public relations, journalism, marketing, leadership, communications or related field + At least three years of experience in similar capacity PREFERRED: + Public relations or journalism experience + Experience working with leadership, constituents, and community TO APPLY VISIT: http://kid.org/employment/ TUALATIN VALLEY IRRIGATION DISTRICT: DISTRICT MANAGER Salary: Dependent on experience. DESCRIPTION: The Tualatin Valley Irrigation District (TVID) is seeking a District Manager. TVID is located in Forest Grove, Oregon, and serves approximately 350 customers and irrigates 17,000 acres in Washington County. A Reclamation project built in the late 70s, TVID operates Scoggins Dam and two pumping plants and maintains over 120 miles of buried pressurized pipeline ranging from 6” to 60”. There are currently 7 full time employees. QUALIFICATIONS: Applicants must have the experience, education, and management skills necessary to operate and maintain the district. FOR MORE INFORMATION: e-mail joe.rutledge@tvid.org. RUBICON: ACCOUNT MANAGER – CENTRAL VALLEY, CALIFORNIA Salary: Dependent on experience. Description: The role of account manager requires both sales of Rubicon solutions throughout the Central Valley of California and cooperation with management to execute sales strategy and new business development. Primary duties include: + Developing close customer relations and new accounts + Developing proposals to improve customers’ business performance in collaboration with Rubicon’s solutions engineering team + Developing and delivering project and equipment quotations + Strategic business development.

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QUALIFICATIONS: + Agricultural, engineering, or related technical degree (bachelor’s degree preferred) + Excellent interpersonal, verbal, and written communication skills + Technical skills and understanding of hydraulics and basic engineering and construction principles + Exceptional time-management, organizational, and relationship-building skills FOR MORE INFORMATION: e-mail alisa.newton@rubiconwater.com. ELEPHANT BUTTE IRRIGATION DISTRICT: PROJECT ENGINEER Salary: $23.00/hour DESCRIPTION: Will work under the supervision of the district engineer. Duties include: + Designing, developing, and overseeing system improvement projects + Assisting with the planning, field work, design and construction of a wide variety of projects + Providing technical support on all issues related to engineering planning, fieldwork, design, field applications, and construction QUALIFICATIONS: + A BS in civil engineering or engineering technologies and successful passage of the Fundamentals of Engineering exam + Ability to apply college-level mathematics such as algebra and trigonometric computations to standard surveying, design, and construction operations + Ability to use MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint, AutoCAD computer software; the ability to use survey-grade GPS and ArcView GIS or to quickly learn + Experience in irrigation or agricultural systems, public sector employment or consulting, knowledge of engineering land and surveying issues, the ability to read and interpret maps and legal documents, and language skills are all advantages FOR MORE INFORMATION: Visit ebid-nm.org/index.php/information/#hiring or e-mail Delyce Maciel at dmaciel@ebid-nm.org. KENNEWICK IRRIGATION DISTRICT: PROFESSIONAL LAND SURVEYOR Salary: $32.42 to $44.33/hour DESCRIPTION: Under the engineering/operations manager’s direction, the professional land surveyor plans, organizes, and performs various technical engineering surveying activities related to project design and construction; creates and reviews parcel and easement boundary legal descriptions; reviews canal easements, rights-of-way, and property segregation documents; performs measurement of geographical features technical duties; trains supporting staff and coordinates; and performs surveying work. QUALIFICATIONS: + Bachelor’s degree in surveying, engineering technology, or related field + Washington State Professional Land Surveyor license FOR MORE INFORMATION Visit kid.org/employment.

Upcoming Events November 4–8 USCID’s 2019 Conference, Reno, NV November 6–8 88th Annual Conference, NWRA, Houston, TX December 2 Annual Agribusiness Roundtable, Arizona BWC, Tempe, AZ December 4–6 Annual Conference, Washington State Water Resources Association, Spokane, WA December 11–13 Annual Conference, CRWUA, Las Vegas, NV December 13–14 2019 Winter Meeting, Western Governors Association, Las Vegas, NV January 25–30 Las Vegas to Phoenix Education and Trade Tour, Irrigation Leader January 29–30 Operations and Management Training Workshop, Irrigation Leader, Phoenix, AZ February 22–27 New Zealand Education and Trade Tour, Irrigation Leader

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Irrigation Leader November/December 2019

Articles inside

Allison Britain, Inaugural Recipient of the Women in Water Scholarship

Improving Fish Passage With the Flexi Baffle

Developing Weed-Resistant Concrete

Whooshh’s Innovative Fish Passage Solution—Save Water, Save Fish

The Yakima Basin Integrated Plan as Seen From Kennewick Irrigation District

Cory Wright: Ensuring Water for Kittitas County

Staying at the Table: Representative Bruce Chandler on the History of the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

The Power of Coordination: Senator Judy Warnick on the Yakima Basin Integrated PlanThe simplest way to describe the aims of the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan (YBIP) is to say that it ensures water for people, fish, and agriculture. However, the means it em

Reclamation’s Role in Developing the Yakima Basin Integrated Plan

The Impressive Yakima Basin Integrated Plan