OUTCOME OF STAGE 3 EAP MAINSTREAMING PROGRAM: “Now, with EAP as a foundation piece, local governments have a rationale and a metric to do business differently via multiple planning pathways to achieve target-based strategies for systematic restoration of streamside protection zones,” stated Kim Stephens, Executive Director, Partnership for Water Sustainability in British Columbia
Note to Reader:
The community expectation that stream systems will be maintained and managed is the impetus for local governments to include these natural commons in their asset management strategy. EAP provides an original way to analyze and present date from existing sources, In 2016, the Partnership for Water Sustainability in British Columbia embarked upon a 6-year program of applied research to evolve EAP through a 3-stage building blocks process of testing, refining, and mainstreaming the methodology and metrics. The story below describes the Stage 3 program.
Nineteen “Big Ideas” power EAP
“My experience is that master drainage planning, integrated stormwater and rainwater management planning, and other processes at best pay lip-service to the role of the streamside protection zone within a stream system context, the condition of native vegetation and woodlands cover, and the need for restoration,” stated Kim Stephens, Partnership Executive Director.
“Now, EAP provides the reason for anyone and everyone to ask a fundamental question, why aren’t these stream health factors considered and given equal weight to engineering considerations? The community expectation that these assets will be maintained and managed is the impetus for the reason for looking at asset management differently.”
“EAP provides local governments with the philosophy, methodology and metrics they need to make the financial case for stream systems. Maintenance and management (M&M) of stream systems can now be integrated into a Local Government Finance Strategy for sustainable infrastructure funding.”
“In 2016, the Partnership embarked upon a 6-year program of applied research to evolve EAP through a 3-stage building blocks process of testing, refining, and mainstreaming the methodology and metrics. The program involved 9 case studies and 13 local governments in five sub-regions of the Georgia Basin / Salish Sea Bioregion.”
To Learn More:
Stage 3 Mainstreaming showed how EAP fits into local government strategic directions
“When the Partnership embarked upon EAP Stage 3 in late 2019, there was no way for anyone to predict either how mainstreaming would unfold over a two-year period or who would be involved. The hope was that there would be sufficient interest for three case studies per year,” continues Kim Stephens.
“By mid-2020, five willing local governments had stepped up to become project partners, representing a consortium of four regional districts and six municipalities. Each identified local streams for analysis.
“With the perspective of hindsight, each local government took a leap of faith that EAP would fit into their strategic directions. There was no guaranteed outcome. There was simply a recognition by all of the need to just do it. The program as a whole and the individual EAP processes have exceeded expectations.”
“The sequencing of projects was fortuitous, resulting in insights which improved the research process. With the perspective of hindsight, each local government took a leap of faith that EAP would fit into their strategic directions. Every participating local government has benefitted from the building blocks approach to applied research.”
More than Asset Management
“A primary goal of the EAP program is to build support for the idea of operationalizing EAP within an Asset Management Strategy. This was the context for an initial Partnership objective in selecting case studies analyzing streams passing through a range of land use situations – from urban to suburban to rural – and in five South Coast regions,” explains Kim Stephens.”
“The unexpected outcome is the realization that local government has multiple pathways to achieve the goal of Natural Asset Management. These pathways are in the form of planning and environmental initiatives that are challenged to bridge from high-level policy statement to on-the-ground realities.”
Ultimately, the success of these initiatives would depend on having a measurable metric, the Riparian Deficit, a real number. This is what starts the conversation with engineering and finance about what must be in an Asset Management Budget if a local government is serious about a strategy for Sustainable Drainage Service Delivery.”
Target-based Strategies for Riparian Restoration
“Now, with EAP as a foundation piece, these local governments have a rationale and a metric to do business differently via multiple planning pathways to achieve the goal of ‘natural asset management’,” adds Tim Pringle, EAP Chair
“The Riparian Deficit would allow them to change their internal asset management conversations and begin the process of engendering community support for a target-based strategy for systematic M&M investment over decades, as opportunities arise, to restore riparian woodlands and native vegetation for the full 30m width of the regulated streamside protection setback.”
TO LEARN MORE:
The table presents capsule summaries which describe the outcomes for the five Stage 3 EAP projects. These highlight where and how EAP fits into strategic directions which represent a range of pathways.. Click on the image to download a PDF copy of Case Study Outcomes of Stage 3 EAP Mainstreaming.
EAP is a BC Strategy for Community Investment in Stream Systems
The Synthesis Report is a distillation of over 1000 pages of case study documentation into a storyline that is conversational and written for a continuum of audiences that includes land use practitioners, asset managers, stream stewards, and local government decision-makers.
To Learn More:
Download and read a copy of the entire Synthesis Report on EAP, the Ecological Accounting Process, A B.C. Strategy for Community Investment in Stream Systems (2022), the 4th in the Beyond the Guidebook series of guidance documents.
Or, cut to the chase and read the 7-page extract titled Case Study Building Blocks Process.
DOWNLOAD A COPY OF https://waterbucket.ca/gi/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2024/11/EAP-Synthesis-Report-Beyond-the-Guidebook-2022_Jun-2022.pdf