Water-Centric Planning

banner

Tag:

Richard Horner

    LIVING WATER SMART IN BRITISH COLUMBIA: Robert Hicks is skilled at providing historical context and perspective for “the big picture” of today


    Robert Hicks co-created the “streams and trees component” Integrated Liquid Waste and Resource Management Plan for Metro Vancouver. “There was a time when the value of managing drainage on a watershed basis within a broad framework of land management and ecosystem planning was not yet apparent. Research on stream health changed all this,” stated Robert Hicks. “In recent years, I have been advocating about the connection between rainwater management and groundwater. It is a slow process. You just have to say it enough times: groundwater and infiltration!”

    Read Article

    LIVING WATER SMART IN BRITISH COLUMBIA: “Vancouver Island University is all-in because EAP, the Ecological Accounting Process, is an idea that can change the game with respect to protection or restoration of riparian integrity along streams. And students are excited to contribute to the change,” stated Graham Sakaki, Manager, Mount Arrowsmith Regional Research Institute


    “The EAP Partnership was set up in a really unique, really valuable and viable way right from the beginning. The Partnership for Water Sustainability made the connections to the three local governments. Together, we met with each individually. Then we all got together as a group to talk about what our values are and what we are really hoping to achieve. The fact that the three are showing their support for the students, and for the training to occur, is a great story. I just wish that partnerships like this existed among all research projects,” stated Graham Sakaki.

    Read Article

    LIVING WATER SMART IN BRITISH COLUMBIA: “You can do all the research that you want but you need good people in government to implement changes in engineering and development practices. They must be technically savvy and have the drive or desire to give back and do good work,” stated Dr. Chris May, retired Surface & Stormwater Division Director, Kitsap County Public Works in Washington State


    For two decades, Chris May had a leadership position in Washington State local government – first with the City of Seattle and then with Kitsap County. The latter was his living laboratory. Because he was Division Director, he could put science into practice. “Kitsap is at a manageable scale. The County is big enough to effect change and make things better. That was our goal – have a positive impact on the community! We knew we needed to work on multiple scales and on multiple fronts to improve conditions in our small stream watersheds – that was our strategy,” stated Chris May.

    Read Article

    LIVING WATER SMART IN BRITISH COLUMBIA: “Over the long-term, I believe local stewardship groups have an essential role to play in refining the water balance numbers and our understanding of what they mean,” stated Peter Law, Chair of the former Guidebook Steering Committee, on the 20th anniversary of Guidebook publication (June 2022)


    “Stewardship groups have local knowledge about local water resources, and are the most invested and most connected to the land base. It is in the small tributary streams where the impacts of changes in the seasonal water balance are being felt most. Small streams are now going dry and have zero levels of riparian protection . Now that I am the one standing in the creek to take the flow measurements, I appreciate just how much variability there is around hydrology. So, I can see why it take 10 years to have confidence in computer model results,” stated Peter Law.

    Read Article