Summary:  The overall purpose of the Accord STAR is to summarize and present information about project implementation progress, and the outcome of actions, that result from the 2008 Columbia Basin Fish Accord agreement (Accord), in support of the National Ocean and the Atmospheric Administration’s 2008 Biological Opinion for Federal Columbia River Power System Operations (BiOp).  The reports are meant to convey information and inform judgment in a manner meaningful to the target audiences of the Yakama Nation Tribal and General Councils, program managers, and project implementation practitioners.  Additionally, the reports are designed to provide information regarding the status and trend of species of particular importance to the Yakama Nation, in order to track detectable responses and gauge the effectiveness of actions over time.

Background:  A principal purpose of the Accord agreement is to implement projects that contribute to improved survival and productivity of salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) to the levels anticipated in the BiOp.  Written into the Accord is a commitment by the Yakama Nation to assess implementation efforts and report the impact of these projects, including (a) an annual reporting of progress (section C.2), and (b) the evaluation of implementation results (section C.3), in order to estimate whether the actions proposed and implemented by the Tribe are having the intended outcome, and producing the expected benefits – in support of the regional recovery goals articulated in the BiOp.

The design of the Status and Trend Annual Report (STAR) project is intended to give meaningful substance to the Accord promise of effective evaluation and reporting.  Documenting the implementation effect of Accord actions taken by the Yakama Nation – including the status and trend of key species – also serves to validate the assurances given about the expected contributions of BPA-funded projects to the estimate of survival benefits expected to accrue to populations of listed salmon and steelhead.  However, STAR reports too overly broad in nature will not address the need to track activities and report on progress at a scale small enough, and in a manner sufficiently useful, to enable local adaptive management evaluation and adjustment.  With information summarized at ESU/DPS, population/subbasin, and assessment unit scales, the STAR project will serve both as a high-level reporting mechanism for the Yakama Nation Tribal Council and managers, and as a more narrowly tailored resource to inform practitioners about refinements needed in implementation strategies.  
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Project Status /Background

In 2013-2014, the STAR project released four high-level summary status reports, initiated as draft versions in the prior contract term.  The emphasis in the summary status reports is  to:  (1) track the Yakama Nation's implementation of the projects described in the Accord agreement; and (2) provide estimated habitat quality improvement and survival benefits from the implemented projects (or suite of projects) by reporting trends in the status of ESA-listed salmon and steelhead populations, based on key limiting factors and the progress being made in addressing those identified ecological limitations (see, 2008 Fish Accords, section C.3.). The topics covered by the status reports are: Yakama Nation's Accord supported habitat restoration work, hatchery and reintroduction work, and status and trends for priority species. Additionally, we produced a summary report on the status of action implementation in hydrosystem operations and hydrological restoration as they impact salmonid, lamprey and sturgeon populations of concern to the Yakama Nation – in the observed and projected performance reported elsewhere within the region, such as for purposes of compliance reporting by the action Agencies under the FCRPS BiOp.

These reports are currently being used to inform the Tribal and General Council as well as help project managers when educating various audiences about the purpose and benefits from Accord-funded Yakama Nation Fisheries projects. These types of comprehensive program-wide summaries have not been previously produced by or for Yakama Nation Fisheries. Each of these reports is developed in close coordination with the BPA, other action agencies, and relevant resource managers and implementing entities.  

Note: Yakama policy and program staff are not indifferent to the sensitivities associated with reporting on hydrosystem operations.  We appreciate the perception of risk inherent in an independent review, and the concern that a report may prove to be insufficiently connected to or grounded in ongoing performance reporting under the BiOp.  We understand the potential for disagreements or misunderstanding from a review that could draw inconsistent or differing conclusions about the effectiveness of actions and adjustments in operations – negotiated in the BiOp and incorporated into the Accords – as implemented by the Action Agencies. However, the language of the Accord agreement encompasses the hydrosystem performance reporting we expect to be a component of the STAR project:  “The Action Agencies acknowledge that the Tribes’ ability to monitor and verify performance of the FCRPS under the BiOps is essential to their participation in this MOA, and the Action Agencies support such monitoring and verification … .” (Section II.D., at p.5).

The scope of STAR project reporting is consistent with the language of the Accord, and reflects the expectations of the Yakama Nation about the role of the STAR project.  Rather than an independent analysis, our reports are a summary and interpretation of existing evaluations in order to best inform the target audiences from a Tribal/regional Yakama perspective about the areas and concerns that are most important to them. Remember that project staff serve a Tribal Membership that will be asked in the coming years what they think about the consequences of this 10-year Accord arrangement with BPA. To address their needs and inform their consideration will require report products that conclude whether we think progress is being made under the BiOp.  To meet that objective requires an approach to reporting grounded in the answers to two questions: (1) whether the actions we and the region said we were going to take, got done; and (2) whether the results of those actions are what we thought and said would be the outcome.
    
To help manage the appearance of risk or uncertainty in answering these questions, we proceed openly and collaboratively in the development of the report products.  Because the potential for misunderstanding or disconnect may linger, it is important to say what the hydrosystem report is intended to be, and what it is not.  To be clear, we are conducting no independent analysis of effectiveness in our review.  Our approach will be to compile and synthesize a summary of the available analyses and evaluation developed by others (for example, in the recently released 2013 Comprehensive Evaluation).  Our purpose is to report what others are concluding about the effectiveness of actions, in a manner that is discernable to and digestible by the Tribal Council and members to whom we report.  
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Current Contract

The STAR Information System covers the Yakama Nation treaty trust natural resource use area of 12 million acres, and consolidates information extracted from other sources into one place for easy summary, updating, and reporting. Sources for information include: Pisces, DART, PUD Reports, BPA Annual Reports, Stream Net, NOAA's status reviews, and information reported by various state agencies. In the 2013-2014 contract year, the YN staff recognized that for the STAR project to assist with local adaptive management decisions and to generate timely summaries, there was a need for greater flexibility and responsiveness to information requests. Therefore, in 2014, in addition to completion of the high-level summary reports, we developed the groundwork for the mid-layer of the information query and reporting system (STAR Information System) and conducted a pilot for  the more detailed bottom layer of the reporting system. This functionality supports reporting efficiency, flexibility, and the capacity to adaptively summarize information at multiple scales for the high level report topics. The system is easily updatable and inclusive to inform managing actions and will ultimately enable partially-automated generation and updating of habitat, hatchery, harvest, hydro information, and focal species status reports at multiple scales. The reporting system is for internal use and is not open to the public, but it will be used to update status reports and provide material for mid-level summaries.

During FY14 development of mid-layer reporting, the first “H-Phase” (habitat) was completed as a pilot effort, as well as a portion of the focal species status and trend information. This project information can now be extracted/summarized, and downloaded/printed at the assessment unit and subbasin-scale. Products include technical information summaries at the assessment unit and subbasin level, detailed information sheets (e.g., tables of detailed project information and associated benefits for a specified region), and user defined or ad-hoc reports. The staff can query the system themselves or the STAR coordinator can extract the requested information. The system has been useful in responding to managers' and leaders' requests for project information. During FY2015 STAR will begin to add the remaining H information to the STAR Information System to be inclusive of all YN Accord-funded projects. The addition of the remaining Hs will lead to better informed management decisions. The habitat section will continue to be updated and refined, with the addition of more detailed information about outcomes and benefits. These details are expected to include: new habitat/watershed functionality rankings from expert panels (similar to 2008 Accord Appendix G) for the Yakima and Klickitat subbasins; progress reporting relative to the estimates of project benefits, since 2008; and more detailed limiting factor monitoring information for priority areas.

In FY 2014, STAR began to develop the most detailed layer of the information reporting system, populating it, and building user-defined summary reports. At this detailed level, however, considerable effort is required for the tasks of building and loading all of this information into the system. In order to maximize efficiency, STAR used the pilot effort in 2014 to evaluate and adapt a centralized data management system developed by CTUIR – to accommodate the reporting needs of the Yakama Nation. Parts of the already developed "H-phase" mid-level reporting system (discussed above) will be utilized in developing summary reports at the detailed information level as well. The web-enabled information system improves reporting efficiencies, consistency, information security, timeliness and accessibility within a secure environment. In addition, the system allows for increased collaboration with other regional information management efforts. Building on what was learned in FY 2014 through the pilot effort, STAR will continue in FY2015 to develop the detailed and mid-level centralized data management system to include a larger suite of project and monitoring information. This will assist in improving data management across the program as a whole. The system will continue to be developed in an iterative manner so that we can build upon progress and remain focused on priority products.
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Future Direction / Potential Challenges:

In FY2016 we will continue to develop and update the STAR Information System and its products by: a) continuing to incorporate Accord funded project information; b) providing status and trend information for priority focal species; and c) include in summaries some non-BPA funded project information that complements YN Accord projects for the entire treaty trust natural resource use area. Reporting requests continue for all of the information that informs restoration planning and prioritization decisions, since impacts and benefits of Accord and non-Accord funded projects do not occur in isolation, as well as for continued improvement in our ability to track benefits and support future effectiveness evaluations. In  FY2017 we will update the high-level status reports, as well as maintain and update other levels of the STAR Information System.

This carefully designed approach will ensure that the STAR Information System is capable of managing information that is current so that sound decisions are made to support the FCRPS BiOp. The STAR Information System and its associated reports are essential to the YN for validating that Accord-funded activities are providing benefits and improvements under the BiOp, for supporting adaptive management to derive maximum project benefit, and for instilling improved efficiency, security and timeliness in information processing and reporting. The STAR products have been developed to meet the needs of the YN’s leaders, program and project managers for these purposes.