Contract Description: The Integrated Status and Effectiveness Monitoring Program (ISEMP, 2003-017-00) is an ongoing collaborative effort to design, test, implement and evaluate Status and Trends Monitoring for salmon and steelhead populations and their habitat, and watershed-scale Effectiveness Monitoring for management actions impacting salmon and steelhead populations and habitat in the Interior Columbia River Basin.

ISEMP explicitly addresses work requirements of many 2008 FCRPS Biological Opinion RPAs (56.1, 56.2, 56.3, 57.1, 57.2, 57.3, 57.4, 57.5) and is directly related to additional 2008 FCRPS Biological Opinion implementation strategy requirements and recommendations. ISEMP takes a pilot-project approach to the research and development of monitoring by implementing experimental programs in several major subbasins of the Interior Columbia: the Wenatchee, Entiat, Methow, John Day, South Fork Salmon and Lemhi River basins. The overall goal of the project is to provide regional salmon management agencies with the data, information and tools necessary to design efficient and effective monitoring programs.

Specifically, ISEMP generates quantitative guidance on and examples of: the robustness and limitations of population and habitat monitoring protocols, indicators and metrics; sampling design approaches for the distribution of monitoring effort in time and space; analytical approaches to the evaluation of monitoring data, information and programs; effective data management and communication designs that support the use, standardization and compilation of implementation, compliance, status, trends and effectiveness monitoring data by regional data generators and decision makers; and finally the design and implementation of watershed-scale restoration actions to maximize both the biological impact and associated learning opportunities resulting from the design and implementation strategy.

Through its work to date, ISEMP has developed expertise in the coordination and implementation of large-scale monitoring data collection programs. Applying this experience, ISEMP coordinates the installation, maintenance and calibration of in-stream PIT tag arrays across the Snake River basin and is designing and coordinating the implementation of a Columbia River basin-wide stream habitat status and trends monitoring. These programmatic implementation facets of ISEMP leverage previous experience with logistics and social factors to effectively implement comprehensive, standardized monitoring research and development at an unprecedented scale.  

This contract is one of several contracts that will implement this project.  Each contract is responsible for an end of contract progress report.  Additionally, a project level "synthesis report" will also be produced under this project and data and analysis from this contract will be utilized in the production of that project level report.  The synthesis report is a deliverable under the Terraqua contract (not this contract) under this project.  

In order to coordinate among Project elements, the need for any changes in scope that may arise during the implementation of this SOW will be communicated to NOAA Fisheries and Terraqua, Inc. (by contacting Chris Jordan (1 541 754 4629) and Mike Ward (509-486-2426)).   Actual changes to this SOW must be approved by BPA.This contract will support the overall project in the following manner:

The Cascadia Conservation District (CCD) offers support to other agencies as part of the larger project in the form of landowner coordination and agency coordination.  Specifically, the District coordinates outreach to private landowners, and facilitates landowners and cooperating agencies getting the appropriate information based on the needs of each entity (agency or private landowners).  For landowner coordination during habitat and fish monitoring surveys, private sites on the list are identified and appropriate landowners along these sections of stream are contacted by the District to ensure agency staff access will be possible and allowed by the landowner.  The purpose of the survey is explained to the landowner and permission to access the stream at specific locations is requested. A database is developed for the survey and maps are created of each site for the appropriate agency conducting the survey.  The District serves as the contact point for questions from landowners about the purpose of the survey and for any special requirements specific landowners may have for agency staff to be aware of during the visit to a private site.  The work under this contract is coordinated through Terraqua, Inc. and NOAA Fisheries, entities that also implement actions under this project.

This contract includes funding support for a position at the Cascadia Conservation District which is essential to the successful implementation of the Entiat Intensively Monitored Watershed (IMW).  The Entiat IMW is called for under the 2008 BiOp RPA 57.1 and seeks to determine whether a suite of instream habitat actions designed to improve habitat for listed salmonids and steelhead are effective.  The ISEMP has designed an implementation and monitoring experimental design for the Entiat IMW that calls for habitat restoration actions to be implemented in a spatially and temporally explicit manner.  This approach to action implementation and monitoring will require significant coordination, facilitation and support for the many agencies and stakeholders involved in restoring the Entiat River and the need for a person to head up this coordination effort was recognized by all those involved.  It was agreed that such a position should be housed at the CCD, with support from multiple agencies involved in the Entiat IMW, including the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, Bonneville Environmental Foundation, and ISEMP.