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COMMUNITIES TAKING CHARGE -- CHALLENGES & OPPORTUNITIES FOR PUBLIC LAND MANAGEMENT

Jack E. Williams, Michael P. Dombeck, and Christopher A. Wood

Their names are becoming part of the lexicon of conservationists and land managers: Applegate Partnership, Blackfoot Challenge, Henrys Fork Coalition, Trout Creek Mountain Working Group, Malpai Borderlands Group, and numerous others. Throughout the West, members of local communities are creating partnerships with industry, federal and state agencies, and conservation groups to address natural resource issues as diverse as salmon declines and livestock grazing. For the Sake of the Salmon, a umbrella group that encourages and monitors local watershed coalitions in the Pacific Northwest, tracks more than 300 such local groups presently active in California, Oregon, and Washington (For the Sake of the Salmon 1996).

Not only are the coalitions numerous, but they are growing in stature and influence. In California, the Quincy Library Group proposed a plan to manage 2.5 million acres of three National Forests that was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives by a margin of 429 to 1. In 1995, Oregon Governor Kitzhaber announced the Oregon Coastal Salmon Restoration Initiative, which relies heavily on the involvement and commitment of community-based watershed groups to implement restoration efforts for declining stocks of salmon. The effort drew praise on a variety of fronts and resulted in the National Marine Fisheries Service's decision not to list coho salmon along the Oregon coast as endangered or threatened pursuant to the Endangered Species Act.

In the past, "public participation" in government decision making may have amounted to little more than public notification and the opportunity to comment on agency proposals. The actual agency decision-making process remained largely unknown to the public. Kemmis (1990) referred to this "participation" when he spoke of problems in resolving issues through the formal political process, or as he called it, "the deadlocking practices of the procedural republic." He also observed that once communities understand that they themselves are responsible for coming up with the answer, they begin to think and behave differently. Community-based coalitions offer the distinct potential to end the deadlock and to reach mutually-agreeable decisions regarding seemingly intractable natural resource issues and to simply get things done on the ground.

The challenges that such community-based coalitions pose are many and the ultimate success of their efforts remains the subject of much debate. How should federal agencies interact with the emerging coalitions? How can ecological principles be integrated into community discussions and agreements? And, how can agencies meet mandates of federal laws and broader obligations while working with local community coalitions? These concerns are discussed in Watershed Restoration: Principles and Practices (Williams et al. 1997) and related articles (e.g., Dombeck et al. 1997). This column will attempt to summarize key points from these publications as they relate to community-based coalitions and public land management.

ECOLOGY AS COMMON GROUND

One of the critical first steps in resolving any natural resource problem is to understand the fundamental cause of the problem. Reduced salmon runs, for instance, may have many causes that are not readily apparent. If reduced egg to smolt survival is the symptom, its cause may lie upstream in a network of roads that contribute too much sediment to headwater streams. Studies of water quality in the Mattole River led to such a realization. The study demonstrated to the Mattole Restoration Council that juvenile chinook salmon could not survive in the river's estuary because of high water temperatures (Zuckerman 1997). An early emphasis on hatchery production was reduced while greater emphasis was focused on improving riparian vegetation, adding large woody debris to upstream areas, and reducing sediment inputs from forestry practices and roads. This watershed approach allowed the Council to treat the underlying causes of the decline rather than treat the symptoms, a concept that is a fundamental principle of any successful restoration effort (Frissell 1997). Ecologists, whether in land management agencies or academia, can assist local community groups in identifying the underlying causes of natural resource problems and help insure that these groups remain focused on such causes.

Scientists also can be a critical link in finding common ground among diverse interest groups. Not all local citizens may want to recover a rare stock of salmon. Local farmers may be sympathetic to improving water quality while downstream landowners may be interested in reducing seasonal flooding. Restoring riparian vegetation along headwater streams can improve water quality, dissipate flood flows, and restore stream habitat for fish. Ecologists understand such relationships and can explain them to local residents.

Although they may not understand all nuances of a problem, local residents often are keenly aware of environmental degradation in their watersheds and are eager for cures. Social scientists have found that the ability to tap into such local knowledge and desire can yield greater environmental improvement than does the top-down regulatory approach often associated with the federal government (Preister and Kent 1997). This does not diminish the importance of federal mandates for clean water or endangered species recovery. Quite the contrary, community-based coalitions can, if balanced by a variety of interests and underpinned with good scientific information, substantially improve society's ability to meet federal mandates for an improved environment.

INTEGRATING FEDERAL AND PRIVATE STRATEGIES

Recent federal land management strategies in the Pacific Northwest, such as the Northwest Forest Plan and strategies to restore anadromous fish habitat (aka PACFISH), are major advances in our efforts to restore critical habitats and to treat entire ecosystems rather than individual endangered species (FEMAT 1993, Williams and Williams 1997). Companion strategies for private and state lands in the Pacific Northwest have been slower to develop. The Oregon Coastal Salmon Restoration Initiative is stimulating community-based watershed groups to develop efforts on private and state lands that can link to work on Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management lands as guided by the Northwest Forest Plan. The Coquille Watershed Association is one such group stimulating work on private and public lands to the benefit of the basin's anadromous fishes (Hudson and Heikkila 1997). Indeed, it would be difficult to imagine restoring salmon with efforts restricted to higher elevation public lands, while the critical valley bottom lands, which usually are in private ownership, remain degraded.

BUILDING LONG-TERM COMMITMENT AND UNDERSTANDING

Building a successful community-based coalition requires substantial commitment of time and staff. Parties with a long history of competing interests may take months or even years to establish close working relationships. These first meetings can be frustrating, but if the groups can stay together and focus on problem solving, the long-term results can be rewarding.

Restoring natural resources requires a long-term commitment. Whether the focus is on recovering endangered species, improving forest health, or restoring entire watersheds, many years or decades may be needed. Changes in agency leadership, budgets, and personnel can make long-term agency commitments problematic. Local landowners and citizen workgroups tend to be more consistent. The long-term commitments necessary to resolve natural resource issues may be institutionalized more readily through local communities than through agencies, although both factions are part of the solution.

Monitoring is a good example of the need for long-term commitment. Fixing almost any serious natural resource issue requires a plan, monitoring the implementation of the plan, determining whether the plan was effective, and some form of adaptive management. Despite its importance, monitoring often is underfunded and not implemented fully. Watershed coalitions provide an opportunity for agency scientists to design participatory, cooperative monitoring efforts.

Several watershed coalitions utilize local citizens in their monitoring efforts. High school and middle school students monitor restoration work on the Crooked River in central Oregon (Nolte 1997). The students provide a good workforce, and integration of monitoring into school curricula enables long-term data collection. Such programs provide nontechnical people with an opportunity to learn more about ecosystem function while helping agencies to initiate and maintain long-term environmental databases.
The increasing role that communities will play in local decision making is clear. We have reached a new frontier in land management where cooperation rather than dissension frames the landscape. However, it is critical that community-based coalitions focus on solving underlying ecological problems. They need sound scientific input. If we as professional land managers and conservation biologists do not assume an active role in community-based coalitions, we will have missed a key opportunity to restore the health of the land and educate its citizens on fundamental ecological principles needed for all of our long-term survival.

LITERATURE CITED

• Dombeck, M.P., J.E. Williams and C.A. Wood. 1997. Watershed restoration: social and scientific challenges for fish biologists. Fisheries 22(5):26-27.
• For the Sake of the Salmon. 1996. Directory of watershed groups in the Pacific region. For the Sake of the Salmon, Gladstone, Oregon.
• Forest Ecosystem Management Assessment Team (FEMAT). 1993. Forest ecosystem assessment: an ecological, economic, and social assessment. USDA Forest Service, Portland, Oregon.
• Frissell, C.A. 1997. Ecological principles. Pages 96-115 in J.E. Williams, C.A. Wood and M.P. Dombeck, eds. Watershed restoration: principles and practices. American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, Maryland.
• Hudson, W.F. and P.A. Heikkila. 1997. Integrating public and private restoration strategies: Coquille River of Oregon. Pages 235-252 in J.E. Williams, C.A. Wood and M.P. Dombeck, eds. Watershed restoration: principles and practices. American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, Maryland.
• Kemmis, D. 1990. Community and the politics of place. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman.
• Nolte, D.A. 1997. Involving local school systems in watershed restoration: Crooked River of Oregon. Pages 198-215 in J.E. Williams, C.A. Wood and M.P. Dombeck, eds. Watershed restoration: principles and practices. American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, Maryland.
• Preister, K. and J.A. Kent. 1997. Social ecology: a new pathway to watershed restoration. Pages 28-48 in J.E. Williams, C.A. Wood and M.P. Dombeck, eds. Watershed restoration: principles and practices. American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, Maryland.
• Williams, J.E. and C.D. Williams. 1997. An ecosystem-based approach to management of salmon and steelhead habitat. Pages 541-556 in D.J. Stouder, P.A. Bisson, and R.J. Naiman, eds. Pacific salmon and their ecosystems: status and future options. Chapman and Hall, New York.
• Williams, J.E., C.A. Wood, and M.P. Dombeck, eds. 1997. Watershed restoration: principles and practices. American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, Maryland.
• Zuckerman, S. 1997. Encouraging communities to think like watersheds: Mattole River of California. Pages 216-234 in J.E. Williams, C.A. Wood and M.P. Dombeck, eds. Watershed restoration: principles and practices. American Fisheries Society, Bethesda, Maryland.

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