Chehalis River Basin Flood Authority earns national floodplain management award





In 2014, the Flood Authority helped a construct a new berm around the settling ponds at the Montesano wastewater treatment plan. During the major 2007 flood, waters from the Wynoochee river nearly overtopped the existing berm.

An essential partner helping develop and carry out the Chehalis Basin Strategy has earned a prestigious national award.
The Chehalis River Basin Flood Authority has been working with the Chehalis Basin Board and our Office of Chehalis Basin on a collection of actions to reduce damage from floods while restoring aquatic habitat in the Chehalis River basin.


Last week, the Association of State Floodplain Managers announced that the Flood Authority has earned its 2019 James Lee Witt Award for Excellence in Floodplain Management. It is only the second time in 33 years an organization in Washington has received the award.

More than 19,000 professional floodplain managers from across the country belong to the national association. Its mission is to promote education, policies and activities that mitigate current and future losses, costs and human suffering caused by flooding, and to protect the natural and beneficial functions of floodplains.

Of all natural disasters, floods and flooding are the single greatest cause of adverse social, economic and environmental impacts. Since 1971, there have been 14 federally declared disasters in the Chehalis basin from flooding.



New Sickman-Ford overflow bridge
helping Oakville avoid flooding.
 

The association recognized the Flood Authority for its outstanding and aggressive programs aimed at mitigating flood risk, reducing flood damage, and increasing flood threat awareness in the Chehalis basin—the state’s second-largest river drainage system.

“We have come a long way in 10 years,” said Grays Harbor County Commissioner Vickie Raines. “The Flood Authority has helped transform how basin governments approach floodplain management. We have gone from being reactive to being on the cutting edge.”

Raines is also a chair of the Flood Authority, which is made up of officials from the principle jurisdictions in the basin affected by flooding including Grays Harbor, Lewis and Thurston counties, and Aberdeen, Bucoda, Centralia, Chehalis, Cosmopolis, Hoquiam, Montesano, Napavine, Oakville, and Pe Ell. Other communities in the basin have also benefitted from the Flood Authority’s expertise and support.

New flood warning gauge at Montesano wastewater treatment
plant next to new berm, next to nearby Wynoochee River.

When river levels rise in the basin during storms, the Flood Authority maintains a flood warning system based on real-time data from more than 80 different weather and stream gauges that alert interested parties about rising river levels. Since the 2014-15 flood season, more than 1,000 residents and businesses have signed up to receive email alerts from the Flood Authority’s flood warning system.

In addition, the Flood Authority also assisted communities in the basin improve their floodplain management programs by leading a comprehensive review of local programs and practices. This review was turned into a report that communities have used to adopt new regulatory standards that are higher than state and federal requirements.

“Locals know what works best locally,” said Edna Fund, Lewis County Commissioner and vice-chair of the Flood Authority. “We have helped retrofit homes with effective flood vents, and constructed farm pads at over 24 rural locations to save livestock, farm equipment, feed, and keep farm chemical out of the environment in times of flood. While the state has been an important partner, providing expertise, oversight and funding, it’s been a locally-driven approach that’s successfully encouraged Basin residents to be more aware, innovative, and better prepared for flooding.”

Read more about the Flood Authority’s efforts leading to receipt of this year’s award.

Besides the Flood Authority, Commissioners Raines and Fund are also members of the Chehalis Basin Board that provides long-term oversight of the Chehalis Basin Strategy. The Board is responsible for developing budget recommendations to the governor’s office to implement the strategy and is supported by our Office of Chehalis Basin.

Habitat projects to expand fish access throughout Chehalis Basin

The Chehalis Fisheries Task Force will replace these barrier culverts on Bush Creek near Elma with fish-passable structures, opening up 8.2 miles of upstream forested habitat for salmon, steelhead, and cutthroat trout. Photo courtesy Chehalis Lead Entity

While every day is Earth Day at Ecology, this year's celebration falls on Sunday, April 22. It is fitting then that Saturday, April 21, is World Fish Migration Day, a one-day global-local event to create awareness on the importance of open rivers and migratory fish.

In coming months, 17 barrier culverts preventing or reducing the ability for migrating fish to reach 32.5 miles of crucial stream habitat in the Chehalis River basin in Grays Harbor and Lewis counties will be redesigned or reconstructed.

The work is part of the broader, two-pronged Chehalis Basin Strategy to restore degraded aquatic species habitat and reduce the damage from severe flooding in the Chehalis River basin.

Ecology’s Office of Chehalis Basin, the Chehalis Basin Board and Washington State Recreation and Conservation Office are actively working with community groups, tribal governments, and state agencies to put the ambitious collection of potential actions in place.

The $4 million investment builds on work the strategy guided from 2015 through 2017 to provide $5.6 million in grants to improve barriers and provide access to nearly 65 miles in the basin as well as undertake other habitat improvements.

Unique river basin faces flooding, aquatic habitat challenges

The Chehalis River basin covers 2,700 square miles in southwest Washington and drains to the Grays Harbor estuary on the Pacific coast. Besides the Chehalis River, the basin includes the Black, Elk, Johns, Hoquiam, Humptulips, Newaukum, Satsop, Skookumchuck, Wishkah, and Wynoochee rivers, and their tributary streams.

Uniquely fertile and abundant, the Chehalis basin has suffered for decades from devastating flooding – five of the largest floods in the basin’s history have occurred in the last 30 years. In addition, the Chehalis’ once strong salmon runs are fraction of their historic levels.

Projects bolster two-pronged strategy: Reduce flood damages, improve aquatic habitat

Fish passage improvement projects in Grays Harbor County will open important habitat areas in Bush, Geissler and Sand creeks and a smaller Chehalis River tributary flowing under Mattson Road. In Lewis County, the projects will boost fish access in Berwick, Frase, and Prairie creeks.





Migrating Chinook salmon.

While the Chehalis is Washington’s only river basin without any federally-listed endangered salmon species, fish there are still in trouble. According to Kirsten Harma, watershed coordinator for the Chehalis Lead Entity, coastal wild salmon runs are only 10 percent of what they were just 100 years ago.

“Undersized and poorly aligned culverts – the pipes that go under roads – are one of the greatest limitations to salmon productivity in many of the Chehalis’ tributaries. These recently funded projects will allow streams to function naturally again, providing the conditions fish need,” Harma said.

The non-profit community group focuses on creating healthy salmon habitat by identifying and implementing voluntary on-the-ground aquatic restoration and protection projects. The projects, she said, also can have a dual benefit.

 

“Naturally functioning rivers help people, too, because undersized culverts also temporarily back up water. Some of these projects will have the added benefit of helping reduce flooding of our transportation corridors and private lands in the Chehalis basin.”

Grays Harbor County projects to open up 19 new miles to fish


The private, non-profit Chehalis Basin Fisheries Task Force will manage three multi-site projects in Grays Harbor County to improve fish passage to about 15 miles of stream habitat. 


Fish barrier at Sand Creek near McCleary. Photo

courtesy Chehalis Lead Entity.

The task force is one of 14 regional fisheries enhancement groups across the state and focuses on producing salmon for sport and commercial fisheries and restoring and protecting stream habitat. Task force Chairman Lonnie Crumley said his organization will:

• Open fish passage to about 8.2 miles of upstream forested habitat in Bush Creek near Elma by replacing fish barrier culverts with fully passable structures at three separate road crossings.
• Correct five fish passage barriers in Sand Creek near McCleary to open up 5.5 miles of forested habitat upstream, including adding gravel substrate and large woody debris to improve fish spawning grounds. 
• Work toward providing unimpeded fish passage by designing and permitting three new culvert corrections on Geissler Creek outside Montesano so fish have access to 1.5 miles of forested stream habitat.

“These three projects are critical. Salmon, steelhead and cutthroat need unrestricted access to shaded stream reaches to spawn and rear. Upstream areas also serve as important nurseries for juvenile fish during their fresh water life prior to migrating out to sea,” Crumley said. “Providing new access to these important habitat areas on Bush, Sand and Geissler creeks is one way we can help ensure that there will be salmon in the Chehalis basin for coming generations.”

The Grays Harbor Conservation District will redesign the Mattson barrier, a small farm crossing, to open access to 4.1 miles of fish habitat on a small tributary creek near Oakville draining directly to the Chehalis River.

 

Fish will get access to 13 new miles of Lewis County stream habitat


After Lewis County Conservation District corrects this barrier

in Berwick Creek new Chehalis, migrating salmon and trout

will have access to 3.3 miles of forested upstream habitat.

Photo courtesy Chehalis Lead Entity.

In the southeast, Lewis County will manage the replacement of an impassible culvert and oversee the realignment of the Frase Creek channel to open 3.5 miles of highly forested riparian area to Coho, steelhead and cutthroat trout. The county also will replace a culvert and add large, woody debris to Prairie Creek to open up 4.9 miles of forested upstream habitat.

There are two projects slated for Berwick Creek near Chehalis. The Port of Chehalis will design two replacement culverts to make about 1.4 miles of upstream habitat fully accessible to salmon and trout while the Lewis County Conservation District will redesign a blocked culvert to improve fish passage and access to another approximately 3.3 miles of upstream habitat.

“These gains for fish would not have been possible without the groundwork laid by local organizations working on salmon recovery projects in the Chehalis basin for the past 20 years,” said Gordon White, interim director for the Office of Chehalis Basin. “Besides funding and support from our office, these groups are bringing additional funding, experience, and passion to ensure fish remain a permanent part of the basin landscape.”

Multiple entities help guide basin habitat restoration plan

The projects are part of the Chehalis Basin Aquatic Species Restoration Plan to support habitat functions, ecosystem processes, and boosting populations of fish and semi-aquatic species while creating flood and climate-resilient systems that support human needs in the Chehalis basin.

The plan is overseen by steering committee is made up of voting representatives from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Quinault Indian Nation, and Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation, and non-voting members from Ecology, Washington Department of Natural Resources, and the Chehalis Lead Entity.