Ecology stops by Spokane County meeting to talk about Hangman Creek watershed

Spokane mtg

(From left) Kelly Susewind, special assistant to Ecology Director Maia Bellon; Ben Rau, Ecology nonpoint pollution program coordinator; and Elaine Snouwaert, Ecology water quality specialist, met with Spokane County growers last week to talk about water quality problems in the Hangman Creek watershed.

A meeting of the Spokane County Wheat Growers was held June 20 in Airway Heights. The main topic of discussion was the Hangman Creek watershed. Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) representatives were in attendance to gather producer input and maintain open dialogue in response to a current lawsuit and media attention.

The Spokane Riverkeepers, an environmental group, has filed a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The concern is that the EPA and other agencies aren’t doing enough to address nonpoint pollution source problems in the watershed, including sedimentation, bacteria contamination and temperature control. Many critics point to agriculture as one of the main contributing factors, especially with sedimentation.

Kelly Susewind (special asstant to Ecology Director Bellon) expressed the meeting was a first step in working with producers to find solutions that work for agriculture yet address the watershed’s problems, making it clear that the department isn’t launching any new initiatives at this time or mandating any specific conservation tillage practices. The Ecology visitors answered questions about their water clean-up plan drafted in 2009, their process, the testing they’ve done up to this point, and how they would be working with Idaho, which also holds part of the watershed.

Growers talked about blocked culverts that forced the stream to carve new channels and eroding stream banks, bridges and other areas that are supposed to be maintained by other state agencies, such as the Department of Transportation. Many growers agreed that certain spots in the watershed have obvious problems, often caused by fast stream flows or where a tributary joins Hangman Creek, and identifying those places is one of the first things Ecology should do. Afterward, Susewind said he felt they had started on a dialogue with growers and was walking away with some homework to do, such as coming up with more a solid description of the problem and articulating what Ecology does and doesn’t know about the watershed’s problems and what’s causing them.