Local watershed organizations have become increasingly popular in the past decade, particularly in the West (Griffin, 1999). We seem to have certain expectations that stakeholder-driven, watershed councils will provide some contribution towards implementation of the many state and federally funded watershed restoration programs. Measuring the success of these efforts, however, continues to be a "thorny issue", with anecdotal results most common (Kenney, 1997). No one wants to waste their time with an ineffective group. People – participants, community, agencies, advocates, funders, and politicians - want positive results. Can these watershed groups really be effective, and if so, what lessons can help others be more effective?

In 1990, I began as a watershed coordinator for the French Creek Watershed Advisory Group in northern California and later worked with a neighboring group. Since then, I have been searching the literature, participating in "think tank" sessions around the country, and documenting my own experiences about how to make these diverse, consensus-based processes more effective (Sommarstrom, 1994; Elder & Sommarstrom, 1997; Born & Genskow, 1999; Sommarstrom, 2000). The opportunity for me to systematically examine the effectiveness of selected watershed councils came about in 1999, through a study commissioned by Trout Unlimited and Pacific Rivers Council (Huntington and Sommarstrom, 2000).

This co-authored study analyzed the relationships between conservation effectiveness and organizational attributes of watershed councils in the Northwest. The report was divided into three parts:

1. Effectiveness at Developing and Implementing Restoration Programs
2. The Process of Council Operations: Effective Components
3. Conservation Effectiveness, Council Process, and Overall Conclusions

For the purpose of this study, a "watershed council" is defined as follows:

In Oregon, the term is defined by the state as a voluntary, local group that represents a balance of interested and affected persons within the watershed (GWEB, 1995). Not all states, however, have developed a useful definition to distinguish a group of "unlikes" from a group of "likes"; instead, one has to look at a group’s bylaws, membership composition, and decision-making rules to determine whether it meets this definition.

A list of the councils evaluated for the study can be found in Table 1. The groups were selected in a systematic-random manner, with a focus on Oregon councils. Of the 14 councils, 8 were from Oregon and 2 each were from California, Idaho, and Washington.

The approach in Part I used standardized evaluation metrics (1-5 scale) and criteria to evaluate the ecological basis and effectiveness of the councils’: a) restoration plans, b) conservation projects, and c) adaptive management (monitoring, evaluation, and adaptation). The analysis focused on identifying patterns of performance across groups, not ranking the performance of any specific council. Since Part I was not the emphasis of this author, only a brief summary follows of its conclusions.

• Most council restoration projects appeared to have been ecologically beneficial (52% clearly, 36% likely) to salmonids or to restoring stream processes.

• Examples: projects involving riparian restoration, road treatments, fish passage, livestock exclosures.

• Improvement in restoration programs, however, will be needed if these groups are to be truly effective at rehabilitating watersheds and restoring at-risk salmonid populations.
• The many low scores indicate councils represent a new and imperfect experiment.

• The benefits of many projects were limited by an inability to address one or more underlying causes of environmental degradation ("stressors") in other areas of the watershed.
• Examples: forest practices, urbanization, water diversions

• Lower priority restoration sites were often used instead of high priority sites, since too few landowners were volunteering their property for more important projects.

This section evaluated the process portion of watershed council operations (e.g., their structure, function and planning approach), and determined the process components which appear to enable certain councils to be more effective than others in addressing environmental and fisheries problems. Collected information on each council involved: a) interviews with at least one council representative, b) review of materials produced by the council, and c) review of articles written by other researchers about the council.

Key factors for organizational success came from a review of the relevant literature on these topics: collaborative group processes, community-based partnerships, conflict resolution, consensus, coordinated resource planning and management (CRMP) process, meeting management, and natural resource / watershed planning. These factors were grouped into 11 categories related to a group’s Structure and Function, and 3 categories for Planning Process:

1. Originating Factors
2. Authority
3. Composition & Size
4. Staffing
5. Decision-making Process
6. Communication
7. Issues and Focus
8. Education and Training (adult)
9. Funding
10. Agency Relations
11. Self-Evaluation
12. Plan Development
13. Plan Communication
14. Plan Implementation

Within each category, three to eight individual factors specified the needed information for analysis. Of the original 74 factors, 36 were selected as metrics to be used as the criteria for evaluation. Table 2 lists the categories and these selected metrics, along with each one’s assumption or preferred condition (e.g., 7-15 people on decision-making body; clarity in plan content). All 14 councils were compared and contrasted qualitatively as well as quantitatively. The author ranked each council on a 1 to 5 scale (5 highest) for the evaluation metrics, primarily as a means of comparison with the results of Part I for the analysis of Part III.

Table 2. Selected Criteria and Assumptions for Watershed Council Evaluation

Results

In addition to many observations, the critical process factors found common to the four most "successful" councils were:

• Positive originating factors, with clarity of initial purpose and broad support;
• Ready access to experienced staff or assistance in organizational and planning processes;
• Ability to clearly communicate all aspects of the council’s activities;
• Ability to persevere and overcome any serious obstacles;
• Access to stable funding to maintain quality staff;
• Willingness to deal with difficult issues with an open process and clear strategy;
• Not needing to assign blame for problems, but making everyone part of the solution;
• Spending sufficient time to do joint fact-finding on the watershed plan with members and the community.

Almost all of the councils were performing reasonably well. However, most of the councils would benefit from being more effective and the newer ones would benefit from learning more quickly rather than prolong the learning process through trial and error. Good process is a critical part of success and should not be treated as an afterthought.

While no cookbook can create a "perfect" watershed council, certain ingredients are still necessary to make the process work. Measures of council performance, like those in Table 2, can be quite useful to gauge the level of progress at each stage of the group’s evolution. Performing self-evaluations, based on such criteria, allows a group to measure its own strengths and weaknesses, and move towards making any needed improvements.

1. Councils need to evaluate their process based on the evaluation criteria (Table 2) in order to minimize avoidable mistakes.
2. Assistance is needed to improve their decision-making process: a) consensus needs to be made more explicit and clear; b) ability to resolve conflict needs to be nurtured.
3. The focus on project implementation should not dominate the need to develop changes in community attitude and personal approach, which will be the longest lasting effects of the council process.
4. Greater emphasis is needed on building trust and understanding within the community, and not just within the council.
5. Assistance is needed to improve the watershed planning process and plan quality.
6. Reasonable, long-term expectations of councils should be determined and their desired longevity debated, or council sustainability will become increasingly tenuous.
7. State programs should help improve the effectiveness of the councils’ organizational operations as a means of increasing the likelihood of success of both state and local watershed restoration efforts.

Relationships between the restoration value of the councils’ programs (e.g., content) and their organizational process were most clearly noticeable for the following:

• Technically stronger conservation plan content ranked well with better planning .

• Those with better conservation plans and process tended to:

1. avoid low restoration value projects, and
2. implement projects with higher mean restoration value.

These findings should not be surprising. A solid planning process, which includes joint fact-finding between local and scientific communities, clarity of plan intent, community ownership, and built-in adaptability, reflects a substantial commitment of resources and should lead to a technically better plan. Following a good plan also helps focus on higher priority projects and avoid lower priority, opportunistic ones.

• Providing neutral forums for local involvement and cordial discussions among diverse interests
• Developing trust and understanding among council members
• Improving agency relationships - better cooperation, coordination, and communication than before the council.
• Helping to bring the community=s attention to the needs of fish and water issues.
• Getting some landowners to participate and implement projects or practices that might not have been done otherwise
• Persevering despite financial, social and technical obstacles
• Getting projects implemented on the ground

• Not addressing management practices or watershed issues well, with a bias for on-the-ground projects. Without dealing with long-term changes, projects tend to address short-term problems and symptoms instead of causes.
• Not being clear on how to reach decisions through the consensus process. The confusion causes some councils to avoid controversial or >sacred cow= issues, or make >lowest common denominator= decisions.
• Not dealing with intractable issues, which may be the major "stressors" within the watershed. Issues larger than a single watershed (e.g., forest practices, water law) are not well addressed by councils.
• Not focusing on building trust and understanding with the watershed community, causing lower satisfaction levels with the council by those not involved.
• Not all are developing watershed plans that are understandable, supportable, implementable, and adaptable.
• Not implementing projects on a priority basis, but instead as landowner opportunity arises - even with good plans and priority setting.

Watershed councils provide one of many approaches to addressing watershed conditions, salmonid habitat needs, and water quality concerns. They fill a niche that cannot otherwise be filled, particularly with private landowner or mixed ownership watersheds. Almost all councils evaluated in this study represented an improvement over the status quo or "no council" scenario. While doing a number of things well, councils also have certain limitations. Some limitations appear to be inherent to the scale or intractability of the more complex issues. Other weaknesses, though challenging, may be avoidable or minimized by councils if key factors for organizational success are more explicitly considered. With the present sense of urgency to recover listed salmon and steelhead or to meet water quality targets in impaired streams, it behooves all parties to improve the likelihood of achieving better council effectiveness.

Born, S.M. and K.D. Genskow. 1999. Exploring the "watershed approach": Critical dimensions of state-local partnerships. The Four Corners Watershed Innovators Initiative final report. Univ. of Wisconsin – Madison Extension, Report 99-1. Madison, WI. 63 pp.

Elder, D. and S. Sommarstrom. 1997. Evolution of broad-based watershed initiatives: measures of success. River Voices 8(3): 11-13.

Governor’s Watershed Enhancement Board (GWEB). 1998. A quick explanation of Oregon’s watershed council partnership program. Salem OR.

Griffin, C.B. 1999. The growing popularity of watershed-based organizations. Water Resources Impact 1(1): 7-8.

Huntington, C.W., and S. Sommarstrom. 2000. An Evaluation of Selected Watershed Councils in the Pacific Northwest and Northern California. Parts I, II, III. Prepared for Trout Unlimited and Pacific Rivers Council, Eugene, OR. 140 pp. [http://www.pacrivers.org/publications/council.html]

Kenney, D.S. 1999. Are community-based watershed groups really effective? Confronting the thorny issue of measuring success. Chronicle of Community 3(2): 33-37.

Sommarstrom, S. 1994. Moving mountains to keep a mountain from moving: The French Creek watershed case study. Pages 45-48 in: Proceedings of the 4^th Biennial Watershed Management Council Conference. Univ. of Calif. Water Resources Center Report, No. 81, Davis CA.

Sommarstrom, S. 2000. The state role in local watershed councils. River Voices 11(2): 16-18.