Water Quality Monitoring and Assessment Activities
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Central
Coast Ambient Monitoring Program(CCAMP)
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The Foundation provides technical and scientific assistance to the Central
Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board 's CCAMP program. This program
was originated in 1998 to coordinate existing water quality and habitat
data, and to establish new water and habitat monitoring efforts for the
Central Coast of California from Santa Barbara county in the South to Santa
Cruz county in the north. The Foundation supports CCAMP (at no charge)
through web site development and management, data management and software
development, and other types of technical activities.
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Friends
of the Estuary at Morro Bay Volunteer Monitoring Program
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The Friends of the Estuary at Morro Bay have established a volunteer monitoring
program for the Morro Bay Estuary and watershed. Beginning in fiscal year
2000 this program will receive funding through a USEPA Clean Water Act
319(h) grant. The Bay Foundation will aid the Friends' new program by coordinating
data management activities with those of the Central Coast Ambient Monitoring
Program and by ensuring that the Friends' web site can make data available
to users.
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Monterey
Bay Citizen Watershed Monitoring Network
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The Foundation is providing data management and analysis support and web
development support to the Center for Marine Conservation and the Coastal
Watershed Council in their program to coordinate and enhance volunteer
monitoring projects for the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary.
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Morro
Bay National Monitoring Program
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For a number of years the Foundation has worked with the Central Coast
Regional Water Quality Control Board in support of this USEPA sponsored
10-year program. The program is focused on monitoring the effectiveness
of best management practices on agricultural land. Foundation efforts have
focused on data management and statistical analysis. The program involves
both a highly focused study of two paired watersheds and an array of ambient
monitoring sites. While the program still has several years to go before
completion, significant findings have already been produced in the areas
of bacterial contamination and sediment transport. The seventh annual Non-Point
Source Monitoring Workshop was held here in Morro Bay in September of 1999.
Two hundred scientists and experts in various fields attended the conference.
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Aquatic
Bioassessment Laboratory
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Working with the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, the
Foundation has developed prototype software tools for analyzing benthic
invertebrate community assemblages as a measure of water and aquatic habitat
quality. The efforts will continue and hopefully contribute to a suite
of software tools that implement the statewide California Rapid Bioassessment
Protocols and encourage the use of biological monitoring.
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California
Ambient Water Quality Monitoring and Clean Water Act Section 303(d) Program
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The Foundation is serving on a Public Advisory Group(PAG) to the State
Water Resources Control Board to meet the objectives of Assembly Bill 982(Ducheny)
in the development of a new ambient water quality monitoring program for
the State of California. The PAG is also reviewing California's Total Maximum
Daily Load program, as mandated by CWA Section 303(d) and will make recommendations
for improvement. The group consists of 12 representives of the regulated
community and twelve environmental organizations.
