The purpose of the Inter-Tribal Monitoring Data Project (ITMD) is to assist CRITFC and its member tribes in the timely and accurate capture, storage, processing, and dissemination of data for management of anadromous fish and their habitats.


There are four main objectives for the project.

1. Assist CRITFC and member tribes to develop cost effective computer architectures and data management strategies for anadromous fish and habitat data. This entails developing pilot systems and tools and demonstrating cost effective ways to collect, store, summarize, and disseminate fish and habitat data. Assisting in the construction of defensible accounting systems for tribal natural resources. Converting successful pilot projects into production computer applications as resources allow.

2. Provide data management services to the tribes. These take a variety of forms, but include:
a. Partial support for tribal data coordinators (in this expanded proposal),
b. Developing shared data capture, management, and reporting tools for CRITFC and member tribes,
c. Expert advice and coordination of efforts, especially through the annual Tribal Data Workshops, and
d. Limited support for tribal infrastructure through one-time purchases of hardware and software.

3. Assist member tribes to build internal capacity for improved data management and to achieve the tribal gravel-to-gravel management vision of the Commission. Combine local data from tribal sources with regional and international data on mainstem, estuary and ocean impacts on salmon and salmon management decisions; and

4. Enable tribal participation in regional data management and coordination processes: provide tribal input and coordination on regional coordination of data management, sharing best practices, and facilitate inter-tribal coordination on the level of monitoring data.


At the end of the first five years of the project, a suite of pilot projects has been developed, and some pilots have already displayed demonstrable success and have been moved into production. A functional design for a coordinated tribal data architecture has been completed and a detailed design is under development. The data management approach and technology used in the current pilot projects has proven successful, and can be applied elsewhere. The expectation is that the technologies used in the pilots will be used to address priorities identified in the Coordinated Assessment process and the BPA Data Management Framework.

ITMD system architectures depend on a few simple principles developed over 30 years of building complex applications and computer systems.

1. The most cost effective and fastest data management systems are those that enter field data only one time. It is always more expensive to re-enter the same data into multiple formats (e.g. paper forms, spreadsheets and databases).

2. QA and QC should be as close to the field staff as possible. The person who collects the data is the best at performing QA/QC on that data, for he/she knows the most about the data. QA/QC is far more accurate and cost effective when first performed by the field staff. QA/QC may also be needed upstream as data is analyzed, aggregated, and summarized.

3. Defensible accounting needs to be an integral part of the system design. Chain of custody and chain of evidence are concepts used in the legal system to describe the admissibility of certain kinds of data. A paper trail and an audit trail are a good start. Transparency means being able to show your work at every level of derivation. Data in the Columbia Basin is often subjected to scientific, judicial, and policy review; data management systems must make it simple and cost effective to trace the results of an analysis back to data collection in the field, and responsibility for the data collection must be able to be traced back to identifiable field staff.

4. To get buy-in from the field staff, provide tools that actually make their job easier. To get management buy-in, provide aggregated data more accurately and timely than previously available.

5. Minimize fish handling, minimize stress on fish. When monitoring ESA listed fish in the Columbia Basin, there are so many concurrent studies, over handling of fish is a recurrent problem. Monitoring Programs should be designed to collect the minimum amount of data required to ensure the survival of the species and the recovery of the species.

6. Focus effort on getting the field data into tribal data repositories using SQL servers configured similar to the Central Database Management System (CDMS) developed by the CTUIR. Store each project’s data in tables designed for the individual project, and assemble the individual project tables into a master table when feasible. Once the master tables are available, they can be used to produce the CA Indicator tables. Once data is in an SQL/CDMS server, it is a relatively simple matter to aggregate and summarize the data into various formats. SQL/CDMS servers connected to GIS and web services (using. AngularJS) provide one the most flexible method of outputting monitoring data into whatever formats management needs (GIS, Tabular, Graphic) now and in the future.

7. Build on existing field data collection methods and practices whenever possible to minimize training expense and disruption of current field data collection efforts.

8. Access to the raw monitoring data should be controlled by the data originator to insure proper interpretation of the information.


Current Pilot and Production Projects using digital pen technology and web services architecture include the following:

1. Bonneville Adult Fish Facility Data Management
2. Snake River Harvest Estimate
3. Zone 6 Harvest Estimate (Nez Perce component)
4. Zone 6 Harvest estimate (Yakama Nation)
5. Genetics sampling data management (Yakama Nation)
6. Below Bonneville Harvest Estimate (Nez Perce component)
7. Willamette Falls Lamprey Data Management
8. Klickitat Basin Surveys
a. Spawner Patch Survey
b. Habitat Unit Survey
c. Large woody debris survey
d. Stream Bedrock survey
e. Large woody debris jam survey
f. Discharge data
g. Electrofishing survey
h. Sampling events tracking table
i. Stream Survey Tracking table showing reaches for each stream


These projects all use paper forms and a digital pen to collect field data. This approach produces both a paper copy and an electronic copy of the data in one step. The data is transmitted to a web site in the cloud where an electronic copy of each form can be viewed by field staff from any web browser.

There are two QA/QC steps to insure accuracy before adding data to the database system. First, validation codes in each cell allows for range checking, lookup tables, and other constraints to reduce transcription and other errors. Second, field staff visually review the data to insure the OCR software has correctly interpreted the hand-written values on the data sheets before sending the data via web services to an SQL server hosted by the appropriate entity, be it CRITFC or a member tribe. Summarization, aggregation, and other data processing takes place on the SQL/CDMS servers, and the data is almost instantly made available on web sites under tribal management control in whatever form is required. Once the data is hosted on an SQL/CDMS server, it is a simple programming task to output it into whatever form is needed, on whatever schedule is needed (for example, DETs).

A digital copy of each form in the PDF format is also generated by this process, so one can trace any estimate back to the original paper forms, or an electronic scan of the original paper forms.


Other current pilot and production projects include:

1. CRITFC Web based tag loss application for estimating tag loss.
2. CRITFC Cloud Secure Tribal Repository (CCSTR) pronounced like 'sister'.
3. CRITFC Habitat Group snorkle survey database
4. CRITFC Habitat Group habitat data database
5. CRITFC GIS archive

Current resources are focused on assisting the tribes to get field data consolidated on tribal SQL/CDMS servers under the appropriate tribal management control. Project data will be stored in individual tables, and when feasible, a master table will be developed to consolidate data from multiple projects. Current funding supports the ongoing activities of the ITMD, and some new development. Additional resources are required to produce the estimates and analyses currently desired by the Coordinated Assessment Project from the existing field data. If the field data is consolidated under management control on SQL/CDMS servers, it is a straightforward task to produce any format of output that the Coordinated Assessment (DESs) or management groups may require.

Appendix M of the "Columbia River Basin Collaborative Data Sharing Strategy: Salmon and Steelhead Population Abundance and Productivity Indicators," completed in 2011, describes Tier 1 high priority data gaps that need to be filled to enable CRITFC member tribes to begin development of the three initial CA products for ESA listed populations. As the tribes gain capacity for data management, the question of sharing the three CA indicators with the region becomes largely a management issue, once the technical side of the problem is reduced to a manageable level.

The additional funds needed to fill these Tier 1 gaps is 351,000/annually on an ongoing basis. $1,000,000 in additional funding has been provided, which will enable the Tribal Data Network to initially address the goals of the Collaborative Data Sharing Strategy, and the Framework for Fish and Wildlife Program Data Management for 3.5 years. We are updating the 2011 assessment of data management needs described in the updated tribal Data Management Strategic Plans and in light of experience to date. This task will be completed in 2014.

Consistent with the four objectives of this project, each tribal subcontract contains six objectives focused on integration of tribal efforts with the regional Coordinated Assessment Project:

1. A Data Inventory for all BPA funded projects for each tribe, including metadata
2. Report on progress for a Tribal Data Management Strategy for each tribe
3. Report on progress on producing Monitoring Data Sharing Agreements for each tribe
4. Identification of and if practicable transfer of data sets and (VSP) estimates useful for regional management
5.  Metadata submitted to www.cbfish.org, www.monitoringmethods.org, www.monitoringresources.org, and in z39.85 format.
6. Data management tools developed to meet individual tribal data needs.

The specific statements of work and deliverables for each of the Tribal Data Stewards are found in attachments.