The authors propose to enhance the collection and organization of spatial hydrography data for Washington, Oregon, and Northern California, and make it readily and freely available on the web. The value of well-integrated natural resource databases for a variety of users can be imagined. However, the proposal provides no references to establish the need for these databases or how extensively they are (would be) used. URLs that point the reviewer to the existing databases are found at the end of the narrative, but the proposal gives no sense of how the integration of these databases could have fish and wildlife benefits in the Columbia River Basin.

The Fish and Wildlife Program, BiOp's, or other such plans or programs are not mentioned. Other, Washington-state datasets are discussed in a general way, but no specifics or references/URLs are provided. The proponents made very little attempt to link this effort with other Fish and Wildlife Program supported projects. It is not clear how this activity would be linked to all the other databases in the Columbia River Basin, if at all. This effort began as regional partnership for development of data sharing system. How does this relate to StreamNet? Do we have duplication? There are a lot of other systems doing similar things, but the issue of duplication is not addressed. They should describe how this system would work in relation to all other database efforts in the Fish and Wildlife Program.

The proposal provides a very detailed presentation of objectives and specific tasks, with detailed timelines (even meetings are scheduled). This is a good, systematic plan for accomplishing the tasks, starting with setting up rules for incorporating and integrating data. After that data rules are established, WRIA 25 would be implemented as a test case. After appropriate adjustments, including feedback from the agencies, they would proceed to implement the other WRIAs. The only thing missing is a tie to particular Columbia River Basin objectives.

This project might have many benefits to focal and non-focal species, but the specific value of this effort/datasets was not addressed in the proposal. No qualifications statements/resumes for the participants are provided.