?The proposal is very comprehensive in its presentation and provides good detail about work accomplished and anticipated. It identifies a number of very fruitful areas for monitoring and measurement over the duration of the project. Because of the many items identified that are worth study, the proposal sponsors will have to prioritize areas of research.

The objectives could be improved by restatement as desired outcomes, such as noted in the review comments under "major accomplishments."

1. Purpose: Significance to Regional Programs, Technical Background, and Objectives

The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Community of Oregon (CTGR) has chosen to represent its interests and engage in technical and policy issues with resource managers in the Willamette/Lower Columbia Basin. For the CTRG, fish, wildlife, and botanical resources “provided the basis of cultural customs, tribal identity, and had significant spiritual connections.”

Significance to regional programs: The project's significance is placed within the consultation requirements of the Northwest Power Act, the need to represent the CTGR perspective on fish and wildlife recovery issues within the CRB through interaction with the NPCC, Action Agencies, BPA, ODFW and other entities. A focus is on meeting the requirements of the 2008 Willamette BiOp and contributing efforts to strengthen the emphasis on Willamette Basin issues within the Fish and Wildlife Program.

Problem statement: A complete problem statement emphasizes the cultural importance of fish and wildlife resources to the CTGR. Some history is provided on the decline in resources traditionally used by the CTGR. The problem statement notes the complexity of managing resource recovery within the context of human development and competition for limited resources. The CTGR seek coordination funding to enable more effective participation as a partner in resource planning, development of decision documents and decision making.

Objectives: The project has two objectives: 1. Support tribal participation; 2. Manage BPA contract. Neither is worded in terms of desired outcomes. Deliverables include participation on the Willamette Action Team for Ecosystem Recovery (WATER), participation in Columbia Basin and regional coordination, management, administration, and reporting of contract outcomes.

Limiting factors: The proposal presents a good statement tying the ability to participate in various regional meetings to the ability to track emerging limiting factors such as human population growth and international trade. The proposal credits the NPCC monthly meetings as an excellent forum for information transmission on issues such as global warming, gas saturation, and invasive species.

2. History: Accomplishments, Results, and Adaptive Management (ISRP Review of Results)

The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Community of Oregon (CTGR) seek coordination support because, “On many occasions, Tribal comments appear to be merely filed as the apparent federal draft action becomes final with no incorporation or discussions with the Tribe on their issues. The project financial history begins in 2010. The Grand Ronde Tribe Coordination report in Pisces is one of the most comprehensive and complete of the current reports that are available to regional coordination proposal reviewers.

Financial performance and history: A budget history is provided. Tribal cost share is acknowledged.

Major accomplishments: This is a new project, so technically there are no results to evaluate. Historical data on performance is available with the project, “Proposal RESCAT-1989-062-01 - Program Coordination and Facilitation Services provided through the Columbia Basin Fish and Wildlife Foundation.” See the section, “Reporting & Contracted Deliverables Performance.” The proposal’s detailed statement begins with reiterating the importance of funding to the effective participation of the CTGR Tribe in the development and implementation of the Fish and Wildlife Program. Actions taken are presented with explanations as to their significance. They note that accomplishments are “stepping stones” in meeting the larger desired result, which is to ensure that the NPCC Fish and Wildlife Program and the Willamette Subbasin Plan reflect the Tribe's preferences. As a desired outcome, this could be listed as an objective of the coordination funding.

Adaptive management: This section is focused on the need to incorporate tribal perspectives in various documents so that adaptive management can effectively function.

3. Project Relationships, Emerging Limiting Factors, and Tailored Questions for Type of Work (hatchery, RME, tagging)
The geographic interest is primarily the Willamette Basin in the Willamette/Lower Columbia region. In addition, CTGR works with Basinwide programs to restore bull trout.

Project relationships: No project relationships are described, although the list of interactions and participation on various regional efforts presented as accomplishments would suggest that this project is at least communicating with other projects.

Limiting factors: A good statement tying the ability to participate in various regional meetings to the ability to track emerging limiting factors such as human population growth and international trade.

While this is a new proposal, thinking about scientific contributions that might be made during the current funding period is desirable. More specific attention to identifying a scientific component to the proposal help plan for future success. Comparing the three major RME coordination activities, WATER Habitat Technical Team, Willamette Wildlife Mitigation Group, and Willamette BiOp implementation, are there insights about coordination approaches that are particularly useful or not useful?

The proposal says, “Tribal technical staff has minimal access to agency data and information, which in many instances, this inaccessible data resources tend to drive decision making processes for the Willamette BiOp.” A proposal outcome would be to observe the adequacy of data and its relation to Fish and Wildlife Program and Willamette BiOp outcomes.

An observation is made, “The parties will use an ecosystem approach, which means that wildlife projects under the Agreement are expected in many cases to provide dual benefits for both wildlife and fish, and may also address other species and resources of interest to Tribes and regional stakeholders that would benefit from the wildlife projects.” This seems like a very important concept in which more is achieved in terms of Fish and Wildlife Program objectives than with single species approaches. Can data be gathered to show how coordination improves or does not improve an ecosystem approach? Does this suggest changes to Fish and Wildlife Program objectives?

This proposal identifies a number of very important issues that could be framed as one or more hypotheses that would show the value of coordination. Monitoring of these relationships would be very valuable in showing the value of coordination and how coordination procedures might be improved. This could be framed in an adaptive management context where the lessons learned from this project inform the next.

4. Deliverables, Work Elements, Metrics, and Methods

Deliverables: The project has seven deliverables related to participation and reports. The deliverables are well described and related to the objectives.

Regional coordination activities: The proposal describes planned work in six areas: Data management (5%); monitoring and evaluation (20%); develop biological objectives (5%); review of technical documents and processes (30%); coordination of projects, programs and funding sources (30%); and information dissemination (10%). A detailed description of how the work is performed is provided for each.

Work elements: Five work elements are identified – 99. Outreach and Education, 114. Identify and Select Projects, 122. Provide Technical Review, 189. Coordination-Columbia Basinwide, and 191. Watershed Coordination. Only 99 has metrics, but they are more inputs rather than outcomes. Can output metrics be identified to go with these work elements? Ideally, the hypothesis(es) developed in the proposal would be measured during the course of the coordination activities and results presented in the report on this project. There are many ideas discussed in the proposal that are amenable to this approach. Selecting a few of the most important questions, concerns, or hypotheses and monitoring them is recommended.

4a. Specific comments on protocols and methods described in MonitoringMethods.org

The protocols for the five work elements are published but do not provide adequate guidance on the methods and metrics. Guidance is available from ISRP (2007-14:2). Project sponsors should design the metrics into their proposal and identify methods for measurement.