West Coast Estuaries Initiative for Puget Sound under the Targeted Watersheds Grant Program
Request For Proposals Release and Proposed Selection Schedule
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| Proposals must be received in hardcopy by U.S. EPA Region 10 by 5:00 PM Pacific Standard Time or stamped electronically through Grants.gov by 5:00 PM Pacific Standard Time.
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| Finalists notified and requested to negotiate and submit a formal application package. |
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| Grant applications and work plans received via hardcopy or through Grants.gov. |
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| Awards made. |
Description of Grant Program and Funding
U.S. EPA Region 10 is soliciting proposals under this announcement to support the protection and restoration of high valued Puget Sound aquatic resources in areas threatened by growth pressure through holistic watershed protection and management approaches at the local level. The grant funds will assist local and tribal governments in managing land uses while protecting watershed functions and values. Successful projects will match proposed activities to the appropriate watershed scale to ensure environmental results.
The total amount available to Region 10 is $2.5 million dollars. We plan to award 4 - 10 cooperative agreements for the Puget Sound basin. Awards will range from approximately $250,000 to $625,000 and have a project period of two to four years.
Eligible Applicants, Activities and Outcomes
Eligible Applicants
Entities of local governments, special purpose districts and federally recognized Indian tribes in the greater Puget Sound Basin are eligible to apply. State agencies, institutions of higher learning and non-governmental entities are not eligible to directly receive grant awards under this announcement; however, EPA encourages tribes and local governments to solicit their participation as local collaborators.
Eligible Activities
Local and tribal governments are at various stages of developing and applying effective and robust watershed programs. Some need to improve the scientific understanding of their watersheds. Others understand how their watersheds work and need assistance implementing the plan. A “watershed” can range from a small drainage analysis unit to a larger basin or tributary system, such as a Water Resource Inventory Area (WRIA). Successful proposal will match proposed activities to the appropriate scale watershed to ensure activities will lead to an environmental result. EPA will give preference to multifaceted proposals that lead to measurable outcomes or proposals that fill critical program needs leading to significant environmental results. Therefore, a wide range of activities will be eligible including, but not limited to, proposals that:
- Enhance and implement watershed protection and restoration plans, land use and transportation plans, basin plans, stormwater controls, and/or land development standards to maintain native vegetation and natural hydrology by protecting and restoring wetland, riparian, upland, and near shore habitats and ecological processes.
- Refine and implement watershed, land use plans based on watershed models predicting hydrologic impacts of alternative, future land cover conditions, development scenarios, and resulting aquatic resource conditions.
- Develop and carry out laws, ordinances, and incentive programs to implement watershed programs such as systematic implementation of low impact development in sensitive basins (unless engineering analyses demonstrate that is infeasible), land acquisition, and transfer of development rights approaches and techniques.
- Increase watershed data and information available to local decision-makers who write and implement laws, ordinances, and permits.
- Monitor and measure watershed indicators to report on restoration or protection activities.
- Implement watershed-based, interagency monitoring and public involvement and education efforts to establish and run stream-team type approaches that monitor and assess conditions and trends of water quality and aquatic resources.
Successful proposals will demonstrate how activities address the impacts of growth while achieving watershed protection and restoration goals.
Outcomes
Outcomes expected as a result of the awards under this announcement could include:
- Actual on-the-ground water restoration or protection projects put in place.
- Baseline and resulting water quality monitoring data that indicate measurable environmental improvement.
- Local ordinances passed aimed at protection and restoration of water quality and aquatic resources.
- Enhanced public participation and awareness of water quality issues at the community level.
- Transfer of knowledge among watershed groups across the nation.
- Protected high quality water or improved water quality, Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 303(d) delisting of streams, or increased recreation or subsistence use of water bodies.
- Protecting Aquatic Ecosystems: A Guide for Puget Sound Planners to Understand Watershed Processes
- Ecosystem Services Enhanced by Salmon Habitat Conservation in the Green/Duwamish and Central Puget Sound Watershed
- Draft Birch Bay Watershed Characterization Pilot Study
- Alternative Futures as a watershed protection tool
- Alternative Futures in Puget Sound: The Chico Creek project as a model of integrated land use planning and resource protection (PDF) (12pp, 81K)
- Evaluation of Economic Incentives for Decentralized Stormwater Runoff Management: Shepherd Creek Watershed
- Shepherd Creek Watershed Pilot Project, Water Quality Component
- Using Market Forces to Implement Sustainable Stormwater Development
- A Sustainable Approach to Stormwater Management
