Around 125 people attended the First Annual One Truckee River Stakeholder Forum last week at the McKinley Arts and Culture Center on the banks of the river in downtown Reno. The forum brought together knowledgeable people from public safety, academia, government, and non-government groups (The Nature Conservancy, Great Basin Bird Observatory and many others) to discuss what to include in a new overall plan for the Truckee River. Sponsors of the event were the Nevada Land Trust and Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful.
Since the forum just last week, NLT and KTMB have released a Request for Proposal for a qualified firm to write a plan which will address all the issues discussed at the forum and culminate with presentations of the final plan before the cities of Reno and Sparks and Washoe County and “2-3 presentations” to the stakeholder group. The plan is to address the Truckee River reach that includes most of the Truckee Meadows from the Mayberry area to the Reno-Sparks Water Reclamation Facility, approximately 15 miles of the river. Broadly, the plan is to address the following “emerging issues”:
- Water Quality
- Social Issues
- Stewardship
- Ecosystem
- Quality of Life
- Public Safety
- Funding
- Recreation
- Education
Most residents and visitors to the Truckee Meadows are most familiar with this portion of the river. We hope that this plan will result in improvement to the river experience and the improved function of the river: more space for the river, protecting and enhancing the riparian corridor and protecting native trees and acknowledging that keeping water in the river is essential for the river to remain a resource for all of us. Likewise, public safety and preventing vandalism along this river reach is essential to gaining the support of Truckee Meadows residents. (See my recent post of the good and the ugly along the Truckee River trail through the Truckee Meadows.)
I support the current effort as a positive step that, hopefully, will lead to improving the Truckee River through the Truckee Meadows.
Floating the river is a popular summer activity which depends on adequate river flows.
