Watershed restoration in the Skokomish, WA

The Kitsap Sun published a great article Saturday about road removal and other watershed restoration efforts in the Skokomish watershed in Washington.

The opening line in the article reads as follows:

    "The Skokomish River is sick, experts say, and intensive care is needed for any hope of recovery."

The article goes on to explain the kind of intensive care that's happening in the Skokomish, to the tune of nearly $5 million worth of needed restoration (with only a small portion of that money already raised).  The Skokomish Watershed Action Team (SWAT), a diverse coalitoin of agency staff, tribes, conservationists, land owners and others, has helped raise money for this much needed work, including some of the Legacy Roads and Trails Remediation Initiative funds that Wildlands CPR and others advocated for last year.   

The Kitsap story also talks about the cost of the current "Big Dig" contract that is happening right now.  Implied, but not specifically discussed, is the fact that projects such as this employ lots of people.  It would have been great if the Sun reporter had included some numbers highlighting how many people got good jobs working on this project.

Near the end of the article, the reporter talks about how stewardship contracting funds are being used to pay for some of the restoration in the watershed.  Stewardship contracting funds can be a great tool for funding restoration, but they don't work everywhere, since in many cases, the revenue generated from the stewardship sale is not enough to actually pay for the needed restoration.   

It's great to see a story in the paper that highlights how a cooperative effort to fix a damaged watershed is working, and working well.  Great job by the Skokomish Watershed Action Team, let's hope they're able to raise the rest of the funding they need to fully restore this watershed.