{"id":191,"date":"2011-08-24T17:55:17","date_gmt":"2011-08-25T00:55:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.obwb.ca\/blog\/?p=191"},"modified":"2014-08-22T14:07:58","modified_gmt":"2014-08-22T21:07:58","slug":"osoyoos-lake-bringing-international-agreements-down-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/2011\/08\/osoyoos-lake-bringing-international-agreements-down-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Osoyoos Lake – bringing international agreements down home"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Wherever you go, there you are<\/em>” – Mac Rauch (Buckaroo Banzai)<\/p>\n

\n

There will be heavy-hitters from Ottawa and Washington D.C. in Osoyoos next month, but they won’t be wearing dark suits and carrying brief cases.\u00a0 They’ll be listening and talking to US and Canadian\u00a0locals about the renewal of the Osoyoos Lake Operating Orders, hearing water science updates, and sharing\u00a0in-season sockeye salmon, apples and pears.<\/p>\n

I’m really interested in the potential of this cultural and political mixing, and the\u00a0opportunity to be innovative when you take\u00a0a bilateral\u00a0agreement down home.<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a><\/dt>\n
Bringing it all back home: In 2007, locals from the towns of Osoyoos and Oliver (in Canada) gathered with residents of Oroville and other communities just south of the border, joined by leading scientists, politicians, policy makers and agency folks – to discuss international policy for Osoyoos Lake.<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<\/div>\n

Every good relationship needs care and communication – including our international\u00a0co-habitation\u00a0of\u00a0Osoyoos Lake, which crosses the 49th parallel.\u00a0 Most Canadians are a bit on edge about the US thirst for water. We want to cooperate, but there is a cautious pragmatism.\u00a0 The Okanagan has relatively low flows, and we rely on irrigated agriculture.\u00a0 On the other side, they have\u00a0trouble in the Okanogan <\/em>(American spelling)\u00a0 “keeping up with the Canadians<\/a>,” who come in droves to buy inexpensive vacation properties. The Americans have irrigated agriculture and water concerns of their own.<\/p>\n

Then there are those that know no boundaries – the easternmost run of Pacific sockeye<\/a> salmon in the Columbia are enjoying\u00a0their second record-breaking year in a row for\u00a0Osoyoos Lake and the Okanagan River.\u00a0 This has huge significance for the Okanagan Nation, the Syilx people <\/a>who have relied on and celebrated these salmon <\/a>for thousands of years.<\/p>\n

In September, the Town of Osoyoos will host the 2011 Osoyoos Lake Water Science Forum<\/a>: \u201cShared water, shared future: bridges to sustainability for Osoyoos Lake<\/em>\u201d.\u00a0 It is a follow-up to a 2007 Forum<\/a>, but a step forward – very interesting and very unusual.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Forum is interesting because Osoyoos Lake, straddling the border, makes every local issue an international one.\u00a0 And these local issues are some of the hot topics of our times: water shortages, floods and climate change, pollution, endangered species, and the recovery of the eastern-most sockeye run. A major part of the program will be the public\u00a0review of eight studies, sponsored by the International Joint Commission (IJC)<\/a>, to inform the 2013 renewal of operating orders for Zosel Dam<\/a>, which controls the level of Osoyoos Lake (and indirectly the water flows).<\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Looking north to the Canadian Basins of Osoyoos Lake - photo by Dan Millar<\/p><\/div>\n

The forum is unusual because there is a lot on the table, but the communities around Osoyoos Lake \u2013 north and south \u2013 are close and friendly, and they want to work things out in the best way possible. The solution is to bring together scientists, locals, and political folks to talk about the health of the lake, the water flows, what\u2019s being done, and what\u2019s still needed. This, my friends, is what all our political processes should be like.<\/p>\n

My feeling is that the Forum will also be something of a foreshadowing of the negotiations for the Columbia\u00a0River Treaty<\/a> (2014), where big money (hydro-power production) and big water (think Grand Coulee Dam<\/a>) will be\u00a0sharing the table with issues of indigenous rights and fisheries concerns.\u00a0The 2013 renewal agreement for Osoyoos Lake is much smaller in scope, but many of the same agencies, actors,\u00a0and issues are involved.<\/p>\n

Both agreements involve the IJC, and both primarily relate to flood control, but there is no way to get around the fact that other interests and concerns come into play. The State of Washington has been doing a range of studies related to water in the Columbia Basin, and is about to roll out a water supply and demand report<\/a>. In Osoyoos, I will be making a presentation about a 3-year, multi-agency water supply and demand study <\/a>we just completed for the Okanagan Basin.<\/p>\n

On both sides of the border, and in both Basins, governments and residents are trying to determine how to adjust to a future that will likely have more rain in the winter (flood potential) and less rain in the summer (water shortages).<\/p>\n

So along with addressing local problems, and bringing the science to the people, the\u00a0Osoyoos Forum is an ideal warm-up to the Treaty process.\u00a0 This is an opportunity for the various actors to break bread, share information, and build a collaborative working relationship.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Wherever you go, there you are” – Mac Rauch (Buckaroo Banzai) There will be heavy-hitters from Ottawa and Washington D.C. in Osoyoos next month, but they won’t be wearing dark suits and carrying brief cases.\u00a0 They’ll be listening and talking … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,39,6,38],"tags":[41,42,50,13,48],"class_list":["post-191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-governance-2","category-international-joint-commission","category-okwater","category-osoyoos-lake","tag-ijc","tag-osoyoos","tag-salmon","tag-governance","tag-water-planning"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191"}],"version-history":[{"count":44,"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":263,"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191\/revisions\/263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/obwb.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}