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On March 16, 2022, The Department of Enterprise Services (DES) announced that they had selected a preliminary preferred alternative on how to manage the mouth of the Deschutes river – the currently dammed estuary that formed Capitol Lake. The “preferred alternative” is the end result of the evaluation of alternatives under the State Environmental Protection Act (SEPA) that has been underway since 2016. Here is the DES announcement:
Here is the DES announcement:
“Enterprise Services and the EIS Project Team have completed a robust evaluation of the alternatives against the preferred alternative selection criteria that are described in the Draft EIS and have identified the Estuary Alternative as the likely preferred alternative. Enterprise Services concluded that the Estuary Alternative is expected to best achieve project goals and represents a more durable decision than the other alternatives evaluated.
It is important to note that identifying a likely preferred alternative is not a final decision. Designation of a preferred alternative prior to issuance of the Final EIS in no way restricts final decisions. It also does not alleviate the EIS Project Team of additional technical analyses that must still be completed for the Final EIS, in which the final decision will be presented on the preferred alternative.
However, while some technical findings in the Final EIS will likely be revised, the changes are unlikely to be significant enough across the range of technical analyses to change the likely preferred alternative. It is expected that the likely preferred alternative will be confirmed as the preferred alternative in the Final EIS. “
Work on the Final EIS will be conducted in six more meetings of the Funding and Governance Workgroup, and the final EIS will be released this fall by October 31, 2022. Funding will be sought in the 2023-2025 Biennial Budget that will be developed and adopted in the long legislative session in 2023.
What does this all mean? For DERT it means that with your help and support, with your continual belief in restoring the Deschutes Estuary, we have been able to educate and inspire the community towards a clean water future. Thank you for everything you have done since DERT was created in 2009. There is still a lot of work to do – but what a milestone we have reached today!! Stay tuned for how you can continue to help us see estuary restoration become a reality.
Sincerely,
The DERT Board of Directors
