Below are links to offsite resources providing more information on local restoration projects, science and studies on Capitol Lake and the Deschutes Estuary, Puget Sound, local history, and our partners. Information on the Environmental Impact Statement Process and our Watershed Guide can be found on the tabs below the resource page.
DERT Publications
Since being founded in 2009 DERT has collaborated on a number of reports and publications to help people understand the choice we have in front of us. We have also sent out newsletters, produced our Deschutes Watershed Guide, and produced several videos to help engage with our local community. (There are also a few items here we didn’t create, but think you should see.) We try to keep this list up to date, but if you can’t find what you want, contact us!
2016 Deschutes River Watershed Guide
This guide attempts to provide you with a range of information: the history and geology of our watershed and the impacts it has survived with industrialization and urbanization. We, in our daily lives, experience only a small piece of the life of a watershed, and our understanding is limited by our perspective. The hope is that this guide will encourage you to make your own study of this territory, to ask questions and seek answers, to move up and down the watershed’s accessible places and to really understand the scope of the Deschutes River watershed. It is our further hope, that with this understanding, you will grow to cherish the watershed’s unique place on Puget Sound … at the beginning of the Salish Sea.
Problems with the Dual Basin “Compromise”
The Dual Basin option has long been seen by some as a compromise between restoration advocates and Lake advocates. DERT outlined the problems with a solution that meets neither group’s goals in our official response to this option, submitted to the Washington State Department of Enterprise Services in 2016. READ MORE
2015 Handout advocating restoration
This is a short (four page) summary of DERT’s position and advocacy for restoration. READ MORE
Estuary Science
Puget Sound: A Uniquely Diverse and Productive Estuary
Water Quality Issues in Deschutes River and Budd Inlet Tributaries
Press
Works in Progress – An important milestone that could lead to a free-flowing Deschutes River, by Charlotte Persons, April 1st 2022
Videos
Festival of the Steh Chas
Produced by Salmon Defense, this “Highlights from the Festival of the Steh Chass” clip features local leaders from Tribal and State governments as well as music from the event. (4 minutes, 2018)
Freeing the River: interviews with stakeholders
Interviews with people living in and around Olympia, about the impact the polluted Reflecting Lake has on their lives, and the benefits a restored Estuary could provide. (5 minutes, 2018)
Steh-Chass people’s connection to the Estuary
Charlene Krise, Vice Chairman of the Squaxin Island Tribal Council discusses the history of the Steh-Chass people, and the ways it interacts with the Deschutes Estuary, at DERT’s “Whats Up with the Steh Chass” forum. (17 minutes, 2018)
Estuary Restoration buffers Olympia from climate change
Candace Penn Squaxin Island Ecologist speaks about the benefits of Estuary restoration for combating climate change and reducing the flooding Olympia will experience at DERT’s “What’s Up with the Steh Chass” forum. (10 minutes, 2018)
Turning the Tide
Turning the Tide is a three minute animated video produced for DERT to make the case for restoration of the estuary and encourage people to support DERT.
Blue Caron – A story from the Snohomish Estuary
Skokomish Estuary restoration on Hood Canal. In 2007 dikes were breached creating 129 acres of tidal marsh habitat:
Zis a ba Estuary restoration project led by the Stillaguamish Tribe in October 2017:
Links to 2019 DERT Forum Power Points:
Links to 2018 DERT Forum Power Points:
