SMART Planning & USACE Feasibility Studies Guide to Coordination and Engagement with the Services Planning CoP Webinar September 8, 2015 Transcript

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This webinar is part of a series of information-sharing webinars hosted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Planning Community of Practice. In this webinar, Sue Hughes, Deputy for Planning, and Evie Haberer, Office of Water Project Review, are joined by Jason Miller from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Cathy Tortorici from the National Marine Fisheries Services and Rachel Mesko from USACE’s Seattle District to discuss opportunities for collaboration between USACE and the Services in the SMART Planning Process. For more information on Planning training opportunities and options, visit the Community of Planning Toolbox. The Guide to Coordination and Engagement with the Services is available online on the Planning Community Toolbox. Sue Hughes: Good morning and good afternoon everyone. I’m Sue Hughes and I’m really pleased to be here today. I’m surrounded by folks from Washington either in the Corps Headquarters office, US Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). We’ve been working a long time to provide you with this webinar to give you information on the Guide to Coordination and Engagement with the Services. Back when we first started talking about SMART Planning, which Evie is going to discuss in a little more in detail, we knew up front that we needed to engage with the agencies to be successful. We started talking with Fish & Wildlife Service and NMFS but didn’t really have a good framework, just some concepts and ideas about how the resource agencies fit into the SMART Planning process. We did a Webinar back in August 2013 to kick that off. Since that time, we’ve been working on this Guide that provides a more detailed framework for how we engage and how to work more efficiently during the Corps feasibility study process in this era of limited budget and limited resources. We rolled out the Guide back in September 2015. Some of you are aware of it and are using it. For others, this is probably your first experience with it. Today’s purpose is to give you an introduction to the Guide, show you where to go to get more information and most importantly enable you to have a more detailed dialogue at a regional and local level. Those relationships really matter. So again, welcome to this webinar. I’d like to offer Jason Miller from the Fish & Wildlife Service an opportunity to provide some opening remarks. Jason Miller (USFWS): Thanks Sue and thank you for inviting the Fish & Wildlife Service to be here. The Service truly appreciates the tremendous challenge the Corps has in planning and implementing civil

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works projects. Just by themselves they're among the most complex ventures in our nation. Also they're subject to so many external pressures, whether economic or political, and sometimes competing interests. The Service realizes that the Corps has a difficult job and we're proud to work together to ensure good conservation outcomes while planning these projects. And we recognize that the Corps values the Services role and we support SMART Planning. We believe that streamlined civil works planning processes, lower costs and more accessible documentation are in everyone’s interest. In part this initiative relies on enhanced early cooperation between the agencies. And that kind of early engagement is something that we’ve long stressed in our agency. Frontloading our involvement allows us to consider avoidance of our most valued resources or areas with high potential for conflict. And we can do that before significant planning investments are committed. We do recognize that going forward won’t always be easy. The Service will continue for our part to assess the conservation implication of projects individually. One size does not fit all, we will tailor our engagement based on conservation needs. And we may or may not provide a significant investment on projects based on their potential for impacts to our mission. We appreciate the recognition that there will be growing pains. And that’s why we think that having a framework such as is laid out in the Interagency Guide is so important in describing how and when resource agencies and their joint responsibilities with the Corps fit into the planning process. So thank you again and we're looking forward to hearing your reintroduction to SMART and to the interagency guidance. Sue Hughes: Thank you Jason. Cathy Tortorici from the NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is here also. Cathy Tortorici (NMFS): Hello, I’m Cathy Tortorici. I work within the Office of Protected Resources at NOAA Fisheries. We're very happy to be here to participate in this SMART Planning Process Webinar. We’ve been involved in this for a while and we hope that the Guide that we released last year has been helpful. This is a great opportunity to work through that document again and fill in many questions. We recognize that the Corps has a new process, and that we're part of it. As Jason was saying there may be some ups and downs with it but we're committed to working through the process with the Corps to work towards the best outcome we can for our species and contribute to the Corps’ work on projects that they’re trying to move forward with. Sue Hughes: Thanks Cathy and Jason. We appreciate your support, certainly wouldn’t be here without a collective effort. Now I’m going to turn it over to Evie Haberer who works for the Corps headquarters though she is physically in California. Evie took the lead role in helping pull this Guide together for the Corps. Evie will also call on Rachel Mesko from our Seattle district who’s had some hands-on experience working with the guide. Evie I’m going to pass the baton to you.

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Evie Haberer: Thank you Sue and good morning or good afternoon everyone depending where you are. As Sue mentioned and Jason and Cathy, this is a product that we jointly prepared to assist folks in the regional and field offices of all three agencies as they work together on Corps feasibility studies under the Corps' modernized planning process that we refer to as SMART Planning. At some point in time here we will get rid of the “SMART” and this will be planning process. For now, SMART Planning is what we're calling it. I’m going to provide you with an overview of the agency guide and its content. And to do that I’ll be providing you with a framework of the SMART Planning process. I’ll briefly touch on the 3 x 3 x 3 rule. And most importantly I will demonstrate where and when the Services activities integrate into the SMART feasibility study process. For the Services activities, Cathy and Jason are welcome to chime in at any time. I’m pleased to have Rachel Mesko, the Corps’ Seattle district here to provide us some real-time insight to the environmental coordination effort and lessons learned from the Seattle Harbor Deep Draft Navigation Study, one of our first studies to apply the SMART Planning process and the procedures from the very beginning of that study. Of course, there will be time for questions at the end.

If you haven’t seen it already this is the cover of the guide. The guide was developed in collaboration with the Headquarters offices of the Corps and the Services. The guide was released last fall in September and is available online on our Corps Planning Community Website. I will display that website link at the end of the presentation so you can see that or copy it down. Everybody is welcome to go to that site.

The purpose of the Guide is to provide an overview of the SMART Planning feasibility study process and to demonstrate how key environment compliance activities fit into that process. The Guide is intended to be a resource for the Corps and the Services as a means to improve the understanding of the SMART Planning process. This is vital for the successful implementation of our studies across the nation. The SMART Planning process has some different terminology. It has different milestones and timelines from those that you might have been familiar with in our older process. The Guide is our way of conveying this information to you in a succinct way in hopes to improve that understanding of the process. We don’t expect those outside the Corps to have the same level of understanding, but we don’t want the Services to have a disadvantage when you do get engaged in our studies. There are some key differences in the new process that are highlighted in the guide.

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The guide emphasizes the need for earlier engagement and keeping the line of communication open throughout. We’ve always intended to coordinate early in our study process but with the potential for a shorter study duration we must hit this hard from day one. The Guide focuses on key environmental laws associated with the Services, laws that tend to apply to many of our Corps studies and the laws that tend to take some time to fully coordinate. The Guide itself discusses where and when the Services activities related to those laws, such as the Endangered Species Act, occur in the SMART Planning process. The Guide also identifies opportunities to be more efficient in our coordination and consultation activities. We are in a time where we, as federal agencies, must be more efficient because we tend to be doing more with less whether it’s reduced staff, reduced budget or both. The SMART Planning process is just one approach that the Corps has taken to be more efficient in the way we conduct our studies. And that's part of our planning modernization efforts that we have underway.

It is important to be clear that the Guide does not replace any policy consultation handbooks or regulations, and is not a detailed guide for executing our feasibility studies. It can be updated as needed if new policies or laws or regulations develop that may change the planning process. I added this slide because the Corps conducts different types of studies under several authorities such as post-authorization studies or continuing authority programs which we refer to as CAP. There is also a permitting and regulatory

side of the story that you may be familiar with. For this Guide and the presentation, I'm specifically going to be referring to a feasibility study that Congress has directed us to evaluate and recommend a solution to a wider resources problem. The civil works feasibility study is that initial step in the Corps' process for addressing many of the nation's significant water resources needs and typically focuses on one or more Corps of Engineer's missions such as flood damage reduction or navigation. I’m sure you’re familiar with the aquatic ecosystem restoration mission of the Corps. A feasibility study will determine if there is a federal interest in the problems or problems identified. These studies are cost shared equally between the federal government and nonfederal sponsor. We formulate and evaluate solutions and we recommend a plan. The study culminates in the preparation of a feasibility report that includes either an environmental assessment (EA) or environmental impact statement (EIS). The study phase typically ends in a report of the Chief of Engineers with a specific project recommendation. Keep in mind that even though Congress authorizes us to study a problem, Congress must also provide additional authorization to construct a project. The feasibility study is that basis for the future construction and at the end of feasibility, you'll be looking at around maybe 30%, 35% design on the

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agency’s recommended plan. That was the case under the previous planning process and it's still the case under SMART Planning.

So what is SMART Planning? It is the Corps' new process to complete civil works feasibility studies while still following the six-step planning process required by the Principles and Guidelines established in 1986. I’m sure you’re all familiar with the six steps: identifying our problems and opportunities; inventory and forecasting conditions; formulate evaluate; compare alternatives and; select a plan. We're still following those guidelines, nothing

has changed. Why did we change the study process? Well, there was much frustration from stakeholders, sponsors and Congress that our studies were taking too long, they were costing too much. They were overly detailed with data and information that didn't add value to the overall decisions being made throughout the process. We were the opposite of efficient in many areas when time is of the essence to the communities and the ecosystems depending on these studies in these projects.

So, how is SMART Planning different? I’m going to give you a quick overview of SMART Planning and how it differs from the old process but go through the Guide to get more in-depth information. SMART Planning is risk-informed and decision-focused planning, rather than task-oriented planning. Risk informed planning means you must manage uncertainty, which translates into collecting the information you need when you need it. It means that a

study team is critically thinking about the information it needs to make the next planning decision rather than collecting everything possible and then trying to figure out how to use it. We are asking folks at the beginning of a study just to take a hard look at the information, the data, the surveys, the reports available. In the past, it was not uncommon to start a study and immediately spend money on collecting new data and conducting more surveys and not even look at what was available. This is a big change. There is a misperception that SMART Planning has less level of detail than the old way we did planning. This isn’t the case. What we mean is that the level of detail grows or evolves as you work towards a recommended plan. It may be okay to use five-year-old delta habitat surveys to get a general idea or understanding of the marine resources in the study area and to do the initial screening of alternatives. Once the footprint is further defined or the final array of alternatives are developed, or maybe if additional data is needed for a mitigation model, then it may be determined that more detailed information is needed.

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The change is that the more detailed analysis can focus on a handful of alternative plans rather than a dozen. We're saving time and money, and it also falls in line with CEQ’s direction on efficiency with NEPA reviews. SMART Planning does not prevent us from gathering new information or data, however it must be justified rather than assumed. This reorients the planning process away from collecting data and refocuses it on doing the work required to reduce uncertainty as you move through the planning decision. Now a study team will evaluate whether the data provides information useful for comparison of alternatives. Can the risk and uncertainty of not having specific data be clearly defined for decision-makers? Those are questions that the study team must ask themselves. SMART Planning is about working collaboratively with the Corps' vertical team. You will hear the term “vertical team” often during a SMART study. The exact makeup of the vertical team may vary from study to study depending on the complexity or the scope of the study. It will always include decision-makers and technical expertise from the district, from the Corps' division and headquarters offices. The vertical team is involved informally throughout the study process and informally during decision milestones along the way. An engagement of the vertical team throughout the study means that those decisions about that level of detail can be discussed before the investment is made ultimately saving time and money. It is important to reach out to the Services early on for many reasons, especially identifying existing information and data, the surveys, reports. These can be used and are an extremely important part of our scoping feasibility study. Often, I hear folks using SMART Planning and 3 x 3 x 3 interchangeably, but SMART Planning is the process and how we manage risk and uncertainty. The SMART Planning process was developed to align with the 3 x 3 x 3 rule. The rule originated as a Corps policy where studies were to be completed in three years or less with no more than $3 million and should include that assistance and support from the Corps' vertical team throughout the study. It was put into law as part of the Water Resources Reform and Development Act of 2014.

WRDA ’14 also codifies an exemption process for the 3 x 3 x 3 rule. Congress established a process for exemption of the three years and $3 million which I will discuss in the next slide. WRDA ‘14 established a single-phase study process, removing the reconnaissance study. Reconnaissance studies were a precursor to our feasibility studies where we would do limited data gathering. We would produce a report called the 905(b) report to determine

the federal interest in the project. This was done at 100% federal cost and often included reaching out to the Services for input prior to the actual feasibility study launch. Without the reconnaissance phase, it is critical for Corps planners in the districts to reach out to the Services immediately when we know a study

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is approved and likely to be started within the fiscal year. Corps folks should give the Services a heads up when you know that’s going to happen. We know the 3 x 3 x 3 rule is not a one-size-fits-all rule. There will be exceptions but they do need to be justified. Exemptions are not automatic, there are requirements, some in law, some in policy. We follow those if it’s anticipated that a study will exceed three years or $3 million. The process starts with the district's study team. If they anticipate a study may be too complex to stay within the 3 x 3 goals, the district study team will lay out the risk. You need to know what you will “leave on the table” to meet the three years or the $3 million limits and why the exemption is warranted. If the risks are too great, then vertical team participates in the rescoping efforts. Any study that exceeds the three years or $3 million total study cost will require justification and approval by the Corps’ Deputy Commanding General for Civil and Emergency Operations or the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works, depending on the amount of increase in study length. You can see that this is a decision made very high up in our agency. The notification of the exemption must go to Congress.

So here is the process diagram. And as you can see from this process there are four phases: scoping, our alternative evaluation and analysis, the feasibility-level analysis and the Chief’s Report. And this is just a depiction, the phases are not of equal duration. You can see by the drop-down circles one through five these are milestones or the marquee decisions along the path to a study. Decision-makers for these milestones are at the

headquarters level of the Corps. The alternatives milestone for instance, is a milestone where the district is seeking concurrence on the array of alternatives that are identified for further evaluation. The TSP milestone, is our Tentatively Selected Plan and at that milestone, the district office is seeking concurrence on the TSP. Then they can release the draft integrated NEPA / feasibility report for the concurrent reviews that will be happening from public, technical, policy and legal reviews. And that happens after the TSP is approved. The agency decision milestone (ADM) is the number three drop-down that you see there after all the reviews are completed and taken into consideration. The ADM is conducted with our senior leadership of the Corps to confirm that the TSP is the right plan moving forward. With confirmation, this plan becomes the agency’s recommended plan. That will be the focus of increased engineering and cost design and detail sufficient to complete the feasibility study report. Then we have a corporate checkpoint called a Civil Works Review Board (CWRB) to determine if the final feasibility report, that NEPA document and the draft Chief's Report are ready for state and agency review. The Chief's Report milestone is where the Chief of Engineers signs the report signifying their project recommendation.

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The Guide walks you through each phase of the study and describes the Services’ involvement in the feasibility study process as it relates to the coordination and consultation. This overlays the NEPA process with a SMART process focusing here on an EIS level document.

This shows where the key NEPA activities fall into place. Seeing the NEPA process overlaid hopefully puts things in perspective if you are unfamiliar with the SMART process. The bottom line is that SMART Planning is consistent with NEPA and CEQ’s direction on efficiency and NEPA implementation. When the SMART Planning process was being developed, the Corps held several briefings and discussions with the CEQ staff in Washington to ensure their understanding of the process.

Now, back to the Guide. The Guide focuses on the key environmental laws associated with the Services- laws that tend to apply to many of our studies and take some time to fully coordinate. That’s why we agreed to focus on these four laws listed here. The Guide discusses how and where the activities pertinent to those laws interact with the SMART Planning process. Please remember that I will be focusing on this general process and those activities but we're not going to get into the details of the laws.

This diagram is located in the Guide. It’s just a quick overview indicating how multiple processes, NEPA, ESA, Magnuson-Stevens Act, and Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act overlay with the SMART Planning process. It's intended as general guidance or a cheat sheet. It’s much easier to read in the Guide. The next few slides will walk you through the phases of the SMART Planning process and identify what is key for the Corps and the Services as they coordinate and consult on Civil Works studies. I added a slide for each phase that indicates what NEPA activities are taking place.

The goal, in scoping a feasibility study, is to define the problems and opportunities. During this time, the Corps develops preliminary alternatives and determines how those alternatives will be screened. At the end of scoping we will have a final array or reasonable array of alternatives to be carried forward for that rigorous evaluation. This phase ends with the decision point, an alternatives milestone, which also involves the Corps’

Vertical Team. Typically this phase takes 90 to 120 days. NEPA scoping happens in our scoping phase, when we invite participation of affected agencies, tribes and others of course, and the Corps determines its scope and significant issues to be studied. If an EIS is

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needed, a notice of intent to prepare an EIS would be issued in the Federal Register. The Corps would invite agencies and the cooperating agency status. This is a critical time in the study when it comes to communication and engagement between the Corps and Services. Without a reconnaissance study, we start this phase without doing a preliminary investigation. We are relying on existing information and studies and data. It’s important to communicate to determine what data or information is available. It’s also important to determine - do data gaps exist? The expectation is for the Corps here to finish this phase like I said in 90, 120 days so the study team is moving fast. That makes it critical to reach out and communicate early. This is the time to obtain the views concerning fish and wildlife resources and anticipated impacts and to determine the resources that would be evaluated. For example, the Services may be able to suggest Fish & Wildlife opportunities and planning objectives, ways to avoid and minimize impact to endangered and threatened species and even potential consideration for compensatory mitigation if necessary. Through early planning and coordination, issues can be minimized down the road. Under ESA, the Corps would request a species list and the Services would provide a list and hopefully some technical assistance during this time.

The next phase of the SMART feasibility study is the alternative evaluation and analysis which can take upwards of a year. This phase is where the focus array of alternative plans including the “No Action” plan are compared and evaluated against each other including the NEPA evaluation and analysis. A tentatively selected plan is identified at the end of that process and then we hold the TSP milestone meeting as you can see the dropdown Number 2 circle. The decision-maker for that meeting is the Chief of Planning in our Policy Division and he or she

confirms the TSP. Within 60 days of that meeting the district releases the draft feasibility and NEPA report for public and agency review. Under NEPA we are evaluating the array of alternatives identified at the alternatives milestone meeting. We are describing any environmental impact for all alternatives, describe mitigation if it’s appropriate and circulate the draft NEPA report. And in the case of the Corps' documents, our feasibility report and our NEPA report are integrated. And for the EIS level reports, we would also hold public meetings after the draft NEPA document is released.

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What is happening under the Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act, what activities? Well at the beginning of this phase, or during scoping if possible, the agency should be developing the scope of work and working together to identify the information necessary to facilitate developing the draft Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act Report. The Coordination Act Report should address those alternatives that are being evaluated in the feasibility and the NEPA report. Remember the duration of this phase of this study takes on

average a year to complete. If the Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act scope of work is developed early, then there is ample time allowed for the Services to produce a planning aid letter for instance or a planning aid report for that draft Coordination Act Report. That assists the Corps with their analysis and Fish & Wildlife considerations. Then the Corps will include these reports as attachments to the draft feasibility NEPA report that's going out for public review. Under the Endangered Species Act the Corps will be working on the biological assessment gathering information as the study progresses so that a determination of effects on endangered and threatened species can be made. At the time the draft report is ready for public and agency review, the Corps should have their determination of effects ready. The biological assessment then can be submitted to the Services at the same time the draft feasibility report is provided or shortly thereafter. Once the Services received the Corps' determination of the effects, then the Services give the Corps their response and a letter of concurrence or if they don’t concur or need additional information at this point then that needs to be communicated quickly. Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, all practical efforts to avoid taking a marine mammal should be taken. It is rare in a Corps project, for the taking to be unavoidable. But if it is, then the Corps and the appropriate Services will need to discuss the process for obtaining an incidental take. This process can take upwards of a year, so in this rare instance you need to coordinate early.

Under the Magnuson-Stevens Act, NMFS will provide technical assistance to help inform the Corps EFH assessment. The Corps should have a completed assessment to integrate into the NEPA document or it can be a standalone assessment. Once received, then NMFS can begin preparation of the EFH conservation recommendations.

After the public and agency review of the draft feasibility / NEPA report, the Corps takes into consideration the comments received and holds a senior-level meeting to endorse the plan to be further analyzed. This phase of the study includes development of the final draft feasibility and NEPA report and additional design of the recommended plan to reduce that risk and uncertainty with cost data, with engineering effectiveness, environmental impacts and economic benefits.

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Additional modeling and design is done to improve or tighten up the impacts analysis and the mitigation plan. This phase of the study could be up to a year, give or take, but each study is different. At this stage of the study, under NEPA, the Corps is addressing the public and agency comments on the draft report and works to finalize the NEPA document. Between the Corps and Services, the Corps considers the recommendations provided by the Services.

As the Corps is sharpening the pencil on the recommended plan, the Fish & Wildlife Service will finalize the Coordination Act Report for inclusion in the final feasibility report. And then under the Marine

Mammal Protection Act if a taking is unavoidable, coordination will continue. While it’s rare, if an incidental take is issued that must happen before the final report is completed to ensure the final report is policy compliant. Under ESA a lot can be happening between the end of the previous phase to the end of this phase. If there is a “no effect” or “not likely to adversely affect determination” then informal consultation is completed and the Corps will

include documentation supporting this conclusion in the final report. If the recommended plan is likely to adversely affect a listed endangered or threatened species or critical habitat, then formal consultation is initiated during this phase. If it is initiated, all relevant and required data are provided to the Services to inform the development of the biological opinion. This is where the communication lines should be open. If additional information is requested and everyone has a clear understanding of the request, then there will be a quicker response time. This is highlighted in the guide because this is a critical time to respond and ensure everybody has a clear understanding of the request. Again, I’m not going into detail on ESA and the established timelines. You all have the Section 7 Consultation Handbook for that purpose. The point is to not waste time anticipating what may be needed but instead be timely and clear regarding what more may be needed.

The key point with the Magnuson-Stevens Act, another act that has established time frames for coordination and consultation purposes, is that it is during the earlier part of this feasibility level analysis phase of the study that NMFS provides EFH recommendations. And the Corps will respond by incorporating recommendations or provide acknowledgment of that to NMFS and then NMFS responds to that acknowledgment letter and

coordination will conclude prior to the Corps finalizing the integrated feasibility report. Again there are established time frames and I’m not going to get into those because I think it’s clear what should be happening here.

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At the end of the previous phase and start of this final phase, a final feasibility NEPA report will be completed by the district. That is submitted to their division office and then forwarded to the headquarters for a final policy and legal review. At this point in a final report, we are looking for compliance with all acts, from NEPA to ESA, MSA, and certainly many more that we have not discussed today (to be policy compliant, we are looking at other laws beyond those discussed).

If the study is policy compliant then that will tee it up for a corporate checkpoint, the Civil Works Review Board. At the end of the Civil Works Review Board, Senior Corps leaders decide to release that final integrated feasibility and NEPA report and the draft Chief’s Report for state and agency review. After the final report review period is complete then the Chief’s Report is finalized and signed by our Chief of Engineers. It gets reviewed by

the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works and coordinated with the Office of Management and Budget before it is formally submitted to Congress.

This fits in with NEPA through the release of that final feasibility report and NEPA document. If it is an EIS we file that EIS with EPA and issue a Notice of Availability in the Federal Register. We update the Draft Record of Decision to include responses to any substantive comments received. In this final phase, the Corps is providing final feasibility report and NEPA documents to the Services and the Services are reviewing that final report.

That is the end of the feasibility process. I’m happy to introduce Ms. Rachel Mesko of our Corps Seattle district. Rachel is the planning lead on the Seattle Harbor Deep Draft Navigation Study. The Seattle study is one of the first feasibility studies to go through the SMART process from the beginning. They currently have a draft report that just concluded the public review as well as the other concurrent reviews. Rachel Mesko: Great, thank you so much Evie and again good morning or good afternoon. My name is Rachel Mesko. I’m a Senior Planner here in Seattle district and have the pleasure of presenting some local lessons learned from one of our general investigation feasibility studies here in Seattle. The Seattle Harbor Deep Draft Navigation Improvement project was a new start study from fiscal year 2014 as Evie mentioned.

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This study was scoped within our SMART Planning framework, it’ a three-year study that was scoped for completion within our $3 million constraints. And right now, we're about halfway through our three-year timeline. We just completed our Tentatively Selected Plan Milestone meeting back in June and we're preparing for our Agency Decision Milestone meeting in November, 2016. Our Draft Feasibility Report and Environmental Assessment is an

integrated document that has been released for our public review which was just completed. With our new WRDA we are looking at single phase feasibility studies. We no longer have a reconnaissance phase. The Seattle Harbor Study was one of the last studies of the nation to have a reconnaissance phase, which did help us lay the foundation for a successful study as we kicked off some of our environmental compliance activities. I just wanted to point out a few things that make Seattle Harbor a little bit unique for the purposes of today’s discussion. The Seattle Harbor study area is relatively straightforward. The two waterways that we're evaluating for navigation improvements are about a mile long. We're not looking at multiple reaches within a large waterway. We're not looking at a complex set of alternatives and there’s not a whole lot of variation in the alternatives that way evaluated for this study. We basically were evaluating 1-foot depth increments to deepen the existing waterways. And those existing waterways are already highly altered and already fairly deep. This area is highly industrialized and we're not looking at taking on significantly large quantities of dredged material, so again that simplifies the alternative analysis somewhat. Finally, we are partnering this feasibility study with the Port of Seattle, our nonfederal sponsor. They have been highly engaged throughout the process which has been very helpful for us as we work with our agency stakeholders and the public. We have a great working relationship with our nonfederal sponsor which has helped us to set the right foundation and stage for this study.

We want to talk about some general advice that is applicable across agencies. We found that our environmental compliance strategy worked well through initial outreach, ongoing communication and collaboration and following-up with agencies. First, for Seattle Harbor at the very beginning of our study we hosted a Project Kickoff Meeting. We worked to invite our agencies and tribes and had that meeting in person here at Seattle district but also took

advantage of virtual capabilities with a webinar for those who could not come and meet with us in person. At that point we presented a project overview, we introduced the project and we also took the opportunity to discuss issues or resources of concern. Are there resources that are low concern may not require detailed analysis as we work through the study process or are there some critical issues that we

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want to identify with our agency counterparts up front and ensure that our analysis captures specific effects to those resources? At the very beginning of the study was a good opportunity for us to begin some of our tribal engagement. We also invited the natural resource staff members from our local tribes to this initial agency outreach meeting. This was separate outreach from our Section 106 process with our tribal and historic resources team members but we also wanted to ensure that the national resource staff members from the tribes were engaged early on. As we were developing and evaluating our alternatives and our integrated feasibility report and environmental assessment, we continued our communication and collaboration with our counterparts at the agencies. We worked to share information openly, including maps of our potential alternatives, key study assumptions that may impact how we evaluated alternatives or affect impacts of those alternatives. We worked along the way to do a reality check: gut-checking due dates, timelines, how is the progress going or development of say our Draft Coordination Act Report? Do we need to adjust schedule or timeline as we're sharing information and checking it along the way? Finally, prior to release of our Draft Feasibility Report and Environmental Assessment we hosted a follow-up meeting with the same folks from that initial project kickoff meeting. We wanted to ensure that the agencies weren’t going to be surprised when they saw a Draft Feasibility Report and Environmental Assessment hit the street for public review. It was important to us to have another check-in meeting prior to release of that report to talk about our final array of alternatives that's presented in the environmental assessment, talk about effects of those alternatives in the analysis that we use to identify what those effects may be a give feedback on the questions: Did we miss the mark on some of our effects analysis? Did we not appropriately capture a resource that we talked about at the initial kickoff meeting? This follow-up helped close the loop on the initial coordination efforts from the beginning of the study again prior to release of the draft report.

Some additional tips for success that might be more helpful to Corps teams and Districts are that we initiated our Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act Scope budget and NEPA funding transfers very early in our study process. The scope of work for Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act products is fairly standardized so we were able to finalize the scope to include a cost estimate and schedule fairly early in our study. This allowed us to get both a planning aid letter as well as the draft Coordination Act Report prior to our TSP milestone meeting.

That initial effort to finalize the scope and get some funding to the US Fish & Wildlife Service helped get those products back that really fed into development of the Corps draft feasibility report and environmental assessment. We also worked very closely to communicate changes to our alternatives as needed. For those planners on the phone, we know that planning is an iterative process and your alternatives may change as you work through the analysis. We had some minor changes to our array of alternatives as we were working through the analysis so we wanted to ensure that those changes were communicated to the agencies to

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make sure that we were all working off the same sheet of music as we were evaluating different alternatives and working on our individual pieces of documentation. We also worked to create an environmental compliance tracking spreadsheet. We used this in addition to the guide that we have been talking about today. This spreadsheet helped us track the acts and compliance activities that we’ve talked as well as Section 106 coordination activities and timelines for the 401 certification process, what those tasks and timeline will look like. This additional tracking spreadsheet was another way for us to make sure that we were working through this compliance activities appropriately.

We used the coordination guides to help standardize our P2 schedule with appropriate compliance activities and processes. We integrated external review timelines and final product deadlines into the overall study schedule. So even if you have a project manager who may not be familiar with every single environmental compliance task or activity or timeline that’s required, you can cross walk the guide with your P2 schedule and that’s a good way to help kind of standardize our process and also helps us get a sense of whether

there are certain compliance tasks that may be scheduled drivers. Before we wrap up I just wanted to talk about some of the key environmental laws that were outlined in the guide that Evie walked through and about the status of laws and acts as we worked through the Seattle Harbor Project. For the Endangered Species Act, prior to our TSP Milestone, we completed that initial agency outreach coordination by having a kickoff meeting as well as that follow-up meeting prior to release of the draft report. We were also able to make our initial determination of effects at that stage. After the tentatively selected plan milestone we'll be developing our ESA document for informal consultation. Our biological assessment will be submitted to the Services for their review. This timing is a little bit different than what was presented in the guides. This timing was driven by our “not likely to adversely affect” determination and our pathway to go down informal consultation. If we needed to take the formal consultation pathway developments of that ESA documentations would likely occur sooner in the process. Our consultation with NMFS also is occurring in conjunction with our ESA consultation. For the Magnuson-Stevens Act and MMPA, we're wrapping that analysis into our biological assessment. This is a practice that we have here in Seattle to pair ESA with MSA and MMPA and we found this to be an efficient way of doing business. By combining that documentation we're still working to complete our agency outreach and coordination prior to the TSP milestone and after that submitting our biological assessment which includes effects to ESA-listed species, essential fish habitat, and marine mammals.

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Finally, for the Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act I talked a little bit about our efforts to initiate our Fish & Wildlife Coordination Act activities early in the study process. So again, prior to our TSP Milestone, we received a draft planning a letter as well as a draft Coordination Act Report. Prior to finalization of our feasibility report and environmental assessment, we anticipate that we will have our final Coordination Act Report. We were very deliberate with the Seattle Harbor study in ensuring that environmental compliance was not an afterthought. We wanted to set up study tasks and schedules to include our environmental compliance activities early, start that coordination process as early as possible, host in-person meetings if that was a possibility for folks to come in person and have those face-to-face conversations and otherwise utilize things like webinars to ensure that the discussions would still be effective and then checking in with our counterparts at the agencies along the way.