The Clackamas River Water Providers have been working with Clackamas County Water Environment Services for a number of years to jointly fund a number of watershed and water quality projects which are referred to as the Clackamas Watershed Management Group (CWMG) programs.  These programs and additional Clackamas River Water Provider programs are listed below.

CE-QUAL-W2 Modeling of the Lower Clackamas River
The Clackamas River Water Providers and Management Group partners have been working with Portland State University (PSU) for the past few years to develop and maintain a sophisticated hydrodynamic model of stream flows in the lower Clackamas River. The objective of these efforts is to assess the impacts of increased municipal demand has on river flows to balance domestic needs with the flow needed for endangered salmon. The next phase of the project is to enhance the current CE-QUAL-W2 model to incorporate predictive capabilities into the model so that we can better estimate when impacts to the river might occur over short time periods, therefore facilitating better water supply planning and management of the water resources in the basin.

Pesticide Study
The Clackamas River Water Providers and Management Group partners worked with USGS through a Joint Funding Agreement to conduct a second pesticide study on the Clackamas River.  The report for this study was released to the public in March, 2008.  The purpose of this joint study was to 1) provide additional data within sub-basins to better identify pesticide sources areas, 2) verify and contrast results found during the 2000 USGS Phase I study, 3) obtain data from smaller tributary streams that were not tested during the 2000 study, and 4) provide a comparison with the data collection by ODEQ that can be used to direct future data collection. The report is available online by going to: http://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2008/5027/  

Pesticide Reduction Program
The Clackamas River Water Providers and Management Group partners have been working with Clackamas River Basin Council to coordinate a pesticide reduction outreach program to address the findings found in the USGS Pesticide Study.  This has entailed providing funding to the Basin Council to develop, print and mail a pesticide brochure to approximately 2,500 stream side landowners, to develop a pesticide use survey, and to conduct a workshop on Health Lawns for Healthy Water: How to Reduce our Pesticide Use on Lawns and Gardens.  These efforts are continuing this year with the creation of addition outreach materials regarding pesticides, a more comprehensive survey, participation in a Pesticide Round Up day for Clackamas County, and a Filter Strip Restoration Planting program.  For more information about the pesticide program being implemented by the Clackamas River Basin Council for the Clackamas River Water Provider and Management Group partners, click on the following link http://clackamasriver.org/pesticide/

CRBC Financial Support
The Clackamas River Water Providers and Management Group partners provide funding for operation support each year to the Clackamas River Basin Council.  This funding support helps enable the Clackamas River Basin Council to continue to work on project that protect and improve water quality and fish and wildlife habitat in the Clackamas River basin.

Flow Balance Study
The overall purpose of this study with USGS is to provide a better understanding of the hydrologic relationship between the lower Clackamas River surface water and the associated ground-water system.  By constructing a streamflow balance for the lower Clackamas River from streamflow data collected during peak water use; and by identifying locations and the magnitudes of streamflow gains and losses due to ground water/surface water interactions; the water providers will be able to better understand the relationship of ground-water inflow with water use, geology, and geomorphology of the lower river.  Last year's work also included USGS taking several cross sectional measurements to obtain additional bathymetry data which was incorporate into the modeling project.  This study should be completed sometime in 2009.

Other Water Resource Activities  

PGE FERC Relicensing
The Clackamas River Water Providers have been an active participant in PGE's FERC relicensing process and Settlement Agreement. This past year the work has focused on PGE obtaining DEQ's 401 Certificate which had to be completed prior to receiving their new license.  In addition the Water Providers are an active participant of PGE's Blue Green Algae Team which oversees PGE's Blue Green Algae Sampling Program for the Clackamas River.

Stored Water Agreement
PGE and the Clackamas River Water Providers have a Stored Water Agreement which allows the water providers the option to call for water stored in Timothy Lake to be released certain times of the year to preserve minimum stream flows or to enhance in-stream flows. This agreement is the process of being revised and will be tied to the new FERC license.  The purpose of this agreement is to give the water providers more flexibility to manage for flows variations in the lower river.  

 For more information about this program please contact the This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Home     About Us     Water Resources     Water Conservation     Current Events     Contact Us