New Search
_"'"r' __- <br />Conservation Strategy as one of the highest priority conservation areas in the state. Thus, the WEW <br />Mitigation Bank serves as a valuable tool for protecting and restoring important natural resources. <br />Fourth, the WEW Mitigation Bank facilitates implementation of community open space <br />conservation goals. Open space protected and restored through the WEW Mitigation Bank becomes <br />part of our regional open space system and serves recreation and education goals outlined in <br />regionally endorsed plans such as Rivers to Ridges and support possible future scenarios such as a <br />National Wildlife Refuge. <br />Recommendation: The City should continue to operate a wetland mitigation bank. <br />Rationale: (1) There is still strong demand for credits for local projects and the existing <br />banks do not have enough credits to satisfy demand. (2) The WEW Mitigation Bank <br />facilitates implementation of Oregon State's Conservation Strategy. (3) The WEW <br />Mitigation Bank supports identified recreation and education goals of the Eugene <br />community. <br />Issue 2: Should the City's wetland mitigation bank continue to service projects outside <br />Eugene's urban growth boundary? <br />Currently the WEW Mitigation Bank services projects in three areas in order of priority. Area 1 is <br />the highest priority and includes supporting projects within the WEW plan boundary. Area 2 <br />includes projects within the urban growth boundary (UGB) and the airport. Area 3 includes all <br />other projects as approved by the Department of State Lands and Army Corps of Engineers. The <br />intent of this system is to prioritize support of projects in and near Eugene. While Areas 1 and 2 <br />currently provide the largest credit demand, there are several projects on the horizon in Area 3 that <br />have the potential to provide substantial demand for WEW Mitigation Bank credits. <br />Currently, the permitting agencies and private mitigation banks are standardizing mitigation bank <br />service areas based on the 4th Field Hydrologic Unit Code (HUC) which is encompasses most of the <br />Willamette Valley. The rationale for this service area is that wetland communities throughout this <br />area are ecologically similar enough that a development project could be effectively mitigated <br />anywhere within the HUC and meet the "no-net-loss" requirements of the Clean Water Act. In <br />addition to this mitigation banking trend, the WEW Mitigation Bank was recently honored by being <br />selected as one of four mitigation banks invited to provide a proposal to the OECDD for the sale of <br />credits estimated at a value of $2 million. However, the OECDD requires that credits sold to them <br />be made available to projects throughout the 4t" Field HUC. <br />Finally, it is important to note that although there are a significant number of projects within the <br />WEW Plan Boundary and within the UGB that will need mitigation credits, these projects do not <br />provide a consistent enough demand for WEW Mitigation Bank credits to sustain it. Projects in <br />Areas 1 and 2 are often small and come in a boom/bust cycle. Thus, for the WEW Bank to remain <br />economically viable and capable of supporting projects within the UGB for the long term, it is <br />important that it be able to sell credits to projects outside of Areas 1 and 2(i.e., throughout the 4tn <br />Field HUC). <br />Recommendation: Yes, the City should service projects outside Eugene's UGB. <br />Rationale: Agency and private mitigation bank trends along with ecological rationales <br />support using the 4th field HUC as the service area. The economic sustainability of the <br />Page 2 <br />