VOLUME II 

AMERICAN HERITAGE RIVERS

INITIATIVE ADVISORY COMMITTEE 

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Tuesday, May 12, 1998 

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White House Conference Center

Truman Room

726 Jackson Place, N.W.

Washington, D.C.

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Dayton Dunkan, Chairperson

PARTICIPANTS:

WILLIAM GRAF

DR. GERALD GALLOWAY, JR.

P. KAY WHITLOCK

DONALD SAMPSON

DAVID OLSEN

MARIA TERAN

MICHAEL HOOG

ANTHONY GRASSI

DANIEL KEMMIS

CHARLES JORDAN

DOUG WILSON

JERRY DELLIPRISCOLL

Facilitator

STAFF:

CHIP SMITH

ROGER STEPHENSON

FRAN EANGEL

JANET PAWLUKIEWICZ

KAREN HOBBS

I N D E X

PAGE

Deliberations (continued)................220

P R O C E E D I N G S (9:30 a.m.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Welcome back everyone.

I want to start today by saying on behalf of the Committee our deep thanks to all the people who have been working on putting this meeting together. Leslie Warren and Ray Clark, and Karen Hobbs, Roger Stephenson, Chip Smith, and all the people that he has put together. We greatly appreciate all the work that they have done and the logistical complications of getting 12 people from around the country together and ushering us around and making sure that we can get from our hotel to here, and all the minor and major details that make -- make it easier for us to do what we do.

And in case there are some people here this morning that were not here yesterday, I want to repeat something that really has emerged from the feelings of this Committee over the course of the first day and I think has even strengthened as we start our second day of deliberations, and that is how overwhelming the response has been to this American Heritage Rivers Initiative, of how many different local groups have done incredible jobs mobilizing themselves, joining forces with other local communities, other local organizations, to reclaim the rivers and the heritages around the rivers along which they live, and have come to -- responded to this initiative from the grass roots up; and it is a great difficulty for us to have to winnow some of those down, and it is our very firm belief -- and I think we will discuss this -- hopefully, our Committee can discuss this later today a little bit -- that when we eventually do make our recommendations to the President that we include, besides the list of the ones that we consider are the ones he should pick, some way to communicate to those other rivers that -- that we encourage them to continue their efforts, that we encourage federal government not to focus only on the ten ultimate designated American Heritage Rivers.

Many of these proposals have in them plans of action that include ways of trying to avail themselves of serves of the federal government that they see that they need; and, while a navigator would certainly be helpful and the designation would certainly be something that gives highlight to it, the federal government is still there and, under normal rules of operation, that is their job to do the things that they are supposed to do anyway.

So, we would hope that -- that many of the proposals, many of the nominees, would continue that work; and it is -- it is -- it is really incredibly heartwarming and overwhelming sometimes to look at the depth of all these proposals and realize that we have the, on one hand, welcome task of going through them, and the unwelcome task of somehow running some of them through.

We are going to start back right in the midst this morning, but Doug has one thing he wanted to raise before we go.

MR. WILSON: Yes. CEQ and myself has received a letter from Congressman...District in Illinois, and he has chosen to opt the 20th District out of the Chicago-Illinois proposal; and, so, I do not see this as a major blow. I think it is fine if that is what his decision is. It is a very small portion of the total package and I guess I would like to respect that and, then, hopefully the rest of the panel would not take that as a negative to the total package.

I think the Chicago-Illinois, the majority of it is still there and I think it still is very worthy.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Thank you, Doug.

Kay.

MS. WHITLOCK: Doug, could you tell us where the 20th District is?

MR. WILSON: It is an area --

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Maybe somebody on the map could just point it out.

A VOICE: The 20th District, basically, runs along from the Springfield area down towards the southern end towards St. Louis. So, the actual area that -- there is only six counties in the District . They are actually within the Illinois River.

MS. WHITLOCK: Are they the lowest ones on the river, the downstream end?

MR. WILSON: Yes, close to, although that is not -- it does not go all the way to St. Louis. So, it would probably be just slightly above that would be the area that would buffer along there.

So, like I said, it is only a six-county area and that is an area that I think, when you look at the scope of the entire river, you know, there is a lot of -- most proposals are above that point, so --

A VOICE: (Inaudible/unintelligible.)

MR. WILSON: There is 102 counties in the State of Illinois. It is not like out here where you have a quarter of the state is one county.

(Simultaneous voices.)

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I just also want to recognize that with us this morning is Congresswoman Coren Brown from Florida, and we appreciate your presence here and your understanding that we are not accepting public testimony now. But we appreciate your support of the initiative and your presence here this morning.

Doug.

MR. GRASSI: Yes, I -- Doug, you know, around this table we were enthusiastic yesterday about the Chicago-Illinois proposal and I think we still are; but I also want to say that I do take it as a negative that we do have some Congressional opposition on two counts.

First of all, through respect to the Congressional office, obviously; and, when a person in that position expresses an opinion, I am willing to listen to it.

It is also the case that I think one of the standards that we are using as a Committee in terms of trying to sift through this list of proposals that Dayton has correctly characterized as pretty impression, it really does get to the point where one of the decision-making criteria the President has asked us to consider is the breadth and depth of the local support. And I would be very reluctant to see another competing group of river supporters who were opted out of the process because the Chicago-Illinois proposal looked a little bit better than theirs.

They had all their support together in one basket and then we pick this river and let ourselves off the hook by saying, well, it is just a minor number of counties.

I guess what I am trying to do is I am trying to have my cake and eat it, too. I am trying to say I like the Chicago-Illinois proposal and I am enthusiastic about it, but I am not as enthusiastic today as I was yesterday.

MR. WILSON: I understand that and from that point of view I am disappointed, too. However, knowing that area of the state I understand the pressure the Congressman was under and some of the situations that are there.

I guess I would also state from that point of view some of the negatives that I have seen in the letters I have reviewed in opposition. Not all of those are oppositions flat and clear. They have some conditions of which they wanted us to prove to them that we were not coming in to take over.

They talked about initiative should be funded from exiting programs, which they are. It should have all aspects of interest included, including agricultural, which I believe they can have. It should be voluntary non-regulatory. It is. It should be consensus based. It will be.

So, I really do not look at these so much as opposition letters as just wanting more assurances and perhaps information this one organization could have been clothed better.

And I am still real positive about it and I think even with the Congressional opposition in this area, if you look at the total package, there is still considerable support and widespread.

So, I understand it can be considered negative. Don't -- don't tie a big weight around its ankles.

A VOICE: Sure.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Okay. I just would say I agree with both of you.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Except I have become concerned that the farm bureau apparently is in broader scale than just the counties of the Congressman and throughout the river the farm bureau seems to be in opposition; and it is unfortunate that local sponsors could not convince the farm bureau, as a group or as county organizations, to -- to get behind this, because some of them are, just as you say, are conditioned if we don't oppose -- if these things would occur, but others are just general opposition...

(Simultaneous voices.)

MR. WILSON: And on that point, when our organization had Leslie Warren and other representatives of Heritage Rivers come to Illinois and speak to us about it, the only farm bureau that did not send any representative even though they were invited.

A VOICE: That is unfortunate.

MR. WILSON: So, I -- if you take that accordingly, too.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: This morning we are going to talk a little bit about the Mississippi.

Our sub-committee looked at the different proposals according to the questions we raised yesterday. We have looked over the request from a member to -- of the Committee to talk about the Potomac.

It is my thought and I hope you all agree that after that, if we -- for those who have not yet had a chance to go and look at the board you might go look at that. That may prompt us to -- to want to talk about some rivers that we have not discussed or, if they are even not on the board, again, I want to always encourage us to from time to time to step back and talk about some of these other proposals.

And, then, Jerry, you thought is we need to then look at the map that is the result of the exercise that we did yesterday and then what?

MR. DELLIPRISCOLLI: And then I thought we could take, as we go to lunch, since the group will probably be using ten this time. You go to lunch and we feed that back to you. Then we do some reflection on that. Long day. Right?

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Right.

MR. DELLIPRISCOLLI: Reflections and then describe how we describe our two days and where we go.

And, one quick thing, the material that was done overnight as background material is the chart here as now put together, the red ones, the red dots, are what came up in that first round that you did before you came.

The blue dots are what happened yesterday. Some have both blue and red for the obvious reasons that they were hits twice.

And this is a little summary for those who want to do and put it in front of them essentially of the 19 that had two or more both times around.

So, that is roughly it; and this is just background because we are going to do it again...

(Simultaneous voices.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: So, let's proceed to the mighty Mississippi.

I just want to say -- I want to say a word to Puyallup.

A VOICE: Puyallup.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: It is in Missouri, though.

(Laughter.)

(Simultaneous voices.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Yes, let him do it.

MR. DELLIPRISCOLLI: We did generate a lot of material on the Mississippi yesterday and then we did home work last night.

Quickly what we did was we started off an we talked about whether -- how these were, well, pieced together, the three -- one encompasses the three down to the mouth of the Missouri, then there were the other -- other two, then the lower Miss to Baton Rouge to New Orleans, and there is one around Memphis.

We talked about whether or not we would take four and call it a Mississippi proposal; but, then, we cautioned ourselves about being careful not to take the whole body, just take the pieces that come with it and all of these perception problems back and forth. Look at chunks of those which fell out.

But then we said, well, maybe we are really talking about a letter at the end of the actual wording here to get the perceptual part of this right, cause people are going to call it Mississippi regardless of whether it is a piece.

Then we talked about how do the four proposals on the Mississippi -- Kay raised -- how -- we need more information about these and so we asked Kay to do home work and then she was joined with a few others on this to go into some depth.

We asked again does Number 77 subsume the other three into it. And then we came up with the notion that essential we have a string of pearls and that has some consequences to it because the pearls are strung together but there's things in between that may not, and that raises the issues of the agriculture and the urban and other things that we need to look at.

So that leaves stuff out in between and that was our team, which was Kay and Jerry and William. And how do they talk about flood control in the Mississippi with... That's it.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Who wants to --

MS. WHITLOCK: Let me just start with the concern of orient, on the Mississippi there are six different dots here and to give one -- let me just start at the top. The -- this Minneapolis, St. Paul dot is Number 21, and it is basically 72 miles. It is a pretty long reach of reach in the twin cities area, Minneapolis and St. Paul. And it is basically an urban kind of proposal.

Then coming on downstream to Dubuque, this is under Tab -- this is Number 63 under Tab 3, and it is also an urban proposal in the Dubuque area, an 18-mile stretch of river.

Then further downstream from there is the quad cities proposal. This is Number 59 under Tab 2. I did not get a length written down on that one. And that is the quad cities' proposal. It is called Upper Mississippi in -- in the book.

And then this dot, actually, I believe, represents the whole stretch; but, actually, this is the downstream reach of that stretch, which is described as Project Number 77, which comes from upstream of the Minneapolis proposal up to the Midgee, all the way down there. It is actually, when you think about how somebody did this it is kind of a remarkable accomplishment because 56 mayors of the towns between the Midgee and St. Louis signed on to this proposal, and that is a remarkable accomplishment.

Being familiar with that area, I would like to hazard a guess that there are not very many towns between the Midgee, Minnesota and St. Louis, Missouri that are not covered. I did not have a decent map to see if I could find if any were left out. But some of those towns are tiny, tiny towns along the Mississippi.

So, we looked through there to see there were two questions we thought we ought to look at.

One of them was does this set up some kind of a conflict between those rural reaches, between those little towns along the Mississippi.

And my personal conclusion was that I did not find the basis of a conflict. I think of it now as any urban proposal. It is just an urban proposal coordinated among those 56 urban areas in that reach. So, I would not see it differently than, say, the Detroit River reach and Detroit, which is an urban proposal; but it is like 56 urban proposals where they all have some common goals and some unique goals to their region. There may be some kind of historical features that are more -- more appropriate to be on one community's list than another.

So, it really helped me get a better sense of that proposal to look at it that way.

What appears to be is the Dubuque, the quad cities and the Minneapolis proposal are their own proposal and then subsumed into the Number 77. So, they are not inconsistent, they are not in conflict.

We could look at a Minneapolis, St. Paul proposal or quad cities' proposal, or we could look at the whole 77 and we -- you know, I think the fact that there is not a focus on what to do in those agricultural regions in between, to me, does not -- does not minimize it as an urban proposal. It is not a proposal for every mile of the whole Mississippi.

And, then, the Memphis proposal and the Louisiana Baton Rouge proposal, the Memphis one is Number 68 and that is behind Tab 2 in the book, and then the Louisiana proposal is Number 118, which is behind Tab 1 in the reference book. And those are similar proposals, in my view, just urban kinds of proposals.

But in the lower Mississippi, this is the...River, this is where the 27 lots in...Mississippi is the part that we call the upper Mississippi.

So, I did not find in my scanning through the documents a conflict between the rural and the urban, except that set up, anytime you have an urban proposal and you do not have an agricultural, I do not think this one uniquely does that.

And I did not find reference to the big picture sort of flood damage dilemma that Donald was looking for. Gerald Galloway has some experience from the knowledge about the '93 floods and he may be able to answer your questions about some of the damages that actually took place in '93. I was no longer in the mid-west.

A VOICE: Good timing.

(Laughter.)

MS. WHITLOCK: Well, in California that said that is the reason it flooded.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Jerry, did you want to --

DR. GALLOWAY: No, no. I would just support what Kay has said. I think that the...as we have talked about them, those 56 communities, it is important to note that the mayors of St. Paul and Minneapolis, for example, signed on to the larger project.

Now, I am sure, given their choice, they would rather have their own than be part of the other, but they were perfectly willing to be considered part of that totality.

They also noted that there is a natural resource component and in some of them there is a flood control, flood management component. The quad cities, for examples, has some efforts in there to deal with some of the problems they encountered in the '93 flood.

There are also natural heritage trails that, essentially, move down that entire river; and it is a remarkable accumulation of individual projects with common threads of heritage, love of the river, and protection of the natural resources, and building on the economy of, my goodness, we have this wonderful river, and let's parlay it into a tourist attraction for economic development. And so it seems to be well linked.

I would comment on the other two, the lower two, the Memphis and the Baton Rouge to Louisiana, that they seem to stand on their own. So, whereas, we might look at incorporating the upper into one, the lower two would not fit together and would not fit as part of anything else.

MR. JORDAN: The challenge we have would pose multi-jurisdictional rivers. I appreciate their uniqueness but we need to make sure that their uniqueness is confined to the banks, not to the water, because the uniqueness can conflict if they are going to have a different treatment of the waters, one wanted high the other wanted low. So, we need to insure that those conflicts are not there.

I think that was the issue raised yesterday.

DR. GALLOWAY: On the Mississippi that is a totally controlled river north of Alton, Illinois, so there is not much of a problem there. I mean, they are all part of a -- they are all undergoing a five-year multi-million-dollar study of the upper Mississippi, its navigation and its environment.

So, I think that they are fairly well tied together. And this has -- the support this project has is broad-based, both environmental and, I guess, economic, business.

MS. WHITLOCK: In response to conflict around the expansion of Lock and Dam 26, which is the dam at Alton, in the seventies we did extensive transportation and environmental navigation studies collectively in the upper mid-west; and, so, those communities are living with a river where the decision are made regionally about those balancing acts.

So, I did not find anything but I really did not expect to.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: William, you were part of that committee?

MR. GRAF: Yes. First of all, you and Jerry need to call me Will. The only person that calls me William is my mother.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: She called me last night.

(Laughter.)

MR. GRAF: That means she is angry with me.

(Simultaneous voices.)

MR. GRAF: I did work with Kay and Jerry on this to review it. And you remember my concern yesterday was that we were going to have this string of pearls and I was worried about what was happening between them. It was a little bit like what Charles is getting at.

And after reading the -- all of the proposals and reflecting on my recent experience in Minnesota, where I was -- that is why I got here on Sunday, Mom -- I do not have that concern at this point.

I think that what we are seeing is the nation's largest river in terms of its geographic extent and because of that immense amount of just plain, ordinary space, we cannot quite approach it the way we do some of the other rivers, and that is why we got this string of urban areas along the stream that seem to cooperate with each other in a way that I think is quite unique; and we do not have this kind of proposal from any other system.

And if you notice the extent of this proposal, it does go from essential the head waters region down to Alton, Illinois, not quite up to the last lake in Minnesota but it is close enough, and I think this might serve us well as a unique sort of experiment to see whether or not this kind of arrangement with various, particularly business along the river and urban groups can, in fact, coordinate their development efforts.

And the water quality issue is one that I think we need to be cognizant of; but if you think about the history of these cities working together, I think you will find that they are aware of this issue and have a long history of working well together to protect each other's water quality. They have no choice, of course. I mean, they have to do that, but they have been successful at that.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Tony.

MR. GRASSI: My presumption in reading this, I am troubled by the strings in between still; but if this is -- if our extract is accurate, there were -- there appear to be no letters of opposition from the agricultural areas that exist in the string as opposed to the beads.

MR. GRAF: There is -- there are --

MR. GRASSI: Is this accurate or not?

MR. GRAF: No.

MS. WHITLOCK: No.

MR. GRAF: Illinois, in particular, stands out in my mind as having rural opposition; and it is difficult to read because the letters you read yesterday in this rump session that we had were from groups that were protesting the Illinois-Chicago nomination and, then, almost as an afterthought, the Mississippi seemed to have been mentioned in some of these letters. So, it was almost as though we were facing a shotgun approach and there were not specific statements that, well, this portion of the river we want to opt out for...

MR. GRASSI: How about the other side of the river? How about Missouri, Minnesota?

MR. GRAF: No, we are not dealing with that.

MS. WHITLOCK: You know, I could look again. I --

MR. GRASSI: I mean, just in terms of -- that is where I presume the aggregate mileage of string is.

MR. GRAF: Yes.

MS. WHITLOCK: Mm-huh, mm-huh.

MR. GRASSI: And we have -- we have nothing from them at all.

There is a curious thing that has just gone on for the last three years they have been struggling with how to handle this whole business and they just concluded in March, March or late February, a summit of all the federal and non-federal state agencies somewhere in the upper Mississippi to decide how they were going to go as a whole. It is a pretty difficult problem to get those five upper states to come to a common agreement and they have now concluded this summit with a federal-state partnership to deal with the flood control, the navigation, and the environment.

And I think that the sponsors of this particular program realized that that was in too hard box to add not only the 56 communities but all of the agricultural area in between, given that we had just gone through a three-year debate over what you should do with that. And I think they have reconciled into some sort of common approach.

Maybe the next time around they would add some of the land in between, but I do not see that as a fatal flaw. It would have been nice to have it in there; but, again, that is five states of a massive extent of territory would be very difficult to put together. So, I think it is remarkable to do what they did.

MR. GRAF: Tony, to answer your question about the opposition letters, I just checked them to make so I can give you the right answer. I went through the package that we got yesterday of the most recent receipts. There are no negative letters there from Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: From the earlier ones there are some from Iowa farm bureaus.

MS. WHITLOCK: I was going to say, I thought I saw Iowa.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: But they are all farm bureau ones in which we would take into consideration at the same time what Doug has told us is that, unfortunately, they did not avail themselves, at least in Illinois, a meeting with the people to explain it.

But there are some. For the record, there are a number of -- looked to me like four or five -- letters from -- all from farm bureaus in different counties.

MR. WILSON: If I could say just a little bit more on that part. The Illinois Farm Bureau had their policy meeting in early December. We did not have our informational meeting until in March, I believe. I'm not sure of that. The dates all ran together for me. Too many meetings this winter.

Policy was taken at that point by a group of counties that carried their delegate body to have disposition. In some ways that tied the unit together; and, so, they do not have the flexibility to do something. And, I don't know, as far as directly associated counties that are on the Mississippi, how many of those or how many were an afterthought add-on. And a lot of them were saying, we do not want any part of any river and they may not even be in an area where there was a river considered.

MS. WHITLOCK: I wanted to make an observation about Proposal 77, which I had not really thought about so clearly until yesterday, and that was that the difference between how a community plans for and responds to a river when it is a small water shed and their region and they have the ability to impact it and the fact that, you know, if you think of a town along the Mississippi that may have 500 or 600 people and a river that is draining the magnitude that it is, I mean, it is further across the river than it is across town in many of those towns.

And so it is -- I think this proposal represents those, particularly on the part of those smaller urban areas, their proposal for the things around that river that they have some control over. So, it is a proposal sort of coming out of the size of the water shed than the size of the river.

MR. WILSON: One other comments, too. Lt. Governor Custer in Illinois had an Illinois River, if I may use the word, task force, but that was not actually what it was, group that looked at the situation of the Illinois River prior to the Chicago-Illinois proposal.

Within that there were, I believe, 36 recommendations. There were two that the only farm bureau who was there present at Ron Warfield was a member of that task force had objection to that pertained in particular to property rights. And you all know how farms are with property rights. And I qualify myself in that area, too. If I felt there was a problem here, you would be hearing.

But, at any rate, I think what has happened to some extent is that the ability for them to separate the two actions was not well transmitted; and I think the Illinois River task force and the problems there, even though they were not part of the Chicago-Illinois, that was not necessarily clear to a lot of the members of the farm bureau that there was that separation to where it was not the same.

And, so, that is another factor that I think probably illustrates why there is maybe some -- so much reference to private property rights and such that they have not separated those.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Maria, you want to --

MS. TERAN: Yes. How do we want to consider the proposal, which way? I mean, obviously, from what I have heard, there is a need -- there are some good proposals. Are we going to nominate a proposal or consider it as the entire river for heritage purposes and then four proposals? Is that what we are saying? As the leaders.

MS. WHITLOCK: I guess I personally was not proposing anything. I was just trying to --

(Simultaneous voices.)

MS. TERAN: You know, it sounds like you might agree.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Maria, before we even -- that is, I think, a question we need to -- to consider. What you are saying is one of the proposals subsumes three of the others.

MS. TERAN: Right.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: And then there's two others and you -- you have mentioned earlier that maybe we just want to consider the proposals on the Mississippi.

MS. TERAN: And share the responsibilities of the navigator.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Right. But, I would like to -- I think we need to hear from our sub-committee a little bit more in detail about the other, the two lower river ones, of just any impressions that you have on the one at Memphis and the one at the final reach.

MR. GRAF: Well, I will start with the Memphis proposal. I think it is a solid proposal and we were impressed with it. However, I think that we felt that it was more strongly oriented towards economic development dimension of the process and perhaps less to some of the other objectives of the initiative.

I did not feel that it was as effective as those in the upper river simply because the ones in the upper river I think I can see how they are sutured together and they effect a long component of the system; whereas, naturally, the Memphis one is focused on a particular urban area.

I think we feel that this urban area is worthy of assistance and we recognize that it is in a difficult circumstance at the present time economically. For that reason the proposal was appealing.

I think it is less competitive, though, when we put it into context with the some of the other things we have talked about where we are looking at some city designations; and, frankly, the upper river seems to be unique and would contribute to an overall series that we might propose to the President better.

Jerry, I think deals more with New Orleans.

DR. GALLOWAY: Number 118, Baton Route, New Orleans, as you all may know the combination of Baton Route and New Orleans is one of the greatest ports in our country, if not the greatest, in terms of tonnage.

It is also an area that has been highly polluted as a source of a lot of the chemical petroleum works along there.

Also the home of 125 historic location, southern historic landmarks. And this proposal is focused on heritage and taking advantage along the way from New Orleans north to Baton Rouge of the opportunity to enhance what they do have left in the area of heritage communities that have a history, older buildings, and to try and bring some preservation and link to the river itself.

There is not a lot of environmental or natural resource work in there.

I was taken that there was not support by the levee boards who control -- there was no opposition but there was not support from the levee boards who actually control the activities along the river itself.

The Mayor of New Orleans is strong in his support and, obviously, New Orleans is an area that would like to see continued growth with the river as one of the sparkplugs; and, so, from that standpoint, just like the Memphis one, it is a certainly a project worthy of consideration.

It is not as broad-based, I would suggest, as some of the others we have seen. On the other hand, it is -- the first leevies in our country were built in the 1700's in New Orleans and development in the Mississippi started north from New Orleans towards Baton Rouge. So, there is history, there is heritage; but I think we have to weigh this against all the other urban communities.

It is kind of different because it is a very unique part of the Mississippi, that is, there is deep water part that has this relationship with industry and not a previous history of doing a lot for the natural environment.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: My own sense, getting now referring about those other two, is that the issue of us recommending to the President you have got all of these along the same river, in essence you can look at it as six or, essentially, three proposals, cause once you -- once you designate the St. Louis north region you have designated the three individual proposals as well.

I think the principal concern of doing that would be to what extent once -- if they were designated, to what extent have you weakened the implementation of -- of the action plan in the sense that the river navigator -- you are spreading out whatever the resources and attention, the administrative attention is over more projects.

I do not know the answer to that question but I think that is a consideration for us if we consider that a large thing; and, of course, there -- people might -- some members might say, well, the one that really stands out.

I would like us also to be thinking about if we did not have that option, would you nominate two Mississippi rivers? Do you have strong enough about it?

One? None? But I do not want us to quite yet come to a conclusion that we may not be -- we maybe asking an administrative thing that -- that does not work.

I mean, conceivably you could say, well, we consider all of the northeast rivers great ones and name them all and one river navigator get to handle everything.

It is not the same, obviously.

MS. WHITLOCK: I guess I would say that --

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I just do not know if -- if -- if it -- if it creates certain other problems that weakens the action plan.

MS. WHITLOCK: I would think that if you were interested in the upper Mississippi River with the 56 mayors, then, I would not think it would be useful to have named, for example, Dubuque and the upper Mississippi River because it is subsumed in it.

But, for me, and the individual members thinking about what they want to support, I would say that Dubuque or Minneapolis or -- is a stand-alone proposal also and you might -- you might want to endorse one of those rather than 77 if you specifically liked that proposal better than the group.

MR. GRAF: Yes, I think Kay is correct. It is one way or the other and I think you have to think about the nature of the proposals and decide how you view the best chance for success here.

MS. WHITLOCK: But I would not propose that we tell the group what we recommend because I think that now that -- I mean, I just needed to understand how it all fitted together.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Unless people have other substantive questions, my suggestion is that we move on from the Mississippi, and we do our next exercise in which everyone is going to be marking their top ten.

What I think we will want to ask you to do is be very specific about if you are dealing with -- if one of your ten or two of your ten or any of your ten are the Mississippi, be very specific.

If you feel strongly that you want all of the Mississippi proposals, then -- then you should mark that. If you want just the 77 -- we will go over it before we vote so that -- so that we are operating -- because there is some confusion of terms about the upper Mississippi.

MS. WHITLOCK: Yes. I think we need to put the proposal number on the next round.

A VOICE: That is a good idea.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: And just so we know there is a point of information, is that on Number 77, that ranges from east St. Louis to the Midgee at the very bottom of that, the St. Louis portion, Congressman Jim Tallent opposes that.

MS. WHITLOCK: Oh, okay.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: That portion of it.

MS. WHITLOCK: congressman from which state?

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Missouri, the city.

(Simultaneous voices.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: There are several, I guess.

A VOICE: He has got part of it.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: He has got part of it.

MS. WHITLOCK: Thanks for that.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I do not know if that --

A VOICE: It is not the downtown part. It is out in the suburbs.

MS. WHITLOCK: North of downtown.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: So, part of the St. Louis would be in and part of it would be out.

A VOICE: Around the airport.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Whatever his Congressional district is.

DR. GALLOWAY: He may not even be in the City of St. Louis. I think that would be interesting.

A VOICE: The suburbs. I think the airport is in his district.

MR. STEPHENSON: It is the very end of that teach.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: While he is looking at that, let's move to the -- unless somebody has got another Mississippi question, let's move our discussion to the Potomac, which is in Tab 1.

MS. WHITLOCK: Number 90.

DR. GALLOWAY: One of you raised the question why did we lave the Potomac out.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: That is what prompted it. Tony yesterday at the very end said he was surprised that no one had...

DR. GALLOWAY: And I guess after I read it I was surprised myself. When you look at that, recognizing the very strong support from the local communities, 27 -- I think 37 of the 38 counties in the Potomac River water shed supporting it, the communities here in and around Washington, D.C., a water shed that runs from West Virginia, Pennsylvania and upper Maryland to the Chesapeake Bay, and a plan of action that meets water quality, restoration of living resources, fisheries, reduction in mine drainage, reduction in nutrient run-off, more effective flood protection, working for improvement and appreciation of heritage resources, and improvement in public participation, there is not a goal of the program that the Potomac did not attempt to address in a broad partnership that includes the support of the Senators, with one exception from Virginia, and it is not opposition but Senator Byrd from West virginia, two from Maryland, two from Virginia, the appropriate representatives, mayors, state legislators, the D.C. City Council, effected landowners.

It is a -- from a history standpoint, I would be preaching to the choir, but George Washington called the Potomac River the center of the Union.

I think we were taken, if I were to answer the question why didn't we consider it, because we each found a favorite somewhere else and that just got left out.

But when you look at the package as a whole, as looked at by the screening committee and then as I looked at it yesterday, it is a rather ambitious, sound, well-partnered, well-organized proposal.

The only question is they have got so much on the plate are they going to get it all done. They are blessed by the fact that they do have interstate commission on the Potomac River basin, which is a non-regulatory commission made up of the representatives of all of the communities in this region that is and has been working to do many of the things that provide a framework to link their present activities with those they propose for the future.

So, I think the call yesterday by Tony why didn't we pick the Potomac, I'm sorry I did not look at it when I drove across it and I should have. It should have been on here.

MR. GRASSI: I did the same thing. I read the whole proposal again and I guess the one thing that struck me as compared to all the other proposals I read is the very clear delineation of the segments of the river and rather just sort of dealing with the river.

It breaks out the Blue Ridge province, the Piedmont province, the coastal plains providence, and it really is a very throughout and concise approach to every -- all these different aspects of different issues effecting the river in different places, and that was -- I was impressed when I read this last night.

MR. JORDAN: I think we all were impressed with the proposal as well written, but there were a number of others that were written just as well. I mean, we have some outstanding proposals written here.

I think the thing with the Potomac that I feel as strongly as I do about the Mississippi. I mean, theirs was a good proposal. So, when you talk about heritage, I mean, how are you going to leave off the Mississippi and Potomac? I mean, they just go together, they are -- so that is the only part of it that really does cause me to want to take a hard look at it.

But, in terms of the proposal itself, I have got some other ones here that I would like to talk about. I am not sure the proposal is better than some of the others I have seen. It is just that the heritage part of it bothers me.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Well, I think it is -- I mean, essentially, the difficulty that we keep butting up against is exemplified there of so many great proposals just in the substance against which we are also measuring the heritage against which we also will have to, when we finally get to a final mix, the call for diversity of types of plans, the diversity of types of rivers, geography, and all that.

But you could certainly -- just by listing the number of rivers that have been nominated. you could trace the -- as someone who is passionate about American history, you could trace our history just be listing the rivers that have been nominated from the Potomac to the Hudson to the Ohio to the Mississippi and the Missouri and the Rio Grande, the South Fork of the American, the Chicago and Illinois. It is a great thing about this initiative and a hard thing for us.

MR. GRAF: One important thing that I do not want to see us lose sight of with respect to the Potomac is that I think this proposal was very effective in representing the fact that rivers and water sheds are connected to each other and it would have been tempting in this proposal simply to have dealt with that portion of the river that is highly visible to the American public which is the portion here in the D.C. area.

That is not what happened with this proposal. This proposal effectively took into account almost 15,000 square miles of drainage area, not only physically but in terms of its administration and politically as well, and drew support throughout that entire water shed.

I think that is a key to success here, because such things a water quality and flood control and all those other things that we worry about in terms of stability of the system are dependent not on what is happening right here in Washington, they are dependant on what is happening upstream, and this proposal did a good job of taking care of that.

MS. WHITLOCK: Well, and it referenced this Potomac Water Shed Vision Project, which they conducted in '93 and '94. So, I am sure that is why you see so much of that in the proposal because they have been visioning on the water shed for those years.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: They are accessed together here.

MR. OLSEN: I would suggest that would be one of the filters that we use to try to winnow out the proposals, the ones that do include consideration of the water shed; because if we do not have the health of the river as a primary factor, then we are not going to achieve any of the other objectives and so I would agree strongly with that.

Another filter that I have been struggling with among so many excellent proposals is -- is really where -- how to find out where designation as an American heritage river would have the greatest impact, and it is very difficult for me to have any sense of that from the materials, even the full applications. But, given two equally excellent proposals, I would tend to want to designate the river in which the help and support would have the greatest impact. How can we know that?

MS. WHITLOCK: That was one of the comments from the Board, too.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Does anybody have an answer to that question?

MR. JORDAN: Without local knowledge, it is rather difficult to tell from the proposals. I do look for certain things where -- I was looking at the Black Stone of Rhode Island. 2,000 young people, close to 2,000 young people have written letters. At least they are engaging those who are going to have the responsibility to carry on the challenge, and I like that.

I like the New River in Carolina. I look for things that is going to contribute to community building. Now, that is what it is really all about. It is not just about isolating a river, trying to save that river, but you have to look at -- you have to have a holistic view and does it help build that community; does it help to unify that community; and so maybe I read between the lines and maybe it just isn't there, but that is the only way I can tell if I don't have the local knowledge because the words just do not bring it out, and that -- that is a difficult one. But I agree with you a hundred percent, you need to look for those where it is really going to make a difference.

MR. OLSEN: So, for example, in the case of the Potomac, is there enough underway and is there enough visibility already because of its location that these many excellent initiatives in this plan will continue even if it is not designated a heritage river.

MS. TERAN: Is there a need? Is there a need for federal aid at the time? There certainly is merit in naming it as a heritage river but is there a need/

MR. JORDAN: Also is there a structure that will carry on? Now, you have got some champions there now but eventually they are going to burn out or they are going to get kicked out. Is there a structure that will bring in some new players who are also as committed as those who put this together or is this just a fleeting fancy that once they go then the dream also dies?

And proposals are limited in terms of convincing us that all those things are in place, so we have to try to, again, read between the lines to see if we feel secure enough that this is going to be a long-term commitment.

DR. GALLOWAY: But I would be troubled if somebody had their act well together and we decided that that might be a penalty; because if they are, in fact, doing well and have organized and continue to do that, we would like to have some of these have success and immediate success.

And I think, yes, we do have to look for the person that is really struggling, but we -- or the group that is really struggling, but I think we also ought to be cognizant and reward those that have put their act together.

MR. JORDAN: I agree, Jerry. I do not think there is going to be any immediate success in some of these challenges we have, but we have got to look at those who will come after us and that is who we are doing it for and not just for you and I. But if they have no appreciate of the value of what we are doing then they are not going to protect it. And if they are not going to protect it, they are going to lose it.

DR. GALLOWAY: Well, I think in the Potomac --

MS. TERAN: Well, in naming them and looking at basing it on need and also picking the first rivers as models for others later on, would we see more dramatic change and more dramatic results, positive results from more needy areas? Or would we see it in areas that are already developed and well on their way in correcting their own problems? And then there is this fine line of did the initiative help more or would the progress have been realized anyway?

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Donald, I'm sorry...

MR. SAMPSON: I guess looking at the institutional opportunities here in the Potomac, I note some of the comments that are the segments and the goals within the application which talks for the curriculum models and the lower Potomac basin school... I think that is an important one. That you begin looking at the future generation. Support for ongoing education, outreach, and a demonstration project.

I know that they mention about the work they have done in the Shennandoah River which they say in the 40's were biologically dead and now they have fisheries returning to those types of streams.

They also talk about a Pure Water 2000 Forum in the Shennandoah and investing in conservation education for local leaders, professionals, and citizenship of the fish and wildlife service facility, $138 million facility that provides training for local leadership. I think that is something that, I guess, in the long term might help benefit the continuation of this effort.

But one other point, coming from the west, you always hear people say, well, the federal government in D.C. always establishes great plans for everybody outside of D.C. but let's see them do it in their own back yard. And I think this would be a good opportunity to see what this nation's capital can do and the President can do in his own back yard.

If they can clean up their river, then maybe they can provide some initiative and incentive and be a model for other communities throughout the country. So, that's all.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Tony, did you have --

MR. GRASSI: Well, I am sensitive to this issue of where can we use the designation most effectively, and there is other -- I presume that later in the day we are going to sort of come back to the broad criteria; but one of the things that I am struck by is we have very specific and detailed instructions of the criteria we are to use, and that is not one of them. Nowhere does it say that in our guide.

So, I think that we have to be careful that while of us -- each of our judgments may be effected by second order priority issues, that we have to set our criteria based on the four that are outlined in our charge.

And the Executive Order says that and it does not say that we are supposed to be influenced by where this is effective.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Well, we have in our -- those four criteria as part of our direction of looking at plans in the sort of diversity. It includes, you know, not just diversity in terms of geographical diversity but --and steam size diversity and water quality of the beginning river, but also serves the stage of the plan.

And I guess one way of reading that would be of saying that -- that the hope is that the diversity would include perhaps a designation of a river or two that -- that the initiative helped begin and assist in the early stages as well as the ones that are already mature plans hat are well underway.

MR. GRASSI: I don't find that language. That is what I was looking for.

DR. GALLOWAY: It is on Page 3 of the Executive Order.

On our charge it says, will seek to recommend selection of rivers as a group that includes community efforts in early stages and those that are well established.

MR. GRASSI: Where do you find this?

DR. GALLOWAY: On -- the Executive Order on the Advisory Committee.

MR. GRASSI: Under recommendation process?

DR. GALLOWAY: Let's see --

MR. GRASSI: I am just looking at selection criteria.

DR. GALLOWAY: It is on Tab 6, Tony, the green Tab 6 on Page 3.

MR. GRASSI: You are reading a different Executive Order than I.

MS. TERAN: Mine is Tab 7.

DR. GALLOWAY: Next tab.

MR. GRASSI: What is the difference between the Executive Order in 7 and Executive Order in 8?

MR. CLARK: There is one Executive Order that sets up the federal advisory committee and there is one that sets up the American Heritage Rivers Initiative.

MR. GRASSi; All right. You are reading the one that sets up the initiative, which does not mention any of those things.

MR. CLARK: Right, the Federal Advisory Committee Act which gives instructions to the Federal Advisory Committee is the one that you should be taking your que from about what criteria and what your charge is.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Well, I think in the larger -- in the larger sense of this anyway is I think what we -- as we continue to discuss individual rivers and the things at large is that all of us individually bring into it different considerations and I think it is good that we talk about those with everybody because it is good for -- it is good for all of us as we make our individual judgments and we try to eventually reach a conclusion as a group of all these different considerations. Some may be balancing higher, some may be balancing more heritage than environment, some may be doing economic development more than others, just as the plans do. And for some what might have trapped an individual member and other members of the Committee is that this is a small, well-focused proposal for which the designation might really be a major thing and for others it might -- it might be that this is without this river how can you have an American Heritage Rivers program.

Doug.

MR. WILSON: Two comments. One on the Potomac, based on what I see as a merit proposal that is well balanced, I look at all aspects of it. I think that they are taking on an awful lot; but, at the same point, I give them credit that it looks like they have tried to cover all the basis.

The background I read as far as agricultural proposals and what they are working on there, they have got a good start there, that is a good direction.

The other areas where they are looking at child education and other things like that are very good.

My question would be can they accomplish all that? The merit of the program is pretty good.

On the bigger picture of what will finally end up as the designated rivers, I mentioned yesterday about maintaining our balance, and I think my point being there was that I want to see kind of what you were saying: I want to see a pristine river; I want to see bio-diversification; I want to see a come-back kid; I want to see economic development. I want to see a mixture. I do not want ten environmental; I do not want ten economic. I want a mixture that gives opportunities for all segments.

And I think all of these proposals do have stronger and weaker areas even if they meet the criteria and I think we need to keep that in balance, too. And that is the balance that I was talking about, that we need to deal with all three of those and make sure that we make the recommendations that will make this, if you want to say, three-legged stool stand.

MR. DELLIPRISCOLLI: Before you finish the Potomac and take a break, two observations.

One, we have copied the Potomac and Mississippi down. As we have shifted as a group to criteria and how we are going to choose from a whole as different from individuals, we have been moving around the table the last 20 minutes and looking at the whole criteria, the whole package, I have been capturing the criteria as it filters up here next to all the other criteria stuff. That is what I have been doing or trying to do in that debate, because we are going to come back to it later.

The sense that I am getting, though, of course, is that we are eager to look at the package again at some point.

My suggestion would be, if we don't have anymore on the Potomac, finish that up, take a break, go to the wall or any other source and look at other rivers. If you can handle that for another hour, do that, then come back to another sense of reading because we are getting close to wanting to do that, that is one of the criteria.

(Laughter.)

MR. DELLIPRISCOLLI: And then -- but, I would say, if there is nothing more on the Potomac, we should take a break and then honor some of the stuff on the wall if we can and others and spend an hour or so on that and then go back to take a reading from the group...

MR. WILSON: I just wanted to make one comment about things on the wall and that is yesterday on the Chattahoochee we had a very specific discussion about...overflow and some problems in the Chattahoochee, and a member of the audience has explained that to us, so those of you who had those questions, it is --

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I think it answered the question that Tony had raised as well about why didn't they get it done during the Olympics.

MS. WHITLOCK: That right, yes. That part of the question that that very specifically addresses.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: The answer is they tried but -- the short answer is they were trying to and it got balled up in litigation which is now coming to fruition.

Fifteen minutes.

(Whereupon, a brief recess was had.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Our hope is to spend about an hour talking about other rivers that members want to -- want to raise.

I do want to point out that we have had no river metaphors yet today.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: We are starting afresh today, despite my commanding lead yesterday.

We are going to talk about a number of rivers that Committee members would like to throw open for discussion. We will see if we can do that in an hour and then Jerry wants us to do another exercise in which we will have ten to select at that moment your top ten.

Jerry Galloway wanted to start with a river.

DR. GALLOWAY: I am concerned as I look at rivers in our geographic diversity that we have somewhat, other than the Chattahoochee, not spent a lot of time on the southeast and we did not get a chance yesterday to discuss the St. John.

Now, the St. John is shown on our chart as a mix of -- with opposition and strong support, and it is difficult for me, as I read through this stack that you each got last night of letters concerning the St. John what the nature of the opposition is.

The Mayor of Jacksonville, who is perhaps the proponent for the project, its strong supporter, notes that some of the Congressional opposition deals with only a very small segment. He points out that a 20-mile segment of 310 miles of the river.

And, so, I think it is something we probably need to learn a little bit more about and see if we can map what that really means to that river.

It is, again, a very valuable resource in Florida, in the southeast United States, flowing from near Cape Canaveral northward, pointed out to be one of the few rivers that flows north -- water does flow uphill now -- that flows north into the Atlantic near Jacksonville, but it has the qualities of being both in the typical Florida atmosphere that we would see and, yet, running through the major urban area of Jacksonville and the county, and they have a joint cooperative government there.

So, it benefits not only the people who live in a large metropolitan area but the people that run all the way south from there to the coastline.

It is a project that has been really supported well, including the Mayor of the State of Florida, many of the conservation groups in the area.

MR. JORDAN: He is quite a mayor.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: The Governor of the State.

DR. GALLOWAY: The Governor of the State, right. Excuse me. I was looking at ten mayors. You never can tell.

(Laughter.)

DR. GALLOWAY: After I read all these letters, it will give me a clue.

But certainly the mayors have come up with a great deal of support that includes the Governor.

The only sure thing in this project, which was rated quite highly by our screening committees, was the fact that there was, in fact, this opposition, and how do you play this opposition in building this -- the public's response to this. How, in that particular part of the world, do you gather the consensus that is necessary to have the support?

There are a number of groups involved and there are commitments for partnerships, and I think the only thing we have to weigh is what is the effect of the opposition of the members of Congress and now a considerable body of Florida legislators, but I don't even know where their districts are, so I think we need to examine that.

But I would ask that we keep the St. Johns on our screen until we can resolve whether or not there is really opposition or if it is limited opposition.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Okay. One thing that I said that I have learned is in terms of the Congressional opposition, which is always tricky for us to understand the dynamics, is that, I think as you mentioned, Congressional opposition to that district is 30 miles, and the district that has a very avid support by Congresswoman Brown covers 300 miles or 200.

DR. GALLOWAY: Yes.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: In essence, the rest of the river.

And that, also, in their deliberations that the Governor and his cabinet undertook in terms of this initiative, it was the St. Johns that -- that they decided to support. They do not oppose any of the other Florida nominations but they decided that they would give their support to just one project and it was the St. Johns. And I think that is similar with Senator Grant who has indicated his support with that and is not in opposition to any of the others but decided that were the Senator to pick the one that he thought was the worthiest it would be the St. Johns.

Maybe we could have somebody on the staff level try to wrestle with the things on the -- of the other parts of the opposition in terms of the state legislators, whether it is significant or not.

DR. GALLOWAY: I gather that the Administration has not made a commitment to necessarily respond totally to state legislatures. It is to certainly look to the sense of the governor and then also the members of Congress.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Is it the sense of the Committee that you would like a little bit more information on -- is it every state legislator along the St. John or is it legislators that are peripherally involved or is it just something you want more information.

A VOICE: More information is always better.

MS. WHITLOCK: I think there may be some members in the audience who may have some information that would be useful to us also about that. You may want to put those on yellow stickies if you think you have an understanding.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Any other things about the St John?

No.

Dan?

MR. KEMMIS: Well, speaking of the yellow stickies, I just wanted to say how helpful they have been. I know that I spent most of the break, and it really does add a whole different dimension here. So I wanted to thank the people who are taking the trouble of doing that. It was very educational.

And following up on a couple of those I just want to put the Rivers of Steel on the table here.

Again, when we talk about American heritage, thinking of Port Decane, and the way in which the head waters of the Ohio were the opening to the west, the substantial role that was played there.

And I think what is interesting about those rivers, particularly focusing on Pittsburgh, is the way in which they stand for a kind of transformation and economic base that is going on throughout so much of the country where de-industrialization is --tends to be followed by a refocus on natural amenities as a much more important part of an economic base, and Pittsburgh really stand for that, I think, in a very substantial way.

So, I would like us to at least take another look at that. I think the proposal itself is very strong. The communities around Pittsburgh have really learned to act regionally and in this case they are doing it on a water shed basis that is very sound.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I will open it to anyone else that -- you have some, Will?

MR. GRAF: Yes, I had a couple that I do not want us to overlook and I want us to seriously consider.

If we look at our map, you will notice in the northern portion of the midwestern United States we have got the Ohio outlined there, we have got the Mississippi outlined, and then there is discussion of the Chicago-Illinois business, but those are the prominent ones. You will notice there are an awful lot of red lines on that map, fine red lines, meaning they are streams that have been nominated but that we have not voted for, we have not talked about in any great detail, and I think there are a couple that are worthy of consideration.

Particularly in the State of Wisconsin. I am thinking specifically of the Milwaukee River and the Fox River.

The Milwaukee River is located, as you may expect, in the southeastern part of the United -- or the state, and it does drain through Milwaukee, which is a port and has a long history of activity in the Great Lakes shipping trade. It is also a city that has a great history of immigrants and it has a very strong ethnic identity.

But the Milwaukee is not only an urban one. It extends about 900 square miles or something like that, I believe, further into the state and it includes many areas that are in a transition zone between heavy industry at the lower end and very nearly pristine natural at the upper end.

There are wet lands, for example, in this basin that are critical wildlife habitat, I believe, and that would be of interest in terms of seeing how a local group can integrate this very nearly natural kind of habitat with an industrialized situation in the lower portions of the stream.

And I think the region, in part, is making this transition that we talked about earlier from one kind of industrial emphasis to a more broadly based economy and is worthwhile considering from that standpoint.

I think the State of Wisconsin has a good track record in terms of dealing with its natural resources and coupling those resources to economic development in a supportive way, and that is kind of what led me to look more seriously at Fox.

Those of you who know about industrial history, know that the Fox River in the northern part of the state drains into Green Bay, it is not for from Lambo Field, as a matter of fact, at one point, for those of you who are into football. But it is also very close to dozens of paper mills and the history of northern Wisconsin and northern Michigan is bound up in the paper industry and now the environmental conditions that we find in the river system are bound up with that industry and what potential things we might do to build on that history and to capitalize not on the basic products now but to capitalize on the heritage and the attractions through tourism and other sorts of recreational uses.

The Fox, by the way, is also interesting because of its canal history. We do not think of Wisconsin as being a great center of canal development but the Fox does have a hand-operated canal system that is still, I think, of great historical significance.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Hand-operated?

MR. GRAF: Hand-operated. I think it is presently inoperative but it is in place. In other words, with assistance, perhaps from an initiative such as this, we can see its preservation and redevelopment.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Others from the group here?

MR. JORDAN: Well, there are a couple of others that I will be taking home to read and they are full of text.

As I mentioned before the break, the Blackstone and the New River, and I think the last two days we have been talking about some of the parts of these proposals that they are not a part of the criteria and I understand that and I know that in the final analysis we will go back to the criteria and we will use that only, but for the sake of discussion in my consideration I do feel very strongly about those that will have the support of the people who not only play there but the people who live there, those who live on the land, and I think I found that in the Blackstone as well as the New River.

And the Blackstone, of the 26 communities along that river, 24 of them already have their comprehensive community plans, and I am sure that all of you have seen what those look like. That is where the communities come together and they decide what they want their community to look like, and they develop their comprehensive plan of which only the cities, the state, all try to support the implementation of those plans.

24 of the 26 here have developed their plans and they always include that portion of the river that runs through their community and this way they turn back to the river and also they develop a very strong sense of ownership.

So, I like those features, but I need to know a lot more about the rivers and I would like to read the proposal in its full text so that when we do talk again, and we will be talking again, I would like to maybe raise some other parts of their proposal to the group.

The other, of course, is the New River; and, of course, you know, reading that one, it is, as I read on one of those yellow stickers up there, a unique rural laboratory, and I think it is one worthy of you taking another look at because it has tremendous potential as a different model.

So, what I plan to do and to deal with these, because I will take them back and I will read them in their full text so that I will be more knowledgeable the next time we talk, but those are two.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: My recollection on the New River that that is -- the proposal is the first phase of a longer-term --

MR. JORDAN: Right.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: -- plan that they are going to start with the head waters, the more rural sections of it, and hope to build from a success on that to move downstream which is an interesting, I find interesting, concept, because whatever you do at the mouth of a river, if things are terrible at the -- you know, the farther upstream you go, that is -- that is where you logically begin your -- your work at making sure that everything --

MS. WHITLOCK: Yes, that direction really pleases me in this proposal.

MR. JORDAN: I was interested in Blackstone, which is -- how do you pronounce that? -- like Puyallup?

(Laughter.)

MR. GRAF: I would point out that it is spelled two different ways in our -- who has got the correct one. Tony?

(Simultaneous voices.)

MR. JORDAN: But the Blackstone has things going for it right now, and now it is bringing in a new partner. So it is a strange marriage, so it is going to be interesting to see how that works. That now they are moving along and now they are bringing in a river that is not moving; and, so, it is going to be a nice marriage. I am interested to see how they plan to make this marriage work.

MR. GRAF: I would like to second Charles' interest in the Blackstone and its much larger area. Those of you who know it, know that it drains southward from Massachusetts down through Rhode Island and that it empties into the ocean.

A VOICE: Yes, we all knew that.

MR. GRAF: Okay, well, now we are reiterating.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: We just couldn't pronounce the other river.

MR. GRAF: Well, the deal is this, the Blackstone has the largest concentration of dams of any stream in the United States. Most of them is small. The point is that there have been a considerable number of studies underway to determine which ones might be removed to enhance the river habitat, to enhance its utility for other uses. This is another one of those laboratories.

It is a place where perhaps under the aegis of the American Heritage Rivers Initiative we can see some investigations of the long-term effects of re-thinking the structures of this type.

The issue is, of course, you remove all the dams and all the sediment behind them goes downstream from Massachusetts to Rhode Island on to the oyster beds which makes other folks unhappy.

And, so, I think that this water shed base approach that you described for the Blackstone and its tributaries is pretty important.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Something that Roger gave me, that I will just make available to everybody, during lunch, is just looking at proposals that are also national heritage, already been designated national heritage corridors, and the Blackstone is one of those; and also once affiliated with the national park system and so forth, again, not that that is a determining factor, but just as additional information to address and look over.

MR. JORDAN: Are those Congressional designations or --

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Can you -- is Roger here? You want to just talk about what that means, without getting into individuals ones, just tell us --

MR. STEPHENSON: Congress does designate these corridors, and some of them, but not all of them, are affiliated areas of the national park system. So there is support for appropriated funds to these heritage corridors and they have their local governing bodies, if you will.

MR. JORDAN: So they are already receiving federal funds? There are dollars tied to those?

MR. STEPHENSON: Some but not all.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Cris, do you have anything else to add to that? Cris Brown is...and works for the National Heritage.

MR. BROWN: There are now 17 Congressionally designated national heritage areas and they do have -- all of them have some kind of small appropriation attached to them.

The National Heritage Area program is similar in many respects to the American Heritage River Program, but --in terms of being community lead and bottoms up and so on, but it does differ in that these are specific pieces of legislation that designate them.

Four of them have been around for a while, 8, 10, 12 years, so we have got some record on them. Most of them are still getting their feet on the ground, so we do not have a lot of record on those.

But I think about a dozen of them have some overlap with proposals that are on the table here for American Heritage River areas; and I think some of them there might be a major overlap and others would be a very minor overlap.

But the one other significant difference I would note is that -- that the National Heritage Areas are administered by the National Park Service with a local commissioner. They do not have the kind of multi-agency support that is envisioned for the American Heritage Rivers program.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Thank you.

Other rivers that people want to raise and talk about.

Maria?

MS. TERAN: Further discussion on the Ohio. I was wondering if any of the other members did read a little bit further into that project and if we could hear their...

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I am looking for it right now. There are essentially two. The longer one of the Ohio and the one at Ripley.

MS. TERAN: Ohio River, right.

(Simultaneous voices.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Both of them have some Congressional --

MS. TERAN: There is a specific need shared by 24 communities along this river; and I think that in itself --

MS. WHITLOCK: Number 82.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Number 82. The thing that truck me, I mean, obviously, again, in the whole discussion, if you just name the main rivers that mean things to the larger national history, the Ohio certainly...

One thing that did strike me that is not necessarily to their benefit, I am sorry to say, is they have got 26 mayors, which is great, but there was only one Congressperson, at least on mine, that was supporting it, Congressman Hanna from Ohio, and just what it raised to me is the question is why not any others? And I do not know the answer to that -- to that -- to that question, but -- and I know that the other one at Ripley was the one that had the opposition.

What was not clear to me is that with that one where there is opposition, that is Number 25 in Tab 3, I am assuming that if you take the Number 82, the Ohio River, that is basically the length of the Ohio, it is unclear to me if --

MS. TERAN: Can I --

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: -- Congressperson who is opposed to the one at Ripley doesn't care about the larger one --

MS. TERAN: But it is just like the support that we have of 20 mayors along the Rio Grande. They are close to it.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Right.

MS. TERAN: But the problems are in their back yard. Sometimes Congress' -- what is the right word? -- is persuaded to deal with other issues that are more popular in areas of that state and will not deal with the problems that are -- that exist on the boarder of that.

It is the same thing with Mexican government. Right now the local government along the boarder are more powerful and are more independent of national government because their needs are specifically and very unique from what the rest of that country needs.

We cannot dismiss the support of 26 mayors who--

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Right.

MS. TERAN: -- actually live there, as we cannot dismiss 20 mayors along the Rio Grande who are actually on the Rio Grande who know the need, who know that the problems exist and the need exists.

I just would like for you to consider it one more time.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Okay. Others anyone? Tony, you said you had --

MR. GRASSI: I have got a couple.

The Edisto I mentioned yesterday. Again, I am concerned there are a bunch of rivers, any one of which might accomplish my purposes here, but I am concerned about this -- this area of the country where we are not talking about major political powers, we are not talking about people that are in this room and, therefore, influencing this group.

I think we need to be very careful that we consider rivers -- and awful lot of what we have on our list are rivers that have major population centers and, therefore, have more political stick and, therefore, are maybe a little higher on our screen; and I think it is very important that we not lose track of the rural rivers and the rivers that -- that, in a different way, represent the heritage of this country, which is its biological diversity; and that is a different kind of heritage than George Washington and the Potomac, but it is older and more important.

Somebody pointed out the Neuse is the only river in the continent that is older than the Atlantic Ocean or something to that effect.

You know there is a different sort of heritage here that I think is important and I have got -- I have got a couple of rivers that sort of fall in that category.

The Edisto I talked about yesterday a little bit. It is in South Carolina. I thought the proposal was excellent in that it, again, I think is a very good description of the -- sort of the opportunity for a -- for a whole river basin initiative. This isn't just -- is not just the river itself. It deals with the river and its tributaries and the larger basin. It is basically an all agricultural community, if you will, and a large portion of it is forest and is reasonably protected and reasonably pristine, the water shed, the mouth of it comes down into the Ace Basin with two other rivers I can never remember their names, beginning with A and C, that form the Ace Basin and which is one of nature conservancy's last great places and is a very -- is important in terms of water fowl and there are some important natural communities there...and so forth.

So, you know, again, I think it is very easy for us to sort of gravitate to the places where there are a lot of people and a lot of politics and I am inclined to look the other way.

The second I would sort of like to get on your screen that has not been on anybody's screen is the -- is the Cumberland River in Tennessee, which is the same idea.

The Cumberland River, again, I am dramatically influenced by this book that the conservancy has just published which -- which one of the things they say here is they ranked fresh water regions in the United States by at-risk fish and muscle species and the Cumberland River basin is the first in the list with 104 species, the next closest is the Mobile area which has 65, so there is a rather dramatic drop till you get to another area, and I sort of then went into the books to sort of find the Cumberland River proposal and try to ferret it out and it is interesting.

It has -- again, it has many of the characteristics of the other proposals we are looking at and just because nobody's sort of here from Tennessee it is not on our screen and that is really very troublesome to me.

But there is -- it has got lots of restoration work; it has got, you know, sort of a strong local support, mayors and the like; but, again, it is a different sort of a region, it is a different -- so you are not going to find 26 towns and -- and -- and, you know, four governors and eight local legislators.

MS. WHITLOCK: There aren't 26 towns there.

MR. GRASSI: Exactly. This is a different game and I think it is really important that we not lose sight of that and I really would like to draw your attention to that.

As I look at it, you have got a series of these river proposals. The St. Johns is one, the Edisto is one.

I am interested in the coastal plain rivers. The Rappahannock we talked about, the Lower Roanoke. There are a whole series of these, any one of which I think might in some way fulfill some of my objectives, and I have a hard time distinguishing between them because I am not from that part of the country; and, as somebody pointed out on the board, there isn't anybody here from that part of the country, and that is a major flaw in the construction of this Committee, in my view. Somebody who sort of...back woods of the southeast, which is where -- where all the bio-diversity I referred to yesterday is in this country, it is all in those rivers in the southeast.

I think it is sort of important that we hone in. There is the New, there is the lower Neuse. I mean, there are a whole series of them that -- that somehow get to that same issue; and one of my worries is that because there are no major sort of industrial pieces when we come up with our lists, I will put the New and you will put the lower Neuse, and somebody else will put the Edisto, and they will all look like they are sort of low priority and they will all have one --

(Simultaneous voices.)

MR. GRASSI: And maybe we are all trying to acomplish the same thing but we are not -- but there is one thing in one that appeals to me and there is one thing in another that appeals to somebody else; and I don't know how in your -- your calculating counts you deal with that. You know, there are -- there is only one -- I mean, there are five or six Mississippi proposals and I think we sort of honed it down so now there are three and we have got to go through the round again and we probably solved that problem with respect to the Mississippi. We have not solved it with respect to this.

MS. WHITLOCK: That is a real good point.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: I think -- I think it is a great point that we circle around certain types and maybe this afternoon, if we all think it is possible and Jerry gives us the green light on it, we might try to figure out some way that if there is one particular type of river that we all think is -- at least so in our minds. Not to put them and then say, okay, which one of these do you want, but at least to put them all together so that in our minds we can sort of lump them; because, at the end of two days, you raising about the Rappahannock reminded me of it, just mentioning it. And by the end of two days we are starting to forget points that may have been made earlier.

MS. WHITLOCK: The other thing that would be helpful to me is if -- if there is a category of river in that part of the country that is real important from a bio-diversity point of view. I am not expert in that arena so that I can read the proposals and not recognize the same signals that someone who has that kind of background could have or would recognize and so it would be helpful to Committee members with bad expertise could help the rest of us figure out because when you said that I realized that the reference to the agricultural connection on the lower Neuse was the reason that I kept leaning in that direction and if the value there is bio-diversity, I may need to treat more seriously one or two of the other proposals in that region.

MR. GRASSI: Yes, it is -- I found the -- it is just hard to sort these out.

MS. WHITLOCK: Right.

MR. GRASSI: And I think in the lower Neuse proposal there are a -- I think that was the one where there were some specific species mentioned.

MS. WHITLOCK: Right.

MR. GRASSI: And, you know, I read the Cumberland thing and there are 300.

MS. WHITLOCK: 300 endangered species.

MR. GRASSI: Endangered and threatened species in the portion of river they are talking about protecting. So, it is really -- I thought, gees, maybe we are really missing something.

MR. WILSON: Well, since the Rappahannock has been mentioned, I had some questions about dam removal and things like that and since then I found out that there is no -- there has been work done but that is not an issue, that is actually positive for the area; and I am getting like you, the more I read this book the more I see good, the more familiar I become with it, and with my knowledge growth by feeding off of all of you, hopefully a little bit back the other way --

(Laughter.)

MR. WILSON: -- that it raises more and more. But, I agree; I think we are looking at a lot of similarities in a lot of the proposals and we need to try to define how we are going to take six similar proposals and decide how we are going to come up with it.

MS. WHITLOCK: So, if we said we had different categories and we said we want a bio-diversity, the best example we can find of one, that you may have all the qualities but there may be that bio-diversity really emphasized, and zero down on what can we collectively think are the best two or three of those or -- I mean, I think we are moving towards some categories in other ways, too.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Yes. I would -- I think -- my own instincts tell me that you do not want to say there are these ten categories and let's -- let's list them and then vote on the top five bio-diversity; because a part of this whole thing is the collection of issues around an individual proposal, not just a single part, but the collection of it.

And Tony has a very well articulated view of the things that he is bringing to this table that are important to him.

I think an equal argument can be made for large city groupings as well.

(Simultaneous voices.)

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: So, I am saying individual members have those and part of -- while we do not have someone from the southeast, still we have a diversity of opinions. I think it is great for us to keep raising these things with why certain things are important to jog our minds and to educate other people about some aspects of -- of -- of river issues that we frankly, you know, are not that conversant with.

But, I think if we start doing it, of stringing down from individual characteristics that we are moving in the wrong direction.

MR. DELLIPRISCOLLI: When you bring up this point about the categories and,a gain, one would say if we could look at the whole picture and out of that picture we know we can see what is there, what is not there, and throw out some of the bio-diversity, pristine, coastal, or whatever those categories are, the part of the issue is can we get a picture to work on; and, then, if we get a picture, can we go back and apply some of the categories.

I mean, we are stuck again with just looking at individuals, getting the mosaic. Is the mosaic right; is it missing; let's fill in the pieces it is missing.

And, so, what I hear is, look, we have really been working this over and getting more familiar with all of this and learning; and, again, I think we are close to saying let's try to paint another mosaic and then let's go back and see what pieces aren't there given this criteria. I mean, what have we painted on this mosaic and then pick it out.

So, I would suggest, you know, whatever talking we do and then get a real quick read, but then paint a mosaic and say, look, what does this say.

I do not know another way of doing that because conceptually two...

(Simultaneous voices.)

MR. WILSON: I just want to reaffirm what the Chair has said. I do not want to put a category across the top. I think in our own minds we can all maintain that and I think we can look at it and we can, hopefully, then, based on what Jerry was saying, that we can then start to balance things out and say, yes, this meets my needs.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Yes. At the same time, what I do not want to do is discourage this discussion, which I find very helpful, which is -- and maybe what we should do is postpone a little bit that kind of discussion until we have gone through this next ground in which someone might say, well, look, what we -- no one else besides, you know -- there is only a couple of rivers here in which bio-diversity is important, it is important for us to consider and this river is one of them and maybe there are some others, or whatever the different categories to use that as a discussion of where -- where the whole picture might be headed.

But I would like now, just in order to get to that point, if you don't mind, to keep on, if there are other rivers that people, individual Committee members, want to raise for discussion.

Jerry.

DR. GALLOWAY: I would just like to comment on the James River. I think the James River certainly falls in the category of one that has great historic significance from the early settlement of Jamestown and the length of its run from the Appalachians all the way down to the coast, the major ports, Newport News, Hampton Roads.

The problem that I see with this river in a very fine plan right now is that the middle third is exercised out by the veto of the member of Congress in that central area; and, so, I raise it to say that it is certainly something we should -- we should consider, but I think that the problem with the application is it comes in really three sections and with that it may not be as competitive.

It offers everything we would like were it a whole but without that center piece it does not seem to have the same strength. And I would just say if we put things together and look at historic rivers, it certainly is one but it does suffer from that flaw.

MR. GRASSI: Well, you know, one river that does not suffer from that problem is the Raritan in New Jersey. The nominated segment, I think, is about 30 or 40 miles long and, yet, it is all in one piece and it has got Congressional support across the board in a sense of two Senators and three representatives, and you have got state legislators writing to support it and you have got, I think, a fairly well-defined plan for primarily economic revitalization, although there is some environmental ones and cultural components involved.

So, I would just like to offer it as maybe a counter point to the other rivers that are chopped up and we have support issues to deal with.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Other -- Kay, you have one?

MS. WHITLOCK: Yes, I would just like to share some observations relative to geographic mix.

Clearly, we got a lot more proposals from the eastern third of the geographic United States than we did from the west. So, I have tried to take a look at those western streams, and one of the things -- so, I am the person who keeps putting in a chip for Santa Rosa Creek, not because it is a -- I mean, it is a neat, little community that has really tied themselves together around this stream and are doing a lot of good work, but I have been leaning towards that as a candidate western stream that is not in the northwest where there is a lot more water because that was my understanding, there was some Congressional opposition on the Santa Clara.

So, that was one of my assignments last night, was to research what was going on with the Santa Clara and what I believe is the case is that there -- the staff had originally mistook a Congressional letter of opposition from someone from the very northern corner of California as affecting the Santa Clara and it appears to me that both Santa Rosa and Santa Clara are valid proposals without any concern about Congressional opposition.

It appears from looking at them that the Santa Clara may, in fact, be looking at more of the water shed --

A VOICE: Looked at the entire water shed.

MS. WHITLOCK: Yes. And, so, since I have a leaning toward wanting to look at entire water sheds because that is the origin of the problem so much of the time, that sort of making it clearer for me and I actually may think that in that regard that Santa Clara proposal may be a -- they are very different kinds of proposals. The Santa Clara may -- I was not paying enough attention to it, I felt, because of that Congressional opposition that I thought was there.

MR. OLSEN: I would like to speak to the Santa Clara as well.

MS. WHITLOCK: Okay.

MR. OLSEN: I think it is a unique proposal in the sense that the agricultural support is very strong because it really gets to the issue of agricultural preservation.

This river is the -- is about the only one that I know of in the entire southern part of California that is not extensively channelized and a lot of the development proposals right now are to build in the flood plain of the river several hundred thousand units of housing in the fairly near future.

The State of California just released a growth projection for the next 20 years and it shows that the population of Los Angeles will increase about 80 percent over that time, the great majority of that increase will be in the water shed of the Santa Clara River.

So, it really is -- it is an area that is growing very, very rapidly right now; and in order to protect one relatively free-flowing river, I think this kind of designation could do a lot.

The proposal actually is very well put together. In the interest of full disclosure, I will say that this river is close to where I work and my company has funded efforts to protect this river for over ten years. So, I am familiar with some of the efforts to protect the river going back a ways.

But the challenges to the river now are unprecedented. There are -- there are permits issued to eleven gravel companies to take out 300 million tons of gravel over the next 50 years from the river flood plain.

So, there is a lot of challenges right now; and as a representative of a river in a very arid part of the country that has huge variation of flow -- this winter we had a lot of flooding and we had 100,000 cubic feet per second flows, and in the summertime it will be down to close to zero. So, it is a very different kind of river. But I think there is -- I know there is a lot of local support to -- behind this proposal.

MS. TERAN: I would like to add that it was one of my initial interests. I really liked the project and --

MR. WILSON: The Santa Clara?

MS. TERAN: Yes, the Santa Clara. But, you are right, when there is not a distinction between a letter of doubt or reservation, you know, as opposed to a letter of opposition...

(Simultaneous voices.)

MS. TERAN: Right. I is unclear, but I -- I always thought that it was a very good project.

MS. WHITLOCK: And the letter does not relate to that part of California at all, the letter that I found.

MS. TERAN: I mean, it is a worthy project.

MS. WHITLOCK: And, interestingly, just from the development point of view of southern California, this -- the reason the county is named Orange is because of the citrus orchard and the agricultural land use in the Santa Clara basin is predominantly orchards kind of use.

So, I just -- I do not know how many of you have had that asterisks get in your mind as I have.

MS. TERAN: Yes.

MR. OLSEN: That is a mistake. The asterisk is a mistake, so it should be removed.

MR. GRASSI: How much of this river is a river and how much of it is a gravel pit?

MR. OLSEN: Oh, it is a river; it's --

MR. GRASSI: But, I mean, those are huge numbers you are talking about.

MS. WHITLOCK: What, the gravel?

MR. GRASSI: Yes, yes. What is that doing to the --

MR. OLSEN: Well, if it is allowed. I mean, if the gravel is, in fact, removed. But there are constant challenge to that. So, the gravel has not been removed yet. I mean, there are quarries, but they are nothing on the scale that is talked about in the proposal. So, it is a continuing fight to protect the river and keep it from becoming a quarry sort of head waters.

MS. TERAN: I am very confused

(Simultaneous voices.)

MR. OLSEN: It all ties around agricultural preservation. See, because the flood plain is very rich. That is where all the orchards and field crops are and it would be the urban development, the housing, that would displace the orchards; and, once you get all the agricultural land shut down, why, you sort of take the gravel off. So, it is a two-pronged effort to protect the river.

MS. WHITLOCK: I would say it is the typical California challenge kind of situation where, you know, those -- those factors are there and I think it is a learning opportunity. And I was pleased when I looked -- I looked at the entire proposal last night, starting with what was the status of the Congressional opposition, and I was impressed by this. But I am driven by wanting as many of them as can be to look at the whole water shed. That is an important consideration to me. So, that may be why I lean that way.

MR. GRAF: This river does represent a dry land setting, which I think you have mentioned. It really is representative of that southwestern corner of the country and the sunbelt cities that are developing there. They all face this and gravel mining issue and preservation often of orchard or irrigated type agriculture.

MS. WHITLOCK: It is the kind of challenge that my water district area confronted before the computers were invented. We do not confront it anymore, we are finished with it. We do not have any orchards left.

MR. GRAF: No more orchards.

MS. WHITLOCK: We are just raising chips now.

CHAIRMAN DUNCAN: Any other members have other rivers they want to make sure that we have heard at least a little about before we do the next exercise?

MR. GRAF: I will throw a couple in, just because they are two rivers that I am somewhat familiar with, not intimately familiar with but somewhat familiar with, and I just -- they had not been mentioned and so I think they are at least worth looking at.

One is the Merrimack River in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. It, I think, like some of the other very outstanding New England proposals, is probably our -- many peoples' attention was grabbed by the Connecticut simply because it goes through, as I think Jerry pointed out yesterday, four states and that sort of grabbed everyone's attention, with the four governors and other support.

But the Merrimack, too, goes through two states. It goes from New Hampshire into Massachusetts. And particularly interesting to me is -- in terms, as you know, one of my interests is the history and the heritage, and the old mill towns that it flows through. It certainly in New Hampshire -- it has two communities, Manchester in New Hampshire and in Lowell, Massachusetts, who really played incredible roles in the industrial revolution not only in New England but in the United States and the communities were essentially built around the fact of the river typography, there entire communities were built and flourished and, th