Ready, Willing, Able to Help with Recovery

• Benefited more than half a million people
• Protected 332 public buildings
• Safeguarded 12,866 private buildings
• Preserved more than 900 miles of roads and
• Spared 366 utilities.
  
  That’s a total of $935 million in property protected through EWP last year.
  
  Another way to measure the program’s impact is to look at the outputs:
   
• Nearly 565,000 linear feet of debris removed
• More than 75,000 feet of streambank stabilized
• More than 130,000 acres of land protected
  
  We also need to look at the environmental benefits—erosion controlled, nutrient loads avoided and flooding avoided.
  
  All in all, the overall economic benefits to our nation from EWP in 2004 total nearly $325 million—more than five times the cost.
  
  State Examples
  
  Yesterday you heard in detail about the difference that EWP has made—and is making—for landowners and communities in three states. I want to remind you briefly of a few highlights.
  
  California
  In California, despite some delays—can you ever deliver emergency programs as fast as the customer demands?—we’re making good progress toward removing dead trees identified in the California tree mortality emergency in April 2004.
  
  Professional teams and contract processes are in place. We’ve established networks and relationships to move ahead. California has made good use of private consulting foresters and archeologists to speed up tree marking and surveys.
  
  The good news is that 50 to 70 percent of the area designated for treatment will receive it this year. That means we expect to treat more than 25,000 more acres before the end of this year—removing an additional quarter million trees.
  
  Utah
  In Washington County, Utah, unprecedented winter rain showers—after more than five years of drought—led to floods this past January. The floods destroyed 25 homes and took one life.
  
  Within one week, the NRCS damage survey team had prepared an initial estimate and requested $66 million to restore the water courses. So far, eight contractors have removed nearly 400,000 cubic yards of debris. They’ve also installed about 245,000 cubic yards of rock rip-rap to protect eroding streambanks.
  
  I understand the folks in Utah are breaking new ground by using tablet computers with integrated GPS programs to enable the engineers to plot locations and practices in the field.
  
  Florida
  Finally, Florida. It’s been a rough 12 months in the Sunshine State with Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne—and now Dennis just last week—at least Emily headed west! And there were other projects as well.
  
  For the four hurricanes alone, Florida has already removed debris from 1,450 miles of canals and waterways and stabilized more than 15,000 feet of streambank. And there’s still plenty of work left to do—37 of Florida’s 67 counties were hit by one or more of the storms. You folks have faced a real challenge—and you’re succeeding in your restoration efforts.
  
  EWP Changes
  
  I want to look just briefly at the changes in the Emergency Watershed Protection Program. EWP has been a collateral responsibility for many of you for a number of years. I am proud of the efforts you have embarked on to strengthen and focus this program. Now we have both new regulations and a new programmatic environmental impact statement.
  
  The new rules for EWP:
   
• Clarify the term “exigency” and drop “non-exigency”
• Specify that emergencies have the highest priority for EWP funding
• Change cost-share to
  
  o 75% for most cases
  o 90% for limited resource areas
  o 100% in rare cases
   
• Require interagency coordination and pre-disaster planning
• Permit repair of enduring conservation practices
• Limit repairs to twice in 10 years
• Restrict EWP fund use on federal lands
  
  Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement
  
  The new Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement is also a big step forward. This is the first time that NRCS has developed a nationwide PEIS.
  
  As you know, it’s taken a long time to complete it. But I’m convinced that time and effort is well worth it. And EWP is the only program in our NRCS toolkit with a PEIS.
  
  Our goal is simple—to make it easier for each of you to administer this program. We want to minimize your time and effort and speed the paperwork along.
  
  Only special and unusual situations will require further analysis on your part. This way, when you write your DSRs (Damage Survey Reports), you can simply reference chapter and verse of the PEIS—and your environmental impact work is done! Then you can move ahead to assist with recovery measures.
  
  Integrating EWP and Farm Bill Programs
  
  I know you’ve talked some about how other conservation programs and EWP intersect and mesh. One aspect of that intersection is the opportunity we have to learn from these destructive events.
  
  We need to focus on ways we can improve the landscape to prevent problems before they occur. Our customers have told us they don’t think it makes sense to spend federal dollars repeatedly to fix recurring problems.
  
  EWP comes into play when there’s been a natural disaster. These natural tragedies can be unexpected and unpredictable. But not always.
  
  Lightning may not strike in the same place twice, but flooding can certainly occur more than once on the same stream segment. Fires, ice storms and drought may devastate the same areas again.
  
  As you know, one of the important changes in EWP is the new limit on restoration. We will only repair the same site twice within 10 years.
  
  If there’s an ongoing, predictable problem, landowners—perhaps working in concert with their upstream neighbors—need to find a longer term solution to address it. In the case of floods, for example, we might want to find ways to mitigate the problem by looking upstream.
  
  Disasters offer an opportunity to work with partners, drawing on our technical expertise. Some areas are doing an excellent job with developing post-emergency watershed plans to provide long-term solutions—like the nearly 12,000-acre Buena Vista Watershed in Rockbridge County, Virginia.
  
  NRCS provided more than $375,000 through EWP following flooding in 1995. And this was after local costs for a flood ten years earlier exceeded $1 million.
  
  The goal of the Buena Vista long-term comprehensive watershed plan, developed under the Watershed Protection and Flood Prevention Program, is to reduce damages from flooding caused by four streams by restoring stream channel capacity and removing debris. The City of Buena Vista and the Natural Bridge Soil and Water Conservation District are sponsoring the plan.
  
  About 800 individuals live or work within the 100-year floodplain and will benefit directly.
  But reducing flooding—and the attendant transportation disruption and clean-up costs—will benefit all of the city’s 6,400 residents. Construction on the first phase of this project will begin in the next few weeks.
  
  Sharing the Load
  
  I know many of you are swamped—at least figuratively—with other work when floods, tornados, hurricanes and other disasters strike. You cannot envision how you can possibly add EWP work to a plate already overflowing.
  
  Well, it’s time to share the load. Don’t take all the work on yourself. Consider contracting it out. EWP—and the TSP process—gives us that option.
  
  Sometimes sponsors are willing—even eager—to take this on. Private sector contractors can also do the work. Even the contract administration can be done by an engineering firm or another vendor. For example, Florida made very successful use of contractors in the wake of the tremendous workload following the storms over the past 12 months.
  
  Conclusion
  
  I know you’re all busy with other work. I appreciate your taking on this extra responsibility and spending the time here at this workshop to review the changes to EWP.
  
  I also want to thank you for tackling “emergency work.” EWP work is not like any other program we have.
  
  After a natural disaster, customer emotions are very high with losses to life and property.
  Communities depend on our high quality and prompt assistance. It takes dedicated, caring people with very special skills to work with EWP. We are delivering a unique blend of cooperative conservation.
  
  This program gives us the tools we need to respond when floods, fires, windstorms and other natural disasters threaten lives and property. So when disaster strikes, sponsors call and Congress acts, NRCS—thanks to you—is ready, willing and able to help.

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