Environmental Protection Agency - Network Exchange Grants
Beginning in 2003, the Coeur d'Alene Tribe IT/GIS Program has been the
recipient of three multi-year Network Exchange Grants
from the Environmental Protection Agency(EPA).
These grants provide funding to support the development of a National Environmental
Exchange Network. The first grant assisted the Tribe with equipment necessary to aggregate
information from both the agricultural burning project and the Pesticide Circuit Rider
program. The second award provided the EPA with locational data associated with
facilities listed in the Facility Registration System(FRS) database. Priority was given to
facilities located within current reservation boundaries, and then expanded to include facilities
located within the Coeur d'Alene aboriginal territory.
Pesticide Management
EPA Facility Registration System
The most recent award was granted in 2010 to create a database that would
facilitate Water Quality Exchange (WQX) with the Environmental Protection
Agency. This new system will assist in developing a Coeur d’Alene Lake basin
wide nutrient survey, which is a critical step towards implementing the recently
adopted Coeur d’Alene Lake Management Plan. Additionally, it provides a web
based access point that will allow everyone access to water quality dated
collected from the basin. As a secondary project, the Coeur d’Alene Tribe’s
current Air Quality/Weather monitoring sensors funded by EPA will allow for
both historic and real-time monitoring by the Tribe, EPA, and the public via
a web site. The data acquired by the Air Quality/Weather sensors will assist
in monitoring regional climate change.
The Coeur d'Alene Basin and Coeur d'Alene Lake have been the center of
litigation and conflict over heavy metals contamination caused by mining
activity for the past 100 years. The Tribe and IDEQ collaborated to develop
the 2009 Coeur d'Alene Lake Management Plan (LMP) with the goal to protect and
improve lake water quality by limiting basin-wide nutrient inputs that impair
lake water quality conditions, which in turn influence the solubility of
mining-related metals contamination contained in lake sediments. The EPA
assisted the Tribe and IDEQ in developing the LMP by convening and participating
in an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) process.
A key component of the Lake Management Plan is to conduct water quality monitoring,
so that all parties can have a better understanding of water quality trends. Water
quality sampling has been ongoing on Lake Coeur d'Alene and its tributaries for many
years. Most of this data exists in various Microsoft Excel spreadsheets scattered
across the various organizations. Efforts toward getting this data into a format
that could be digested by WQX are ongoing. However, submissions to WQX have been
problematic and unsuccessful. In addition, all parties involved have received scrutiny
from the public by not providing a publicly viewable list of water quality records.
A second key component of the LMP is for the Tribe and IDEQ to develop a 3 year Nutrient
Source Inventory. This inventory is critical for the future implementation of the LMP
to be successful. This grant reduces the burden of data sharing by facilitating an
efficient and user friendly process for data collected throughout the Coeur d'Alene
Lake basin to be stored, accessed, and evaluated by the Tribe, State, and other
interested parties. The primary goals of the grant consist of the following:
• Water quality database;
• Microsoft Access database connected to water quality database to allow user input;
• Web based access to water quality information;
• Web based GIS mapping;
• Creation of a standardized data collection form and data collection procedures;
• Network linkage for weather site;
• Program for downloading existing data from weather site;
• Web based access to weather station information.
The Coeur d'Alene Tribe's IT/GIS program has received substantial experience in centralizing
water quality records in databases and developing a digital data entry/submission application
to WQX. The Shoalwater Bay Tribe had similar issues with its water quality records, and they
entered into a contract with the Coeur d'Alene Tribe's GIS Program to develop a database solution
for their water quality records. We have taken that framework and made modifications to match
the needs of the Coeur d'Alene Tribe.
Weather Station Location Map
