New requirements for project proposals and AIS project descriptions In Reply Refer To: ACH/Program Operations Mail Stop 441 Sunset Date: November 2004 WATER RESOURCES DIVISION POLICY MEMORANDUM NO. 2000.04 To: District Chiefs Administrative Officers From: Catherine L. Hill Associate Chief Hydrologists for Program Operations Subject: New requirements for project proposals and AIS project descriptions As the primary Federal natural science agency, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has, as part of its mission, the continuous assessment of the Nation's water resources. Within the Water Resources Division (WRD), this mission is met through several program funding arrangements including congressional appropriations, reimbursements from other agencies, and a combination of the two (cost-sharing). In fulfilling our Federal mission, it is vitally important that our work adhere to the strategic directions, priorities, and policies of the USGS and WRD. Regardless of which program is supporting the work, we must communicate this information to our customers, stakeholders, and the public. Two effective ways in which this communication can take place are through our project proposals and our project descriptions in the Administrative Information System (AIS), hereafter called the "MIS" part of AIS. Effective immediately, all new project proposals submitted to a region for approval, whether for Federal, Cooperative, or other Federal agencies programs, must include a section called "Relevance and Benefits." The new section should clearly explain how the proposed work is relevant to the USGS mission and the benefits it will provide to Federal science interests, stakeholders, and the public. Water resources activities that are relevant to the mission of the USGS are defined in WRD Memorandum No. 95.44. Descriptions of work that will benefit high-priority Federal science interests are found in the following documents: the Bureau Strategic Plan, the Division Strategic Directions document, and the annual memorandum of Cooperative Water Program Priorities. (See WRD Memorandum No. 99.30 as the most recent version.) Because these three strategic documents are internally consistent, describing how the benefits of the proposed work aligns with any one of them is sufficient. Brief descriptions of how the proposed work contributes to regional goals and district science plans, if included, belong in this section, as well. The new section should be placed immediately before the "Approach" section in the proposal. By approving a proposal, the region will be specifically endorsing the relevance and benefits of the proposed work to the USGS mission and to Federal science interests. The "Relevance and Benefits" information in the proposal must be entered into the "MIS" part of the AIS after the project proposal is approved. The simplest and preferred way to do this is to copy the introductory information from the proposal into the "summary text" field in MIS. Although the format of this material differs somewhat among the four regions, it should include sections such as Problem, Objective, Purpose and Scope, and Relevance and Benefits, but not the detailed "Approach" section. Attachment 1 provides an example of the type of information from a proposal that should be entered into MIS. (See WRD Memorandum No. 99.36, September 1, 1999, for additional guidance on MIS entry.) The Technical Offices and Thrust Program coordinators will provide standard "Relevance and Benefits" information for programs 001, 002, 003, 004, 005, 006, and Federal Programs such as NAWQA, NASQAN, Toxics Hydrology, etc. When these program "templates" are developed and distributed, districts will be required to use them to populate the MIS files for their specific projects, and will be expected to add district- specific information to them, as appropriate. Any questions or comments about this policy should be directed to Regional Program Officers. References Refer to Web page to obtain a copy of the USGS strategic plan document.
Refer to Web page to obtain a copy of the WRD Strategic Directions document.
Refer to WRD Memorandum No. 99.30 "Priority Issues for the Federal-State Cooperative Program, Fiscal Year 2000" for its discussion of priority water issues for the Coop Program. Refer to WRD Memorandum No. 95.44 "Avoiding Competition with the Private Sector" for its discussion of the types of work that are appropriate for WRD. Refer to WRD Memorandum No. 84.21 for its discussion of "Hydrologic Activities to be Excluded from the Federal-State Cooperative Program." cc: WRD Senior Staff Regional Program Analysts Regional Program Officers File: Attachment 1- Example of information from a project proposal that is appropriate to enter into MIS. It contains a summary "approach" section and a "relevance and benefits" section; it also illustrates how information about the relevance and benefits of a project should be presented throughout the proposal, where appropriate. TIME-OF-TRAVEL STUDIES FOR MAJOR STREAMS INTRODUCTION Time-of-travel data on major streams are critical to studies of contaminant transport, waste assimilation, and watershed modeling. Estimating time-of-travel is complicated by changing flow rates. A stream reach time-of-travel data base would be extremely valuable in: (1) estimating time-of-travel when no such data exist, (2) assisting emergency management agencies in the event of spills of hazardous or toxic materials, and (3) verification of hydrologic models. PROBLEM Spills of hazardous or toxic materials into waters can impair or destroy aquatic life and temporarily contaminate public water supplies. States are currently developing programs to assess the vulnerability of public-supply sources to contamination as required by the 1996 amendments to the Safe Drinking Water Act. Identification of source areas for the assessments of potential contamination is required in order to determine the susceptibility of public water systems to such contaminants. To adequately estimate travel time and dispersion rates for contaminants spilled into rivers, studies are needed for specific river reaches under different streamflow conditions. OBJECTIVES The proposed studies will provide water managers with time-of-travel data for specific river reaches above 14 public water-supply intakes located on the largest rivers (Sugar, Lamprey, Oyster, Contoocook, E. Branch Pemigewasset, Merrimack, Salmon Falls, Connecticut, Androscoggin, Ammonoosue, Mascoma, Exeter, and Piscassic Rivers) within the State of New Hampshire. Data collection will be extensive, providing travel time and dispersion information at typical average and low-flow rates for each river reach. RELEVANCE AND BENEFITS As a priority issue of the Cooperative Program, the information from this study will contribute to mitigating effects of the potential hydrologic hazards associated with contaminant spills, and thus, aid in protection of public drinking-water sources. Collection and dissemination of time-of-travel-data and dispersion-rate information will: (1) enhance the USGS database needed for continued calibration and verification of water-quality solute transport models of riverine systems nationwide; (2) meet the broad USGS goal of furnishing critical results needed by various managers for planning and operation of major public-water supplies; and (3) provide transferability value to assess the vulnerability of present and/or future public-supply intakes on other offstream locations and estimate dissolved-oxygen sag curves caused by assimilation of water from sewage- treatment plants. Some additional technical benefits to the scientific community at large for conducting time- of-travel-studies include: (1) Field time-of-travel studies provide much improved information over estimates derived from empirical relations that have large associated errors; (2) time-of-travel studies are a less expensive alternative to obtaining detailed stream cross-section geometry and other data used for hydraulic models; and (3) dispersion coefficients (mixing rates) cannot be accurately predicted without conducting dispersion field studies on rivers and streams. APPROACH For time-of-travel studies, a slug of the fluorescent soluble dye, rhodamine WT will be injected in each river reach studied to estimate the movement and dispersion characteristics of a soluble contaminant. Time-of-travel will be determined by sampling and measuring the concentration of the dye cloud and observing the time required for the cloud to travel between sampling sub-sections and downstream to the water intakes. Study reaches will begin either at an upstream impoundment or another reasonable distance upstream of the water intakes. A minimum of two sub-sections will be sampled in each stream regardless of total length of reach.