By Mike Petersen

The Lands Council recently weighed in on the Spokane Water Conservation Master Plan. Climate models indicate that the Spokane area will have warmer summers, combined with less moisture. Less snowpack in the Coeur d’Alene and Clark Fork watershed are predicted, which will lead to less flow into the aquifer. This will impact summer aquifer levels, as well as Spokane River flows. This will also increase the need for outdoor watering. A water conservation plan is critical to prepare for the future of our city and river!

We believe that a goal of reducing outdoor summer water usage should be higher than 15%. To achieve a greater reduction, a more robust program to reduce irrigation across all ownerships is needed. Since the critical time to save water is in the summer, it would be helpful to see action steps that focused more on outdoor water usage incentives during this critical time.

We suggested that our native Ponderosa pine tree be given priority for retention and planting. Retention of mature trees not only keeps carbon sequestered, the Ponderosa pine requires little water, provides shading, wildlife habitat and is climate resilient. The guide to landscaping, mentioned in S 8-N could include more information about the value of Ponderosa pine as our native, low water tree. Ponderosa pine can also slow soil moisture loss.

We support the goals to reduce water usage through the SpokaneScape program to eliminate turf. In areas where eliminating turf is not practical or desirable, soils can be improved to retain and slowly release water. New developments should require soil supplements, in particular biochar. The use of biochar as a soil amendment has been suggested as a way to increase water holding capacity. The potential irrigation reduction of a quarter or more on turf where biochar has been applied should be explored. Biochar could be produced locally from city, state and private lands in need to thinning and fuel reduction, as well as landscape trimmings.