WOLF CREEK COMMUNITY ALLIANCE

Engender community stewardship of Wolf Creek and its watershed
Each year we hold 12 or more Restoration Team events on 3-4 project sites in the watershed. We hold creek clean-up events, work with schools on stewardship projects, create interpretive materials for trails and parks, stewardship materials for homeowners, and encourage best management practices for developers. We provide opportunities for people to learn more about and become good stewards of their watershed. We aim to teach people about the natural, cultural, and industrial history of the watershed.

Preserve and protect the integrity of the watershed
Our objectives address working with the City of Grass Valley, Nevada County, and the Nevada Irrigation District (NID), to protect the creek from development impacts, low water flows, pollution, including mining wastes and bacteria. Under this goal we aim to reduce the threats from climate change, in particular, building community resiliency from fires and drought. We promote good practices for homeowners and developers.
address Climate Change and build resiliency

Restore Wolf Creek to a condition of optimal health and integrity
Working from our Wolf Creek Watershed Restoration Plan we prioritize and implement projects, working with partners, that will improve the health of the watershed and the creatures that inhabit it.

Monitor the physical, chemical and biological conditions of Wolf Creek
WCCA has had a robust water quality monitoring program since 2004. Volunteers monitor 25 sites throughout the watershed. In this goal we look towards conducting new rounds of heavy metals testing, bacteria monitoring, and for fish and benthic macroinvertebrates surveys periodically.

Increase public access to the creek along trails, in parks, and preserves
In Goal 5, WCCA advocates for extensions on Wolf Creek Trail and works with partners at the Land Trust, the City and County and new housing developers to install trails and pocket parks along the creeks.

To thrive as an organization and thereby have a long-lasting presence and effect in the watershed
This goal is an internal goal to raise more funds, increase donations and cultivate donors, build contacts, write more grant proposals, increase capacity, create a new website, engage new demographics- primarily people of color and younger people, and build our programs.

1. Engender community stewardship of Wolf Creek and its watershed
a. Restoration Team holds at least 10 events a year to work on restoration sites on Peabody Creek and the Wolf Creek Trail
b. Host annual Wolf Creek Clean-up event in Sept and others when possible
c. Engage people in learning about plants and animals of the watershed
d. Create virtual educational videos and webinars for schools and other orgs- grant
e. Develop stewardship materials for homeowners and business with credentials- booklet
f. Develop Educational materials for developers
g. Promote interconnecting trails with partners and agencies
h. Fund and develop Know Your Watershed in the Schools program in 2-5 schools with stewardship component

2. Preserve and protect the integrity of the watershed
a. Work with City and County to enforce set back rules on all new projects
b. Provide workshop series (2-4) that address how to reduce impacts of Climate Change, in 2021
c. Take steps to ensure that there is guaranteed stream flow on main stem of Wolf Creek and South Wolf, South Fork Wolf Creek
d. Promote the stewardship of creek properties in 2021- update Stream Care Guide
e. Work with BYLT on plan to encourage creek/watershed property owners to consider conservation easements
f. Work with Safe Ditches to protect water sources for farmers
g. Create a watershed group/collective to lobby for watershed protection and preservation at State level

3. Restore Wolf Creek to a condition of optimal health and integrity
a. Identify sources of pollution and develop plan to improve water quality with partners over next 3 years
i. Identify local threats to water quality and watershed in educational materials and public programs
b. Work with partners to fund and initiate 1-2 new restoration projects from Restoration Plan
c. Identify and modify culverts so they are not barriers to fish and invert migration (work with City and County)

4. Monitor the physical, chemical and biological conditions of Wolf Creek
a. Continue to monitor all established sites and add 2 new sites
i. Create new Monitoring Plan in 2021
b. Conduct strategic bacterial monitoring at least 4 x a yr.
c. Find funding and set schedule for metals testing
i. Conduct metals testing below Brunswick and Centennial proposed mine sites for baseline data
d. Monitor for fish populations
e. Conduct flow studies and high-intensity storm events
f. Recruit and train at least 2-4 new monitors each year
g. Conduct BMI testing at sentinel sites every 2 or 3 years
5. Increase public access to the creek along trails, in parks, and preserves
a. Advocate for Wolf Creek Trail and work with the City of GV and BYLT
b. Develop Slide Creek Preserve
c. Develop and encourage public private partnerships that would lead to increased access to Wolf Creek
d. Work with BYLT on access points on acquired properties
e. Work with other organizations to establish local coordinated watershed signage
(see Strategic Plan)

WCCA is a small volunteer-run grassroots non-profit with big plans, and funding is always an issue. However, the leadership is strong. The WCCA Board of Directors is staffed by dedicated and energetic volunteers, all of whom are invested in our community and active in local civic affairs.

WCCA has 80-90 skilled and active volunteers who give generously of their time monitoring water quality and stream corridors, working on restoration and stewardship projects, working with schools and watershed partners, conducting public meetings and outreach events, bringing watershed advocacy to City and County planning meetings, serving on the Board of Directors and Advisory Board, fundraising, managing grants and contracts, maintaining the website and photo gallery, providing technical and administrative assistance..

*Water quality monitoring: Since 2005, WCCA volunteers have been monitoring water quality at sentinel sites on Wolf Creek and some of its tributaries including, when funded, laboratory testing for harmful bacteria, heavy metals from mining, the collection and classification of aquatic insects - key indicators of stream health - and stream corridor assessments. The collected scientific data helps to identify and address problems, disturbances, and contamination affecting the health of the watershed and that of all of its human and wild inhabitants. By the end of 2019, the WCCA water quality data will be transferred to a new, interactive database shared with two regional watershed organizations whose volunteers monitor water quality in the neighboring Yuba River and Deer Creek watersheds.

*Outreach: WCCA works to increase community understanding of problems in the watershed by tabling at local events, conducting public meetings on watershed topics, producing brochures, display materials, videos, maps, handouts, and an informative website. We have established relationships with teachers at local schools whose students are learning about local area ecology and developing watershed awareness. With the success of the 2018 Know Your Watershed event, 30 participant groups have signed on for the second annual Know Your Watershed event in April 2019.

*Restoration and stewardship: WCCA volunteers have done extensive GIS mapping of the Wolf Creek watershed, and were the driving force that led to the adoption of Grass Valley’s first riparian set-back regulations. Volunteers attend City and County Planning Commission meetings in order to advocate for regulatory controls, enforcement, and best management practices in construction and landscaping - erosion and sediment control, creek setbacks and easements, riparian buffer zones, wetlands protection, storm water catchment, permeable surfaces, water conservation, wildlife habitat, and trails. By early 2020, WCCA will have completed a 2-year project “Wolf Creek Watershed Disturbance Inventory, Assessment, and Restoration Plan”. In 2020, Phase II of the Peabody Creek Restoration Project will be completed with American Rivers and the City of Grass Valley as lead agencies. This project includes redirecting a Wolf Creek tributary into its historical stream bed, restoring 1.5 acres of wetland habitat, and improving storm water management to decrease flooding.

*Trails: WCCA volunteers were instrumental in the development of the Wolf Creek Parkway conceptual plan for a connecting system of walkable and bike-able trails along Wolf Creek through Grass Valley, and are working with the Bear Yuba Land Trust and the City of Grass Valley to advance those plans. In 2020, Phase I of the Wolf Creek Trail will be completed with the City of Grass Valley as lead agency. This project is for a 1.5 mile multi-use ADA public access trail on the downstream reach of Wolf Creek.