 Okay. Is it working? I don't know if it's working. I think it was just really quiet. All right, everyone, I think we'll get started here pretty quick. This is, um, it's a full house and I don't know about you. I feel like heating up. Yeah, totally. So no suit jacket for me tonight, but that's okay. Welcome everybody tonight and I'm going to try and play around with the pillars, but I apologize if I can't see all of you. Very pleased to see all of you here tonight. My name is Brooke McMirchey and I work with the provincial Columbia River Treaty team. And I will be your facilitator for this evening. Hands up how many people have participated in these Columbia River Treaty engagement meetings before. Awesome. And hands up who's new to the treaty or the process. That's really awesome. Thank you guys so much for coming and thanks to those who have followed the process through. We really, really appreciate it. So before we get started tonight, I want to take a minute to acknowledge our respect for and gratitude to the Columbia Basin Indigenous Nations on whose traditional territory we're holding this meeting tonight. And I'd actually like to welcome Natalie Allard, who's the cultural lead with the Tunajah Nation to provide a welcome for us tonight. Thank you, Natalie. I'm very, very happy to be here tonight with all of you and then to be in this part of our territory. It means a lot. And to see the great turnout and especially all of the young faces as well too. And you're going to hear from a lot of my colleagues and everything tonight on all of the great work that we are currently working on. And just keep in mind that just because it's Indigenous lead does not mean that we're not looking for input to collaborate and everything because all of our values do align. So thank you. Thank you, Natalie. So I'll take you through a bit about how the evening is going to go. But before we do that, obviously there's food at the back. Please feel free to get up and grab more if and when you need it. There's not tons of room to move around. But if you do need to stand up and move around, please do. And the washrooms are out the door here. Ladies, I believe is straight up and then a little to the left and men's is around the corner past the sign. I think that says bar. And what else I think that that's about it. We are our evening tonight. We'll start. We've already had kind of some welcoming remarks. We'll start this evening with a few comments from our local government committee representative here Ramona Faust. So she'll share a little bit about what the Columbia River Treaty local governments committee has been up to. We'll then move into an update on the Columbia River Treaty negotiations, and we have a member of the Canadian negotiating team joining us via web conference from Ottawa her name's Lynn Pinaya. And we also have Kathy Eikenberger here who leads the BC part of the Columbia negotiating team. And then we also have the ability to hear from Natalie again as well as Nathan Matthew both who represent the indigenous nations as observers on as Columbia River Treaty negotiations continue so we'll get to hear their perspective as well. We will then move on to hearing an update on the indigenous led work to address ecosystems in the Columbia basin. In addition to the indigenous led work on exploring the feasibility of bringing salmon back to the upper Columbia. So we'll hear an update on that. After the presentation on ecosystems, we'll move into a bit of a table discussion on that work in particular. So the ecosystem work is certainly a work in progress. And the people involved in that process really want to know whether it's going in the right direction. You'll hear so there's a gentleman Michael Zimmer who's going to be presenting here he's with he's a biologist with the Okanagan silks nation. He wants to know as well as the rest of the team is this work going in the right direction are the goals and objectives that he lists out in the presentation. The right ones to be focusing on or is there anything missing so we'll get you guys to do a bit of work at your tables with that. And after that we will wrap up the evening with an update on what the province has been doing to address some of the other key community interests that we've heard throughout our consultation process. One in particular we heard across the basin, especially last year when we did these meetings, the need to acknowledge what was lost when the dams were created. We were allowed and clear the need to acknowledge what was lost and enhance or maintain what remains and my colleague Ingrid Strauss will share the details of a project that she's been working on that hopes to begin to acknowledge those losses. She's also been working on a number of other projects, and she'll be able to explain those to you as well. So we've got a lot of information. So in past consultation we've come to you and we've said what is really important to you what do you care about. What do you want to see included in a modernized Columbia River Treaty. And we've been going around the basin in this round of meetings to share the work that's been done to address those community interests so there'll be chances for questions and comments throughout will have a table discussion to get your feedback on the ecosystem work. If you have any other questions, comments or input please feel free to write them on the participant forms at your tables. There's also there should be little post it notes and if there's not just find whatever scrap paper you have and please mark them down because we do. We need and we appreciate your input in this process so thank you all once again for coming very much appreciated and I'd like to turn it over to Ramona Faust. I'm going to turn it over to Ramona Faust who will share an update on the CRT local governments committee. Thank you. I'd like to thank everyone for coming. This is a great full house. I would also like to thank the community members that have participated in the past and contributed to our interests and concerns from the base and perspective. I would like to thank the BC team and federal negotiating team members for making themselves available to the basin and available to the local governments committee on a regular basis. We are updated very soon after they finish their last rounds and it's a great service to you because we can respond then. You have told us in the past. I'd also like to welcome members of our Columbia Basin regional advisory committee which is a citizen based broad representation committee that meets and adds context to the work that the local government committee does as well as informs the negotiating team as well. So in the room are Natalie Allard, Nathan Matthew, Ross Lake, Audrey Repping, Greg Utsick and Dwayne Boyer so you can wave and can talk to them about what they do at a break or afterwards. So I'm just checking to see if the presentation is there and it is. Okay, so what has been our role and I would also, I hope she's still here because I wanted to mention Deb Kozak there she is. So, when I say our role since 2011, Deb was one of the inaugural members of the local government committee definitely was a formative in its existence. Very passionate about it and was the co-chair of the committee and I'm very happy to see that you're here and she's a wealth of information. So our role has been to ensure that Basin residents and local elected officials increase their knowledge and have opportunities to be actively engaged because that was the missing ingredient the last time that this topic was before the government of Canada and the United States. And it's to build understanding of regional views and values with the provincial government and federal agencies. It's to advocate for specific regional interests which is why it's important that you also have input and it's to work collaboratively with our local MLAs and MPs and Minister Conroy has been very available to us and we have been very fortunate to have her input. And so, I think that we were very fortunate to jump on this when we first heard about the possibility of renegotiation or not. So who are we? Well, this electoral term, our members are Linda Warley, the REB director, chair, and Diane Langman from the village of Warfield and as you can see in front of you. We have an illustrious list of members from the RD from all of the electoral regional districts and electoral areas and municipalities, pardon me. And we're all appointed to this role on a four year basis. Activities. If you've been to one of these before you know that we have conducted community meetings from 2012 and have done subsequent meetings up until now. Here we are again. We've submitted recommendations and we support C. Brack, which is the acronym for the Columbia Basin regional advisory committee. And so I think I'll just provide some highlights from the list, which is we've been listening and we've been learning. And we have residents who are experts and we have experts who are residents and we've been very fortunate at the talent that we have had that has focused on this issue. There is a lot of passion. And after you hear everything tonight, if you haven't heard it before, I hope you're passionate too. We have been in contact and regular liaison with the negotiating team. And we are once the federal government became involved, the committee's work to develop strong relationships with federal staff. Local government committee is updated after every negotiating session. And we've met with the negotiating team and the director general from global affairs Canada, during the recent trans boundary conference. And we're currently updating our recommendations as things have changed over the last five years, which is why it's a really good idea to be out here with you. The treaty process recommendations, local government status, and we feel the protocol with the negotiating team is working. So we can all be happy about that. And engagement with base and residents, and we feel that this is really, really important that we're doing this here tonight and that we have the committee has been all around the basin to numerous commit communities. We need to also continue to assess benefits and impacts, and we have to be able to provide those that information to base and residents and also sometimes we actually get to speak to our cohorts in the United States, such as at the trans boundary committee and it's important that we can articulate what we're interested in there as well. And that's just community members to community members. And so our, our draft highlights are here and you can the treaty process local government status we're very, we're very supportive of Indigenous nations having meaningful role in the negotiations. That was a very happy day for us. The committee has ongoing engagement and we're very confident that the recommendation and voices of base and residents are being reflected in negotiations and we're prepared to active this changes. So one thing about is not shrinking violence. I've been very happy with the collaborative respectful, but Frank dialogue that we're able to have. I'm a new kid on the block. I've only been here for a year. And so it's been very refreshing. And so I think that making sure all benefits and impacts along the river are assessed and considered in treaty decisions. And it's very difficult to needs at one end of the Columbia River, not the same as the needs at the other end. So we really have to embrace what our colleagues and fellow citizens of the basin feel are important. And so the committee has been great for that. And we also need to try and identify what information is important to you. And that is sometimes not an easy task either but we are happy to do it. And so the, the treaty content recommendations are to of course reduce the negative impacts to the basin. We'd like to be able to share in benefits equitably. We really have highlighted it so has the community and First Nations that we need to include ecosystems and that is shared amongst many people in the United States. So we're not alone there. Flood risk management, of course, to local government is very, very important. We're responsible for emergency management. And so it's always of interest to us. We'd like to be able to have more input into Libby because as you learn more about the system tonight. It's very important to the management of Kootenai Lake in the spring when the flood risk is high. Power generation we all benefit from and we Sorry. We would like to continue the rates to BC water use. So the committee believes that the US reservoir should be drawn down more to minimize impacts in BC without making conditions worse in the coconut reservoir. We're really happy to also see First Nations championing salmon restoration and ecosystems and you'll hear more about that later. So the recommendations to I think the first two are self explanatory and 13 and 14 are new recommendations. Obviously less fluctuation in reservoir levels and are updated governance so The governance recommendation is based on input from the public last year and we note that based on scale river management organization. Recommendation goes beyond the CRT so The ecosystem expertise and local government advisory role are all important in establishing governance of ongoing public involvement. We've always distinguished between treaty issues that are discussed in the in the presentation above and which involve BC in the US and domestic issues. And we need to we need to work on all of them in BC. Cook news the reservoir is created by the living down in the US and so it's not managed as the other reservoirs authorized by the CRT. We don't think this is appropriate and we'll be working to address issues such as ongoing debris removal recreation access management and agricultural development and water management process for Kootenai River. This is important. The Kootenai well Kootenai River and Kootenai Lake are kind of distinct from the treaty process and so water management process for the Kootenai River is important. And can water use plan reviews that those are on on the list and I think as many of you have mentioned the first two if you've been here before. And of course the Fish and Wildlife Compensation Program. It's been beneficial and it should continue. We're also speaking with staff about how to improve communication engagement with basin residents. And the Columbia and Duncan water use plans were created through public process in the early 2000s and implemented in 2008. So there will be reviews and basin residents are included their views are included in those reviews. So please pay attention for those upcoming. So we do invite your feedback. Local government is local so we're in your communities. We're at the other end of email. Usually Facebook phone. So you can, you can pick up a paper copy of the opportunity to provide feedback or you can get it online by Googling. As I mentioned there. And you can also email our exact director or send written comments. And we do. We will let you know where the paper copies are available later in the program. And we also invite you to chat with us after the meeting because we're approachable. So thanks so much. So just just a side note to so the paper copies of the recommendations that Ramona was talking about are at the side table over here. And just to reiterate the CRT local governments committee has been working with the province since 2011 to make sure that basin residents interests are front and center. And the province works with the federal government to negotiate a modernized treaty so they have been integral in making sure that the needs of the communities are heard or understood and are worked into the negotiations themselves. So this recommendations document that she talks about over there is a review of basically what they're recommending that the province continues to focus on. So if there's any input on that if there's anything you think is missing that should be on there, then that's where you send your to them here. And I should mention to that all of the presentations including that one will be up on our website after these meetings have wrapped up so you can visit our website there if you want more information. So that that's great. Thank you again Ramona will now move on to an update from the negotiators themselves on the Columbia River Treaty negotiations. So I'd like to turn it over to Lynn Panaya who's joining us from Ottawa right now. And we'll see her face up here fairly soon. Take it away Lynn. Thank you very much Brooke and good evening Nelson my name is Lynn Panaya. And I'm a senior advisor at Global Affairs Canada. And part of the Columbia River negotiating team. Canada is really pleased to continue our involvement in these meetings, and it remains our goal to engage with basin residents throughout the modernization of the Columbia River Treaty. As you may know, we were in the basin in September for the eighth round of negotiations with the United States. The negotiations were held in a calm near Cranbrook, which provided a good foundation for our discussions with the basin clearly in focus. Right after the negotiations we attended the Columbia River Transboundary Conference, hosted by the Columbia Basin Trust in Kimberly. We were also pleased that members of the conference organizers and participants for making the Kimberly conference informative and inspirational members of the Canadian team gained much insight, including through our interaction with longtime residents, students and indigenous indigenous nations representatives. I'm also pleased that members of the Canadian team that participated in the negotiations with the US federal provincial and indigenous representatives were in Kimberly. We were equally impressed to see the members to see some members of the US delegation there as well. Before I begin an update on the treaty negotiations I would like to underline three important milestones. We have hit in the last year. In April 2019, representatives of the Tanaka sequip and silk Okanagan nations were invited by the Minister of Foreign Affairs to participate as official observers on the Canadian delegation for the Columbia River Treaty negotiations. These three nations have now been part of the last two round of negotiations this past June and September. Their presence has enriched our discussions and contributed to crafting stronger negotiation positions that reflect a more inclusive perspective, a perspective that was lacking when the treaty was first negotiated in the 1960s. The three nations are part of our pre-negotiation meetings. They participate in our caucus meetings during the negotiations and at the last round they presented on two topics we know are critical to the basin, salmon reintroduction and ecosystem. The second important milestone for the year took place in late July when our five governments, Canada, BC, the Tanaka sequip silk Okanagan, signed a three-year commitment to study the feasibility of reintroducing salmon into the Upper Columbia River Basin. It was a historic moment for all of us, made in the spirit of genuine partnership and reconciliation. And finally, we offer our congratulations to the government of British Columbia for their landmark legislation to implement the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous People. This is a hugely significant step forward and one that will help us as the government shape our approach to the Columbia River modernization process. Now on to the update on the last round of negotiations. As I said, Canada hosted the eighth round of negotiations in a calm near Cranbrook from September 10 to the 11. It was a deliberate and easy decision to hold our negotiations in a calm because we wanted to ensure that as much as possible, we are in the Columbia River Basin, the region that bears the direct impact on the Columbia River Treaty. Our discussions in the calm were fruitful. There is a positive spirit of collaboration as both countries continue to exchange information and technical details to work towards a realistic understanding of each other's interests and concerns as we progress to formal negotiations. Specifically, on ecosystem, we are gaining a better understanding of both of our country's approaches to this issue. Canada's Indigenous Nations representatives, as I mentioned, delivered an ecosystem's presentation along with the government of British Columbia to demonstrate the work that has been done collaboratively on this issue. Notably, the US also recognizes the importance Canada has placed on this issue, and we believe that we have laid the groundwork for further thinking and deeper collaboration in the context of a modernized treaty. The entire Canadian delegation was also really pleased to have the US tribal representatives from the Kutney tribe of Idaho, the confederated tribes of Coalville, and the confederated tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation participate in the negotiation. They spoke about ecosystem work primarily centered around flows for fish that the US has undertaken in the basin, including through their trans boundary efforts. On salmon, the Canadian Indigenous Nation representatives highlighted the recently signed letter of agreement and the upcoming approach to studying the feasibility of reintroducing salmon to the Upper Columbia. I'll defer to the Indigenous representatives at your meeting to provide more detail on these issues. Finally, we also continued discussions on flood risk management and hydropower, and we are pleased to see progress on both of these issues. Frankly speaking, this has been a complex undertaking as both sides grapple with their own unique data. We hope we can hit some common ground here in the coming weeks and months ahead. I will close my round eight update by saying that though this is a multifaceted negotiation and one that isn't straightforward. I can say with certainty that there is a very strong spirit of collaboration and goodwill among the Canadian and US delegation. This is very clear. So it is our hope that we will come to an agreement that is both fair and also encompasses the issues that were missed in 1964 when the treaty was first agreed upon. We are in the process of preparing for the next round of negotiations. As you can see with what I've outlined above and the ongoing work by both sides on flood risk management, power and ecosystems. We are looking at confirming round nine negotiations hosted in the US for some time in January or February 2020. In this upcoming round and future rounds, we will continue to make clear that basin interest, including ecosystems are promoted. We seek a modernized treaty that provides benefits on both sides of the border and for Canada, that means benefits that are felt in the province and in the basin. Thank you very much for allowing me these few minutes to update you on the work of a Columbia River treaty negotiations and for your attention. It's very important to us to understand your views as we continue our negotiations with the United States. Thank you to Kathy and Brook and company for organizing these meetings. Thank you to Ray as always for taking care of our AV needs and beaming us in from Ottawa so effectively. I'm calling you deliberations tonight. We look forward to updating you again soon. And finally, I'd be pleased to stay on for the Q&A session as well. Thank you. Thanks so much Lynn. That's great. Yeah. We'll hear now from Kathy Eichenberger, who some of you may recognize she's the BC lead on the treaty negotiating team. And thank you Lynn for kicking off the negotiation update. I seem to hear more and more of my speaking points creep into my federal counterparts every evening, but that's okay. That's okay. And it just shows how close we are on the same page and but I'm really happy to be here tonight. You can imagine that leading the BC thought process on negotiations and being part of Canadian delegation takes a lot of time and I'm not able to be at all of the 12 meetings, but it was important for me to be here in Nelson, especially since I worked here for 10 years and this place is very near and near to my heart. One of the points that I want to raise is that a lot of people wonder, well, why is BC part of a Canada-U.S. negotiation? Yes, traditionally and constitutionally, the responsibility for negotiating international treaties, it falls on the Canadian government. But in 1963, Canada transferred or delegated the responsibilities of implementing a treaty and the benefits of the treaty to British Columbia under a 1963 Canada-BC agreement. And that had never been done before and it has never been done since. So it shows a very special unique kind of relationship that we have with Canada on this. But the collaboration between us, between the province and Global Affairs Canada goes way beyond the requirements of that agreement. And we've been very fortunate since 2011 to have them work side by side with us and through the Columbia River Treaty review when we were deciding and consulting on whether the treaty should continue or be amended or terminated. And that collaboration continues all the way through this negotiation phase. So we're very pleased. You know, you often hear about Fed-PRO relationships and they're not always smooth, but we are all part of one team and now within the just nations and it's just wonderful. I also have to mention that we're very fortunate to have a Minister Katrina Conroy as the minister responsible for the Columbia River Treaty. She's been very, very engaged in a file and very accessible to our team and her office as well. And that's fairly rare in government. And she knows firsthand about the impacts of the treaty. Her husband Ed's farm was inundated by Errolick's Reservoir and she speaks to, as often as she can, she basically never turns down the opportunity to speak to either media or the AKBLG or the Transbound Reform to keep people informed, but also to raise the importance of the Columbia River Treaty. And one of her passions is involving youth. And I am so glad I see a lot of young faces today and make sure we'll report that back to her. And we should come over and take pictures before everybody leaves because, you know, we need to find new ways of engaging youth and we've been talking about it even this morning and if some of them don't come to us, then we will go to them. So we're really energized about that. The other thing that the minister does is go to the United States and talks about our issues and impacts and the benefits of the treaty in the US. She's a very strong advocate. And next Sunday she's actually a keynote speaker at the Pacific Northwest Economic Region. It's a big conference in Seattle. And I'm sure she's going to be influencing a lot of the US thinking process there. I would say much more about the local government committee, except to say how important they are since the beginning to guide us the province on how to engage all of the citizens and also providing feedback and input and how we develop our guiding principles around the negotiations. And they came out with their recommendations and the province of BC came out with its decision in 2014 on to continue the treaty and seek improvements and there were 14 guiding principles that reflected what we heard and we compared to two documents and there was a lot of alignment. They're very fortunate and I know that they make sure that all of the issues are considered and actually have an impact. In fact, Deb and Karen Hameling, they went to Ottawa twice. Deb and Karen go to Ottawa and talk to senior officials and let them know face to face from a number of departments what are the issues in the basin. So, you know, in the 60s. I know a lot of you weren't born but take my word for it. Nobody listened to the folks here nobody in the just nations were ignored. You're, you've used it and count and now today it's different and it's important as different. There's Seabrack little government committee, we have media Twitter all these rounds of community consultations and government and others are listening now and people are listening to each other. We don't, we don't have this polarization on our side of the border about issues around the treaty so it's it's so refreshing and we have, you know, the upper Columbia basin environmental collaborative who are working together and are also contributing. And it's special but why am I not surprised because it is the kidneys. So the, the indigenous nations contribution. I can't say enough about that you've heard about you'll hear some more about it. We would be so much the poor, if they, they weren't contributing and as real partners, they were so enriching all our thinking and getting us to understand values beyond our normal way of thinking and opening up, you know, processes and ideas and lenses so it's been a wonderful experience. So, I'm happy that you're here we want to tell you how we've we've made progress on progress on things that you've told us over the years. And we also want to hear from you if whether we're on the right track as Brooke said, and with regards to these community meetings. Well, Brooke, I shouldn't be saying Brooke and Anna and Ingrid and, and, and I'd love, I'm so happy to see so many people because I bet that we'd have a good crowd and you made me win my bet so thank you. Thanks Kathy. We may or may not guess numbers before each meeting and you guys blew all our numbers out of the water so thank you. So now I'd like to welcome back up to the stage Natalie Allard as well as Nathan Matthew to speak a bit about the indigenous perspective on the treaty negotiations. I'll go with this. No zooming in too much I can't stop eating those cookies and I haven't checked my teeth yet. Hello again. As was previously mentioned, my name is Natalie Allard so I was officially appointed as the cultural lead for the Columbia River Treaty. And then I also sit on our negotiation advisory team. And then so that's composed of all of the five governments so there's Canada, BC, and then, as well as the Okanagan, Shushuap, and then the Tanakh. And then so we have made a major major headway. One of the highlights and everything from our negotiation advisory team is our negotiation framework agreement. And then so that has been officially signed off by all five governments. And that lays out how we're actually going to work together through this process. And then we do have the observer status, and then so that started in round seven of the negotiations in between Canada and the US. So we officially got pulled in before all of the prep meetings for all of the rounds of negotiations starting in round five. And it is really an observer plus because we're involved in all different aspects of the negotiation rounds, all the way from the prep meetings, the caucus meetings, and then having the observer status. And then so our input in negotiations provides that our, well that longevity and our deep knowledge about the Columbia River and all living things that rely on the river for survival. Ensuring our voice is a strong part of the negotiations allows us to regain our ability to meet our own responsibilities. And so it's very, very meaningful participation. So as was briefly briefly mentioned earlier, the round eight of negotiations was actually hosted in a column. So that is my community that I am from where I live. And so I took full advantage of that and I put together a few different presentations to highlight the cultural aspects. And one of the most important things that I actually did to kick off the meeting was I went and brought in the entire academic elementary school over to open up that meeting. And then I did that because I wanted to highlight our children, because, you know, as with all of you this, this is my life. This is not just a job and I wanted to bring them into this process as well because we're speaking for all of those who came before us, all of those who are here right now, and all of those who are yet to come. And then so we have a lot of various subcommittees that are working on all different aspects of the Columbia River. So you'll be hearing from Michael about a lot of the salmon work that's being done, the ecosystem work that's also going on. And we've yet to make major headway in the cultural values, but it is coming. There's lots of different modeling going on. And we also have our first nations working through. And then so some other highlights is the Salmonella way, receiving the observer status and having very effective and efficient and meaningful participation. So, as I said earlier, all of our values do align. So feel free to connect to learn to participate and to reach out. And then I want to thank especially the local governments committee for all of the support and everything for pushing for first nations direct involvement. So thank you. Thank you. Glad to be here. It's certainly certainly an honor to to represent the indigenous perspective. We have a traditional territory in the Columbia River Basin. I come from a division within a nation called the Simch. And our territory runs just north of Kalmops all the way to Jasper McBride and down the can basket used to be the Canary River to the Big Bend area into the Relastoke. And I work along with the others, the Shushua Band at Invermere. They have a lot of interest, of course, in the basin. And we have another division, the lakes division, the Shushua Lakes. That part of our nation, the people came over regularly and had a lot of relationships in terms of hunting, fishing and occupying the basin area. So that's who I am. And the other observers, and that is a pretty cool position to be able to actually sit in the room with the Canada U.S. delegations and the negotiations and observe what's going on here all the words. And it has been mentioned, we participate in all aspects of planning before and during the caucus sessions. And our voice has been heard. So you might say, and still, why are you involved? Besides, you're just sort of interested. Well, really the much like residents like yourself, when the Columbia River Treaty was negotiated 50, 60 years ago, you really weren't consulted. Your interests really weren't a big priority. And you remember that. And I think that's why a lot of you are here. You want to adjust something about the operations of that system to more fully accommodate some of your interests. So it's the same with us. We were not recognized as mentioned. But since then, through change in the Constitution, our aboriginal rights have been recognized. 1982. These, through a series of Supreme Court decisions. It was recognized and confirmed that none of our. Inherent rights to our lands to our rights to self determination to benefit from our from the resources within and have a voice in how the resources were used and to have a government of our own to represent our interests. Those have all been confirmed. And most recently, taking standing up shoulder shoulder with other nations in the world. Canada has determined that it's best to recognize that indigenous people worldwide have rights. They signed on to the rights of the indigenous people through that declaration. So Canada has an official policy, BC has an official policy, and they say, we want to recognize your right to self determination, self governance, right to your lands territories, right to decision making and right to benefit. So that's a big mouthful. That's why I'm here. That's why the indigenous people are here. And of course, a lot of time has gone past a lot of relationships have been built under the different regimes over time. And now it's time we believe, and I hopefully it's responded to in a positive way to reconcile that history. Reconcile that history. Reconcile those rights, bring ourselves up into today's world and look forward to a better place by working together on issues like this. There are many, many issues to deal with. So, yeah. I had the advantage of looking at some of the information from you, the Valley basin residents. From 2012 when there was more for formal engagement and beyond I mean throughout the generations and decades, there have been concerns by basin residents about what the heck is going on you know the reservoirs go up and down and the water is warmer. It's the quality of water is declined. And what can we do about it. And apparently, there's a possibility through this renewal, this renegotiation of the Columbia retreating. And so, as I was mentioned, we have a lot in common about simply wanting a better environment, clear water and a vision for a better place for ourselves and the generations to come through adjustments that we trust will lead in the operation of the Columbia basin through the Columbia retreating agreement. And just to end, I'm very pleased as mentioned that we were taking leadership in the air of the. It's a funny word to me ecosystem functioning within the basin, but just looking after the environment, how we can make things better. So we're taking on a series of a dozen or more research projects around the environment ecosystem functions. That's for the Canada BC position. So it's not just for us. That's the for everyone. So we'll be doing the research and Michael be talking about that later. But that's something we're taking the lead in and very pleased to be able to do that and make that contribution. And as was mentioned to the salmon. That's a real interest to us and I know a real interest to to other residents of the basin. And that's a true challenge, but an exciting one. The last thing is just how do we determine and express our cultural values are cultural interests within the basin. What are they, what are you indigenous people, what do you think is important for yourself. Well, we're working on that and we're doing some research and that's just started just last week we talking about frameworks and research and all that sort of stuff. So we're just ready to go with that and hopefully within a number of months we'll be able to come up with some draft ideas that we'll be able to put on the table and say this is what we're interested in. And this is why we want and how we want to adjust the the operations of that system to accommodate some of our interests and our values. So, I am so pleased to be here, representing the southern people and working alongside the other indigenous representatives, the federal provincial government BC hydro and people like you cooks down. Thanks so much Nathan and Natalie. So now we can take questions, questions and comments. And as we do, the need to speak into the mic so that it feeds into the speakers and all the rest of it so bear with me as I run around with microphone but I'll ask now does anybody have any questions or or comments for any of the speakers about treaty negotiations or related to the treaty otherwise. Thank you, Brooke. I have two questions negotiations started sometime ago. And at the beginning of the process negotiations, and I think what I'm hearing is negotiations have been quite cordial to this point. There are some critical issues around water worldwide. And we know that the what is happening in the future around the Columbia basin is going to be critical. I'd like to know if the negotiations are heating up and if those if those issues are being brought to the fore and how that's proceeding, and particularly in connection to the date of 2024 when we move to on call flood control. I know that that's a triggering point for the United States and as we move closer to that date I wondering how those negotiations are going what the tone is. Lynn or Kathy what other have you like to take that. Oh, do we hear you and we might have lost her. Sorry about that. I had myself on mute. Okay, go ahead. Yeah, so I would start off by saying that the negotiations have not been heated yet. We're really at a point where we've been exchanging information, exchanging data, and really trying to understand each other's views and concerns, and getting a sense of what each other wants in a modernized treaty. So it's been very cordial as I as I noted in my remarks, but it is going to be tough, and it is going to get tough. But we're not at that point where in where it has been heated yet. I think having these rounds where we've had this opportunity to really get comfortable with one another understand each other is a good foundation. Um, but I don't think that it's, it's beyond the understanding of anyone on the delegation, most especially the chief negotiator Sylvan Fabi, that things will get more difficult as we proceed forward. Thank you Lynn. I think Kathy is moving from her chair so I feel like she's going to say a few words. I just want to add that it's really been interest based discussions and not to win lose and not confrontational and you see that a lot and, and you know people ask us is it like NAFTA or is it, you know, like other difficult negotiations with with the US but I think what's reflected is the collaboration that we've had for 55 years with the US and both sides want that to continue. With regards to 2024, you know, Deb asked, it's still five years away, and we're trying to find what is a path that would serve the interests of both countries in that. And there is, and there is still time. We have, we are, we, we wish we could tell you a lot more of what is said in the negotiating room and what our positions are but as you can understand, that would be very difficult. We need to be able to keep a lot of that, the Canadian positions confidential. And, and I know people are frustrated with that I know that some people in other meanings said well, we've gave, we've given an update but we still know what they're talking about in the negotiating room. But we will continue to come back to you and let you know how it's progressing and also at one point when they're going to be choices. And when we're getting close to some options into a modernized treaty, we will come back to you and we'll present these options and we'll get feedback from you. Okay. Any other questions or comments. No questions off the table there we go. It's nice that we speak of things being cordial and we're reconciling left and right. Could someone reconcile for me how we have an announcement about undripped and the position BC has taken on it which is encouraging. Well, the very same day BC announces that it's challenging the, the presence of the synioxed people here. I do not understand with it. I haven't heard the word synioxed at all tonight. But I think the entire history is embarrassing on BC's part for having effectively been responsible for the expulsion of the synioxed by policy. And we're just seeming to me to be going along with them having been disappeared. And we're going to the Supreme Court to make sure they stay disappeared. Is there anybody that can explain why the synioxed do not have an authentic voice and what's going on here. Okay, I thanks. I appreciate the question because it helps clarify what our position come in retreat BC teams position is regarding the synioxed. We absolutely do respect the decisions of the BC courts in and that we acknowledge that they have rights that the lakes division of the Confederate tribes of the Colville Reservation have rights in this region. There is no question. It's been confirmed by the courts and it's and we acknowledge that with regards to Columbia retreat II had the opportunity earlier this year to have a bit of a discussion with Justin, he's a chairman of the Confederate Colville tribes around the CRT issue. And I suggested to him that while the Confederate Colville tribes are being consulted by the US State Department that would they be engaged with Canada and developing Canadian negotiating positions might seem like a conflict of interest, or at least a perceived conflict of interest. And so we kind of left it at that. A bit of the door open have not heard from Chairman Costin or Confederate Colville tribes that that they wanted to engage with Canada because you can understand, you know, working with with both both countries at the same time. That being said, you know the the Aboriginal rights, and all that includes are shared amongst indigenous nations. And, and that's what we continue to work towards with regards to decision on on appealing to Supreme Court of Canada that's a decision has made by the Attorney General and I really am not involved and can't really speak to the rationale behind I have no information on that, but I appreciate your question so thank you. Go ahead Kathy. I was just wondering, I'm gathering that you said that we had three choices Canada to, to continue the treaty scrap the treaty or to seek improvements. So I'm gathering that the United States is in the same position they've decided to continue the treaty and seek improvements that we all on the same page that way. And I'm also, and I guess you probably can't tell that. What do you anticipate some of the biggest sticking points are going to be in the negotiation. Well, I. So first of all, we have the BC decision is on our website and I think there's copies there, there copies there that outlines in the principles what's important to us in the context. The United States also followed a similar, well a different process, but they came out with recommendations to their State Department. And, and as a fairly lengthy, let the air statement, where there are a lot of things that are aligned, but there are things that are different. I think the best is to compare it to but I think, and we've said this publicly so I can emphasize it that, and I was mentioned before is that we would like to have more input in the management of Libby Dam. We feel that there are benefits to the US beyond flood control and electricity generation on on fisheries and recreation on navigation that are benefits and that they should be shared equitably. So how we view and understand ecosystems for all the right reasons is very different on both sides of the border, just because of the land formation and and the environmental, the ecosystems on both sides. So they're focused more on fish and we're more focused on what you'll hear about tonight. I think we till now we've appreciated each other's interests. And, and I wouldn't say that they'll be sticking point it's it's getting into the zone of agreement and we're, we're working towards getting into the zone. I want to see that wording and be seen in Canada and the US are getting into the zone. Hi, thank you. So a sticking point that I've noticed that other conferences has been the Canadian entitlement. Where are we on the Canadian entitlement if you could bring up the speed. Thank you. And maybe first just explain briefly what it is. It seems when some of these negotiations were being contemplated this having started, there were noises within people in the United States in the in the federal government not to do with the negotiating committee that that said that they felt that the downstream benefits that Canada was getting were much too rich and that the Canadian entitlement was too rich and it really needed to be cut back. And I, you know, is this is this a position that they intend to take in in the upcoming or further deliberations. So, I don't know if I could start and then you could jump in. So noise is not a factor in the negotiations. We ignore the noise. We didn't ignore the noise. We would be very far apart and we'd be very far behind. So what counts to us is what we hear from the officials who are responsible for negotiating a treaty. The Canadian entitlement is our share of the increased I'll call it electricity that's produced in the United States as a result of how we manage flows of the border. And by us doing that in certain ways, they're able to produce more electricity than what they had before they could produce before and we get half of the share and we we find that that's a fair arrangement. Then did you want to add to that. I think what I'd say I'm not going to speak specifically to the entitlement. I think we just haven't haven't gotten to that point into the negotiations where we where we are talking about the entitlement. But I will say that even if there are strong views on the Canadian side that the entitlement was too high for Canada the first time around. I can assure you that with the Canadian negotiating team and I mean the whole team, the federal government, the BC government, BC hydro, the indigenous nations. I believe there's agreement that we are not going to accept a deal that doesn't have value to Canada. And by value I mean not only monetary, but also taking into consideration all of the needs and the concerns that we have. We've heard from indigenous nations and we've heard from basin residents around ecosystem flexibility within a modernized treaty salmon reintroduction attention being given to climate impacts, etc. So I think our view is that this isn't simply about the monetary value of the entitlement but everything around what is going to be a best value to Canada in a modernized treaty. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, one more follow up. And then I think we have time for maybe two more questions after this. The answer to my last question was that to the lady up there thought that what I had expressed was just noise. And that really what we had to do was pay attention to what the negotiating people were saying, not to the larger political community in the United States. However, in your own publication here it says under US Constitution only the president can make decisions international treaties based on advice and consent. Yes, that concerns me. Yeah, and I would say that concerns me too. And part of the reason for that is that we have not decided one of the legal questions around the negotiations is what a modernized treaty is going to look like. Does that mean that we're going to reopen the treaty of 1964. Does it mean we're going to add an annex or protocol to the treaty of 1964. These are questions that we're trying to work around because we do understand that should we reopen the treaty, it needs to be ratified by the US Senate and then approved by the president. And there could be challenges around that depending on when the treaty is the negotiations are completed depending on when and what occurs in the US election in 2020. There are many, many questions around this. We don't have a specific timeline yet for the end of the treaty negotiation. I take your point. Again, these are questions on the legal side that I know our lawyers are looking into and I'm certain other lawyers on the Canadian delegation are thinking about as well. But we don't have that. We don't have a clear answer to this question at all. Yeah, and we'll have to be negotiated with the US. And I just wanted to clarify, I wasn't saying that your comments were noise, but in the US, the views are a lot more polarized and we are very fortunate that the views that we've been hearing throughout the communities are very much aligned with some differences. But I'll tell you why I'm not worried. I'm not worried because this treaty has tremendous value to the United States. And they are, there are people in the US who are worried because they don't want to see that value lost. They don't want to see a predictable navigation level and flows. They don't want to see the disappearance of enhanced flows for salmon fisheries. They don't want to see losing 55 years of flood protection. And so from a value perspective, that's why we think we will reach an agreement because it's as valuable to them. If not more than it is to us currently. Thank you to both of you and then Kathy. I know I said two, but maybe one more question. Any other questions or comments? One more here. Sorry, I got here a bit late, but just a question. Is the ecosystem function going to be considered as part of the treaty? Because I understand the previous government said fish and fish passage wasn't part of the original treaty. And the understanding was that it wouldn't be as they presented to their position when it came out a few years ago, they wouldn't consider ecosystem function and fish passage as part of treaty negotiations, but it would be separate from treaty. And I just wondered if maybe you guys already touched on that or get touched on that and more. I'll let Lynn answer that first. I think I may defer to you, Kathy, on the fish passage side, but on the Canadian side, including ecosystem flexibility is a core position as we go into these negotiations. And I'll keep it at that. In fact, Sylvain, if I be the lead negotiator last night reiterated what Minister Conroy said last night, is that there will be no agreement unless ecosystems is considered within a modernized treaty. All right. Well, thank you very much. I know some of you might have questions that you weren't able to ask, or maybe you're still kind of forming what it is that you want to ask, but I encourage you to write your questions and comments on the participant evaluation forms. We also have cards at the back table here with an email address that comes directly to myself and to Kathy, and therefore can be any questions can be distributed to any of the presenters here tonight. And we're also on social media as well. So please reach out to us with your questions and comments after the fact. Of course, we'll hang out here after this meeting is done too. We really do need and value your input on this. So thank you for your questions so far. These were really great. And we look forward to chatting with you more about this. So thank you very much to Kathy. And Lynn, maybe we'll give you a moment to say a few words before we release you to the rest of your evening. Yeah, it's close to bedtime here. Thank you very much for giving the Government of Canada an opportunity to participate in your community meetings. We really are listening to your concerns. They're not falling on deaf ears. We have an incredibly robust delegation with the province of BC with BC hydro and with the indigenous nations. And I truly believe the Basin's concerns are being well represented in these negotiations. So please don't hold back on providing us with your ideas. Because we will be looking at them and taking them into consideration as we go forward in these negotiations. So thank you very much again and have a good evening. Thank you so much, Lynn. Take care. Thank you. And so with that, I think we'll move into the next portion of the evening where I will turn the stage over to Michael Zimmer, who is a biologist with the Okanagan silks nation. And he's going to share with you an update on the work that's being done and led by indigenous nations in collaboration with many other parties that he'll talk about on looking at the feasibility of reintroducing salmon as well as more on the ecosystem work that we've heard about. So with that, I'll give you the clicker. I'll give you a second. Great. Thank you everybody. Thank you for the opportunity to come and speak and and listen as well. Let me see if I can. You're on deck to start that. So it's my pleasure to come before you and talk about to to the elements within a modernized treaty and that's the letter of agreement or under salmon reintroduction to the Columbia and as well as a little bit here talking about the ecosystem function elements and the work that we've been working through. So just waiting for the slide deck to come up. Um, the, the three first nations on the Columbia, the, the, the, the, the silk as well as the province of BC and Canada, affectionately known as the gang of five ratified this agreement earlier this year and summer. But I just want to give you the backstory here. Where am I pointing there. Thanks. So the salmon story is one of tremendous loss in the Columbia system. So this is just a graphic in a summary this on this map here this shows the historical range of salmon throughout the blocked now blocked portion of the Columbia river. All the way up through arrow lakes up around Big Ben Kimbasket and some of the salmon the large June hogs the 60 70 pounds Chinook salmon would spawn at the outlet of Windermere Lake in in Vermeer. And also the use indigenous use fishing camps noted by those little fishies on the map there, all of that lost, but in terms of numbers. You know, the magnitude is in the order of two to almost four million salmon and steelhead steelhead are the ocean going form of rainbow trout migratory rainbow trout thousands of miles of streams, main stem and tributary habitats for major nursery lakes. These are the arrow lakes Kimbasket, a slow can lake for those that don't know where it was historically part of the salmon range. The upper Columbia tribes in terms of their consumption numbers, six, six to 13 million pounds of salmon annually in the Canadian portion, 125 to 750,000 salmon and steelhead, and the lower river tribes the annual harvest. In the order of one to almost three million salmon and steelhead destined to spawn above Chief Joseph dam and geographically speaking Chief Joseph dam is the 10th dam up from the ocean. The salmon can divert traverse nine of those dams at this point and are now blocked at Chief Joe. In terms of a timeline this is some of the recent history of going back to last four years but I really want to preface this story with with the the story of lost it goes back since the 1940s with with the construction of Grand Cooley so during that time, you know the indigenous nations, all salmon people in Columbia didn't have access to salmon but year after year those tribes would gather and have ceremony to call back the salmon even though they knew it was blocked. So the backstory to this is is an ongoing one of the the desire. The right to have salmon up through the entirety of the Columbia, but in terms of this letter of agreement the history goes back to about 2014 where indigenous nations started to bend the ear of the federal government saying we want the salmon back. Moving on we started to talk internally and also been the ear of the federal fisheries ministry, which is the one that that manages an address salmon DFO in 2017 the Columbia Basin Trust got actively involved to try and provide a cohesive process bringing together indigenous nations, the province, the federal government, as well as the hydro system operators those folks that own the dams and operated. So we all needed to get into a room and started talking about this in earnest and in 2017-2018 we had workshop sessions where we could brand brainstorm and put together a whole list of questions that were that are posing requires some significant thought and investigation in terms of how to make this possible. In October to July in the last year or so that gang of five started to draft this letter of agreement and just this past July in a sunny day in Cal Cigar Millennium Park, all the five levels of government, some of the folks from the local governments all gathered at Millennium Park to sign that letter of agreement. So what's what's involved in terms of commitments and outcomes. It represents a three year commitment to start looking at those questions. With funding provided by the Columbia Basin Trust provided by the province and provided by the federal government which is quite remarkable considering two or three years ago when we started to talk about these things. Nobody had a position in terms of the province or DFO. Under the letter of agreement, the parties will develop a five year work plan. What is it that we want to achieve? How are we going to get there? So essentially a roadmap. The first part of that is the government structure. We've got an implementation team. We've got a secretariat. We've got the technical working groups, the indigenous working groups to try and put together a process to make it work. And also how to how to reach out to you folks how to communicate what we're doing and how we're doing it and what we're achieving. The relationship between us and the states. This is a trans boundary issue. So we need to work collaboratively across that border. And we're looking at options to make it happen in terms of feasibility and the big thing is the risks. We've got a system that hasn't had salmon for 80 years. We've got a system that's got a series of taps and what I call bathtubs and brick walls, not what we call, you know, typical salmon habitat. So it's significantly changed. And we got to understand if we bring salmon back, is there going to be risks to resident fish or those resident fish can have risks to the salmon. And ultimately, what are the benefits? That's the main driver. We've got to, as you can imagine, what we've heard through those sessions in the community, people want the salmon back because of a litany of benefits. And just want to leave you with a couple of postcards on this topic. So how are we going to do it? Those are a lot of questions. This top picture here is the salmon cannon, the woosh system. It's a low pressure, negative pressure that actually sucks fish like a vacuum through this vinyl tube over large distances and over some significant heights. So it looks like an innovative and interesting technology to get adults up. And then in the lower part here, this is what they call a gulper or collector. And you would see those in the head ponds above a major high head dam. And essentially they have a net sort of traction flows that bring the smolts into a collector. The out migrating salmon are collected. You can sort them per species or you can sort them in lots and then transport them via a truck or through a slew sway or other mechanisms. So the message here is that there's technology out there to work on the fish passage issue, particularly around these high head dams. And we're tremendously optimistic on trying to implement some of that here. So that's it on salmon reintroduction LOA. I hand it back to Brooke or oh, we're going to jump right into ecosystem function here. So let me try and do it this way here. So if you have questions on this, you can you can jot down on your sticky notes and things like that. So I'll also say we can take questions about salmon as well once Michael's done with the ecosystem piece and then we'll take the questions and comments at that time. So we've heard throughout in terms of some of the elements of the modernized treaty about including ecosystem function. Some of the language we use in the past was ecosystem based function. So this is all things the environment. So one thing I'd like to mention is that this this presentation, an expanded version of this presentation was was presented to the the Canada US negotiating team in September of this year. So what I want to do is just give some background talk about the draft ecosystem function goals and we talk about ecosystem. We're talking about the elements that make up the environment, the soil, the rocks, the water, the plants, the animals and any interaction of all of those together. So that essentially what an ecosystem is the importance of flexibility in the CRT to implement ecosystem function. And then we'll open up for some brief Q&A and and hopefully at the end we'll have time for robust discussion on that. So at this time I would like to invite sick weapon and Tanaha members to come up and just give a perspective on indigenous perspective on ecosystem function. Thank you. Just that nothing to do with this. But I was talking this evening about Salmo. It hadn't occurred to me that was originally it was Sam Munn and that I assume that when the salmon come up that river shed they'll put the end back on the end of that. Learn something every day. So this is just an example of a whole lot of interests and values that the indigenous people specifically this web and have and just respecting so what we'll do the traditionally we absolutely dependent on the land and the resources around us. And it was the rule. It was the law that we had to take care of that land, the water, the animals, the plants, or else they wouldn't take care of us. And I think that's a that's a very applicable kind of idea, a big one. When we talk about the renewal of this agreement and how we can put that in there. How can we respect the land. So what we'll do is our so what in traditional territory. The other know is that Nicotas at that one river. And again, we see the, the Columbia basin, the lakes and the waterways as being one system that it's one river. And that the system of connections of all of the natural pieces are are real. And that it's part of our job and our responsibilities to make those connections function a whole lot better. So, again, Nicotas at what is just something that we have in our minds and the other first nations have similar ideas very much. So, so just a couple of ideas about the way we approach the idea of what are our interests and what should we be working toward with regard to this renewal process. Another five feet of adjusting. Thank you, Nathan. So the Tanaka we were put here by the creator. So our oral history speak to the creation of human beings. These stories have been handed down from generation to generation. So just on that note, we, it all starts with our culture and our rights practice would directly feeds into all of our stewardship and decision making, and then into the healthy ecosystems and water. So Tanaka, as with many other first nations have maintained our cultures and her spiritual understandings that stress tradition, community and harmony with the natural environment. So Tanaka law is unknown most difficult. So it's our word for the law that was given to us by the creator, and it speaks to why we were put on this land. The creator put us here for a purpose, and that purpose is to take care of the land and all of its resources. The law of the land is a law of survival. The land gives us the resources to survive and in return, we uphold our covenant with the creator to protect and not overuse the land. It is the foundation of our spirituality, that of being humble in our limited understanding, and of being respectful of our role within nature, and with all the creatures, as well as being respectful of acknowledging the creator and our ancestors. The foundation of our relationship with the land and its resources is our recognition that we are a part of the land. Our understanding of connectedness requires that we have respect for all things as anything that affects one affects everything else. The Tanaka have roots that tie us to the territory, and it is believed that we are of the earth. In other words, what we do to the earth, we literally do to ourselves. The Tanaka phrase that captures this interconnectedness is, this phrase translates to our people care for the land and the land cares for our people. Thank you, Natalie and Nathan. Just to give the silk perspective, very much similar tied to the land of the land and responsibility to take care of the land. This is the silk water declaration, and I won't read through the entirety, but I just want to draw attention to maybe perhaps one of the passage. Any use of water shall be an act of reverence and a commitment to our responsibilities of all life, now and to come as silk people. So very much a description of our responsibility to water and its proper management. So let's get into the nitty gritty in terms of ecosystem function. Back in 2011, the Fish and Wildlife Compensation Program, which is sort of a division of BC hydro. They initiated a study, a dam footprint impact study, basically to try and quantify what was lost in terms of inundation of the riverine system as a result. So when we look at, these are the treaty dams, Kimbasket, which is the reservoir behind Micah Dam, Arrow Lakes, which is the reservoir system behind Hugh Keenley side dam, Cucanuts, similar to Libby Dam, Duncan and Duncan Dam. And you can see the totals and these different ecosystem elements that were lost. And to look at the right hand side here in hectares, the total loss of all of these dams in terms of these different habitat or ecosystem elements, 108,000 hectares. So there's about two and a half acres to a hectare. So, you know, we're talking about 250,000 acres worth of lost habitat. But just to zero in on an example here, Arrow, for example, the amount of lake rivers, streams, shallow ponds, gravel bars, wetlands, flood plains, 51,000 acres, or sorry, hectares. But that was the point in time impact. And what we realize also is this ongoing impact. So since the dam creations in the 60s, late 60s, these are ongoing operational impacts. Nutrients are trapped behind these dams, aren't allowed to flow freely through the systems. So bearing ecosystems, we've had discussions last night and a little bit today about these drawdown zones. That's the difference between the high pool of reservoir and as low as they're able to draft it. So these are biological deserts to some degree where there's no vegetation that grows. It provides limited fish habitat value and it fluctuates. And some of the effects that some residents have talked about are these dust storms that are created in these drawdown zones. Streams are inaccessible to fish for spawning, particularly at low flow periods, particularly like Kokini, for example. Rapid changes in flows below the dams. These ramping rates, you know, they cause scour and they strand fish from time to time. So in terms of support for including ecosystem function in a revitalized or modernized treaty, the province of BC under review. Indigenous nations were pretty vocal about including ecosystem function as part of the new treaty. Input at community meetings supported additional ecosystem function. What we heard through those roundtables through 2011 to 2013. I guess some of you participated in those was the community said we want to see ecosystem as a third pillar to a modernized treaty. And similarly, the local governments were all on the same page as understanding that ecosystem function must be in any treaty. And then the province, their decision in 2014 to make that happen. So ecosystem values are currently and will continue to be an important consideration in a modernized treaty. And the province will explore ecosystem based improvements recognizing there are a number of available mechanism inside and outside the treaty. And it's important to understand that flow and discharge and operations are the main elements of the treaty that we can use to sort of help guide some of the goals around ecosystem function. And then there's some other things outside the treaty. We heard a little bit about fish passage. So those are elements that are important, but not necessarily found within this ecosystem function work plan. And we have consensus with the tribes across the border that ecosystem function must be part of the treaty. Terms, there's a lot of jargon, a lot of language, a lot of technical babble, I suppose, when we're working as a technical working group to pull together the elements of ecosystem function. So just to clear up some of the jargon, we need clear goals and objectives. And that's where we want to get to. So an example of this, for example, increased area and flood plains and wetlands. Performance measures, those are the units, those are the little bits of data that we can use and manipulate and model to get to our goals. An example of this is hectares of habitat, for example, or meters of stream, those sorts of things. And then we have the high powered math, the scenario modeling or the computer simulations that we need to put these performance measures, these inputs, these data, and then model different scenarios. One of the ones that we've been sort of talking about over the last few years is this stable aero reservoir scenario, and that's where we keep aero reservoir at a certain certain level, and then model out all these different ecosystem functions in response to that. Another one, of course, is also maximizing the system for hydro production, as it's certainly being operated towards that right now. So we've got to consider a bunch of different scenarios and have these computer simulations guide us in terms of what would be the best benefit for ecosystems. For the last year, we've been working as a technical working group amongst the nations, guided by the province and also assisted by a consultant to help facilitate this process. We drafted this document, which would feed into the negotiating process from an ecosystem function point of view. And the purpose of this was to compile some goals and objectives and these performance measures, and also to understand what are some areas that we don't have information on. We call these data gaps that will help guide further research to sort of help us steer along. And that feeds right into the negotiations. So how do we do this? Like I said, we've got a consultant that helps facilitate. We've got the indigenous working groups, which we have all three nations present myself, technical sort of leads, those that are that are knowledgeable in the fisheries and the plan, the wildlife, all sorts of things to feed into this. And then once we've had this drafted and we're at that point now that we can shop it out to the agencies for peer review. So we need some real critical input into this and then we can identify priorities. One of the main things is also climate change, our hydrological cycle, our inputs, our water inputs, those things have changed significantly. So we really need to be cognizant and include that. And it's a working process, right? So we've taken our best approach. I'm going to go through some of our themes and goals. And please, you've got a form. There's a form in front of you that describes ecosystem function with the goals and objectives. So if something comes to mind, if we've missed something, or if this is an opportunity to critique and suggest. So in terms of just general goals, and I'm just going to try and work through this, there's quite a bit of detail that's hidden in these elements. So some general goals, we want to improve ecosystem function. I think we're all on the same page there. We want stability in the reservoir operations because we've got actually, there's, if we start to look at all the different ecosystem functions, we might have competing interests within those elements of ecosystem function. You know, fish versus, you know, wildlife in some cases. So we're very cognizant of that. But ultimately, we want to strive for balance. We want to find out what's the best scenario that's going to work for a thriving ecosystem. So here are some of our ecosystem function themes. You can imagine we had this session where we're all kind of brainstorming and the shotgun approach to put all these different, and there's literally hundreds of elements to an ecosystem course. So we tried to boil it down and we wanted to put it into bins. You know, we like to compartmentalize things, but we don't want to lose, lose focus of the details, but it was important to try to put it into certain bins. So see, these are some of the themes. These are the major themes that came out of that exercise. So ecosystem productivity, floodplain riparian wetlands, riverine and reservoir ecosystems and anadromous species. These are sort of different bubbles, but they are all interconnected and we're very cognizant of that. Like some elements of a certain theme will, will feed into, into others. So from this, we've got 13 goals and associated objectives so you can maybe follow along in the, in the, in the handout there. So let's get to the nitty gritty. So ecosystem productivity. So this is the primary secondary and tertiary elements of an ecosystem. So when we're talking about these, these bits of jargon we're talking about the things that kick us off like the plants that uptake nutrients that provide food for like invertebrates, bugs, that sort of thing. And then we have the top end things that ultimately consume the plants, ungulates, or fish that eat the little, the little bugs or other little fish. So that's sort of our, that food web food chain type, type approach, both for, for the upslope. So that's outside of the, the wetted edge floodplain riparian wetland and of course the same applies to aquatic habitat. So there's productivity, primary production, secondary production, etc. within aquatic environments. So we want to capture that in productivity. Floodplains riparian wetland ecosystems are second theme. So essentially want to increase area, the amount of habitat in these functioning habitats. And we also want to include connectivity between and among habitats. So moving on into the third theme reservoir and riverine ecosystems. We want to manage flows to achieve geofluvial processes. So this is what, what the heck is that and normative flows. So getting lost in the jargon again this is essentially the sediment and the particles in a river system that are moved by water. So we want to understand those dynamics and try and get it back to a more of a baseline, what they call normative scenario. Moving on to increase and improve functional free flowing riverine main stem habitats, including seasonal availability of critical species life history, dependent habitats. So what we've understood so far is that as we operate the, the discharges from a lot of these dams, we have species that are very much impacted. The lower Columbia River, for example, we've got rainbow trout protection flows. We've got whitefish protection flows to protect those species at sensitive time. So that's an interesting step that sort of guides us, if you will, towards ecosystem function in the broader scale, the basin. Continuing on with the third team there goal C access and connectivity. Talking mostly from the the drawdown zone point of view as the reservoir drops those those streams that come in. You know they become braided and that sort of thing and we want to take a closer look at how fish moving up to those those tributaries have access improved water chemistry. Dam operation sometimes impact water quality total dissolved gases is one prime example where you've got high discharge rates from a high elevation that that's super saturate water and and train gases into the into the water and as fish try and respire in that environment. They may succumb to gas bubble disease and that sort of thing so very conscious of water quality. Surface water temperatures. When we're dealing with our cold water environment here in the basin, some fish particularly bull trout are very very sensitive to slight increases in water temperature. So that's an element that we've included fish mortality particularly in fish stranding as we we look at the operating regimes reservoirs are dropped. The habitat is exposed fish are exposed and also in the riverine sections where we have these different ramping rates. We see fish mortality so we're going to take a closer look at that. Anadromous species so the anadromous is ocean going so a fish that as part of its life cycle completes completes it in the ocean salmon or the sort of one of the hallmark species that travel thousands of kilometers and mature as adults in the ocean and return to their native streams. We want to maximize the flows to for anadromous species and goal a and goal B are very closely linked to the Okanagan salmon recovery story so thinking why the Okanagan river well the Okanagan river comes into the Columbia just below chief Joseph dam and that's just above the ninth dam from the ocean where passage happens through those nine dams and have access to the Okanagan river so flow management that happens here goes through chief Greg Cooley and chief Joe and then impacts the in migration of Okanagan bound salmon as well as out migrating smolts and we also are very interested in Chinook recovery in the Okanagan system so we're looking at biodiversity we're looking at increased abundance biomass condition and that is to really allow the the Okanagan indigenous fishery to flourish and then getting back to our LOA the the last goal of anadromous salmon is is the Upper Columbia initiative to restore salmon to the block parts in Canada. In terms of flexibility much has to be learned about integrating ecosystem function into hydro operations. We're going to be learning through studies scenario modeling and active adaptive management and learning is obviously a process right so this is going to be iterative and adaptive. We're going to go through a series of studies and have feedback to see if we're really getting out at those goals. So next steps you're part of the process. We're looking for impact feedback from from you. You've got that form also perhaps an opportunity to have more robust discussion and there's an online survey component that's been pointed out already. But in terms of where we are from the technical working groups point of view we've got we've narrowed down this ecosystem function the goals and objectives and define 14 major studies to start addressing questions and we have a deadline of I believe June of 2020 to start to pull that all together see what information we have that will fulfill those those gaps and as well as other studies that that we can design to take to get at things that we still don't know and then run through some of the some of the computer simulations to see how those those different ecosystem themes respond to different scenarios and then we'll be putting it all together and reporting out and sharing that with with the public and others. That's all I have for you. Thank you so much. Don't don't go anywhere. We do have time for some questions. So does anybody have any questions or comments for Mike on his work. Back. All right, Alan. Just a quick question for you, Michael. So these are objectives that were compiled by the First Nations in Canada. Would the American tribes endorse all of these goals and objectives. I think we're at that process where we formulated that document and we've we sent it out so that's that's a really good question we haven't they haven't really been part of the the the technical working group this side of the border but that information is going to flow south and we are going to be talking about some of this at the Lake Roosevelt Forum coming up next week. So there is going to be ample opportunity to discuss some of that I can speak a little bit to the salmon. Lo Lo a piece as it's sort of wrapped in the anadromous salmon picture and that salmon Lo a one of the bits that I didn't really talk about is one of the guiding documents to that was that joint fish passage paper that was prepared in 2015 which is the 15 tribes and bands south of the 49th and the three Canadian First Nations that collaborated on that joint fish passage paper. And in that there's a multi phase three or four phase approach to salmon reintroduction so we all collaborated on that. So like a trans boundary effort on that but that's just one piece so I think once we go through the Lake Roosevelt Forum and and have those discussions that it will certainly be an open and robust discussion. What I'm hearing is that they're sort of they're thinking along the same line so I don't think there's going to be any major surprises but we're we're open for for that either way so another question back here. My question is relating to the hydro generation you mentioned that right at the end as a small little item but yet I think all the funding for any of these projects for ecosystem. Are going to be funded out of that and we facing a clean BC act we facing a move away from using fossil fuels in Canada. We may we're moving towards electric hydro generation and other clean sources. I think we've we're we're ignoring the facts that the US are going to turn around and say we because they're not they're not interested in what we're doing in terms of green environment or power generation. And I think we're going to end up you know facing a difficult negotiation in trying to keep the funding sources which I believe is what's funding this move towards ecosystem. My question really is what you know let's assume we didn't have any of these dams would we be having any of these discussions today because you know climate issues are changing with the fish and the ecology whether we like it or not. So if I'm hearing you right if we didn't have the dams would we be having these discussions I'm I'm I'm going to just say I don't think so. Yeah, I mean we look at other other systems that have you know like the Fraser our neighbouring major watershed that that isn't imputed or isn't regulated and you know you can use that as as an example in terms of a thriving. Anadromous connected system where salmon migrate all the way up. I think we were chatting with some folks from Vailmont. You know that seeing Fraser River salmon spawned you know in the foothills of Mount Robson and the benefits. You know there's a lot of benefits from salmon migrating upstream you know one of them that comes to mind is the nutrient cycling right and that's one thing that we don't have currently. Now with a block system we have a nutrient supplementation program that sort of tries to maybe get at some of the impacts of those dams and not necessarily the salmon the marine derived nutrient loss but we can compare those two systems anyway so yeah I don't know if we'd really be having these these discussions so is there. Is there. Good. Could you talk about the wish system and how often it's been used and it's been tested and if it's effective. Or does it, does it know if it'll damage the salmon that transported. Yeah, good question about the whoosh whoosh innovations. Coincidentally, we were invited down to a demonstration down at Chief Joseph dam later this summer, I think it was September where they had it set up below Chief Joseph dam so chief Joseph is the 10th dam and the first block. They've been working a little bit with the Coalville tribes down there the Coalville tribes have a Chinook salmon recovery program they have a hatchery down there so it was a good good site to test that. The big thing is is physics. So you're trying to overcome dams that are like four or five 600 feet high and the lead up time to get a certain object over that height without losing without gravity. Pulling you back down so they've been doing a lot of testing and what they found that Chief Joseph is that they could they could get fish up and over they didn't do a live live test at the time. But in other places clay Ellen dam and I can't remember which which watershed that someone somewhere in the in the Columbia system they had successful tests there. Does it hurt the fish they've done extensive studies on that it's just a it's just a vinyl tube like a pool liner that's suspended and they have a just a low negative pressure that draws them through like one or two pounds per inch. They keep it wetted inside their spray so the fish stays wet and it creates a seal and within a matter of I don't can't remember the distance like 30 seconds to move 100 feet or a couple hundred feet. And then the fish come on to the end of the can that's where they get the nickname the salmon cannon because if you go to YouTube and look up woosh you'll be totally entertained by by by what it does and the fish blast out of this thing as if they were jumping over a natural obstruction so they come out of this thing and they they swim they it's like trying to jump a fall as they know that when they see as soon as they hit the water, they got to turn on the jets to make this obstruction so it's very interesting behavior to see and they've done extensive studies on the on the effect of that and it's it's next to zero so nothing discernible in terms of impact so the applicability. The cost it's very effective it's very mobile so it's an interesting innovation that could have applicability here and there's other technologies like trap and trap and haul fish ladders fish lifts those sorts of things so it's just one one little tool I suppose that that shows a significant promise. Any other questions or comments. A Selkirk student and quiet. Maybe what we'll do at this point then is take five minutes or so at your tables and talk amongst yourselves about what you've just heard from Michael. Do you think that this work, whether the goals and objectives identified and the direction this work is going in the right direction. Via cannon, or if there's anything missing anything that you think should be added or otherwise considered, and we'll come back and share kind of your key thoughts that come to mind after that. And then once we're done with our table conversations, we will finish our evening with my colleague in grid talking about some of the really important projects that the province is working on to address key community interests. So, let's have a conversation with ourselves here at the tables and we'll call us all back in about five minutes or so and carry on.