 You want me to stop sharing for the start? No, you'll be okay there. All right, and we are starting Hello everyone. Sorry for the delay looks like there's already everybody in here Good we've got all right 36 Well, well, we will We will get started here So we have Jeff Vanderwilt. Hello everybody. Good morning We've got Jeff Vanderwilt here is going to talk about the conservation implementation strategy So like before if you if you have questions feel free to use the q&a down at the bottom And then Jeff so we keep you up to speed if we have a question and it's kind of pertinent to something that you're I'm talking about at the moment. I might jump in Usually they're here me or see me. I'll jump in and ask the question because I don't think you'll be able to see the q&a right And I'll ask those questions And if there's any discussion, there's a little chat down on the bottom that everyone can use So yeah, so we are recording too. So if you have to I know a couple people said they might have to To run out a little early So we are recording. So you'll get that as soon as we're finished But with that we will get started. So thanks, Jeff for joining us and I will let you take it from here All right, very good. Well, I'll start off by saying Good morning from sunny Nebraska this morning. I am Down in Lincoln, Nebraska for those that don't know I'm currently serving as the acting state conservationist down in Nebraska So um, but I'm glad to be with you this morning. Um, glad I'm I can have the opportunity to Talk about cis with you guys a little bit and hopefully maybe answer some of your questions Um, I did tell blaine. I've never been a presenter on zoom Um, so hopefully I don't screw that part of this up too bad. I just don't have the uh Experience with it that I do with teams. I've done several presentations through teams But thankfully well, I don't know about thankfully haven't haven't been on a ton of zoom calls. They've all been team calls. So but anyways wanted to talk a little bit about Basically these two documents that we've put together for cis Kind of go over the history a little bit. Um, kind of give you that background and then we'll dive into the Template itself a little bit and cover some of those topics Topics as well but I really wanted to make sure that um, you guys kind of understood The the history or the purpose of of why we're going down this approach and so I've got the vision document up or I call it the vision document Um of cis and I kind of just wanted to give you the history and talk about this this document just a little bit um Oregon was the first state that kind of went this way with delivering their programs and um One of the things um when jeff zimprich was still here, uh, him and I would have several conversations about You know, what can we do to affect change to actually move that conservation needle? um in south dakota and I had uh Gotten to know the assistant for programs in oregon. Um through some of my Um details that I had done and of course jeff Knew the state con in oregon as well. And so we We decided that it would be a good idea to go out and see What it is that they were doing with their programs A lot of attention had kind of been or the spotlight had kind of been put on oregon with how they were implementing their program so Um, I went out to oregon and actually met with their leadership team And had an opportunity to kind of discuss with them their program delivery method and and the benefits And as well as some of the the negatives about about going down this route with program delivery so one of the biggest things that um That kind of drove us to go this route was was this idea of moving that conservation needle of being able to actually measure outcomes um for those of you that have been uh with the conservation districts for quite a while um know that our programs are very popular um, we you know, we get a lot of applications every year and we do a lot of good with with uh individual landowners, but we don't do um Targeted projects We don't uh actually have a way of saying, you know, this is This is a resource concern. We've gone in and addressed and and we we were able to affect this change I think a lot of you may have heard over the years, you know We talk about this shotgun approach where we do something up here in this corner of the county and we do something down here and and it's just spread all over the place and we don't actually Go into an area and try to affect change. So when you see um For me, the easiest one to kind of relate to is is our 319 water quality projects or the tm or the uh 303d list they call it. These are our impaired screams and water bodies in South Dakota When you look at those You never see much for change from year to year um And that I I attributed to that to our shotgun approach where we are working with one individual In a watershed affecting change on their operation But in the grand scheme of things that's not enough to affect change within that watershed And so our thought process was that if we could go into a watershed or into a specific location and affect change with several basically neighbors together We can actually affect some change on natural resources in South Dakota where we can actually go in and say, hey This is what we accomplish. We can measure Soil health beforehand. We can measure water quality beforehand. We could admit we can measure erosion beforehand And we can come out the other side of this project and say, okay now Let's go back and do those same measurements and we should be able to say, okay, we We remove this much sediment from the water or we kept this much soil Where it belongs versus watching it run away Or soil and health soil health improved by x percent In these during this project time frame So our our our true mission our true goal out of this whole thing is how can we affect change how how can we move that conservation needle And and be able to celebrate our accomplishments I've been kind of teased about this a little bit But it is still near and dear to my heart is the fact that at the end of these projects I want to be able to have a barbecue I want to be able to get all these folks together and say here's what we accomplish and let's celebrate our accomplishments Let's take a minute. Let's pat each other on the back Let's have a beverage and a good meal and let's just you know, let's just Celebrate the fact that we were able to move that conservation needle even if it was only by a little bit and so You know in talking with blaine about about this presentation You know one of the things he said, you know We just wanted to make sure that everybody had a better understanding and and that I think is Um a good point in that I think a little bit of what's happened on this first year was expectations were not Um conveyed appropriately. I think A lot of what I've seen out of this first go-round is that people are kind of shooting for the moon Um or think that they need to shoot for the moon And that's not what this is about This is about moving the conservation needle even if it's only a little bit, right? Because it's the little bits that are going to add up to a big hole when we when we look at these 10 15 20 years from now we're going to do A project in this particular watershed and then we might move down to the next watershed below it You know three to five years from now and start working there and and as as these build You know that conservation effect will build along with it. So I want to really stress that I don't want everybody shooting for the moon. That's not the expectations The expectations is just to show change a measurable change Um in in the natural resources in South Dakota. So When you're thinking about a project when you're thinking of putting a project together do not Get bogged down in the fact that oh, I'm not affecting enough change Do not let that thought process creep into your mind Um because we are dealing with mother nature. We are dealing with natural resources and changes take time Um on some of these things, uh, you know, if you if you were to look at a grazing system Those plant communities don't change overnight those the amount of production Uh in our grass communities doesn't change overnight. There's a lot of different things that factor into that And so I I found with this first year That people were really thinking they needed to shoot for the moon that they had to have this big Change that they were going to measure and that's not the case at all We don't expect great and grandiose things to come out of these projects, but we do Want to measure that change and so You know what I kind of wanted to highlight here Um About the benefits And kind of get to this point. Hopefully you can kind of see what I highlighted there this fourth bullet under the benefits You know, it's about having clear goals and objectives That you're able to monitor and evaluate and report on those achievements So that's one of those things that I really kind of want to point out As as being the main strategy or the main goal of of cis What's that you scroll down we can't see Oh Gotcha the benefits part So it's right right here. Hopefully you can see that this is just a one page deal. So it's No, we don't see half of your page Oh, okay. See there again. That's where I'm not a zoom expert So there it's kind of close to the top and that's as far as I can get it to go so hopefully Unless I'm doing something wrong, but that's as far as it'll scroll for me on my on my particular view Interesting Like I said, I've never presented on zoom before so I'm not really familiar Can you shrink the percentage Of the zoom percent Yeah, but That just moved it towards the bottom So we're looking at Make sure we're looking at the same screen that you're looking at you have your pdf open, right? Yep And you've got two tabs like a projects template and a vision sheet Yep Yeah, I'm on the vision sheet the projects template was the next thing that I was going to To cover So I don't know If we can try to reach Just wondering if we tried to reshare it real quick. Maybe we could Get it. Okay. There it went there. It moved down. I'm not sure what you did Apparently it stopped sharing when I moved screens Which I did not realize so I hit start sharing again and then Yeah, okay. Okay. We're good now. Okay. Good. Sorry about that. Oh, it's all good. All right So, yeah, again, you know, we're we're really about measuring that change and so One of the things that's been brought up a lot Is is How do we how do we do how do we measure essentially? And you know, it really depends on what you're trying to Uh, accomplish. Obviously the measurements are going to be different um, but the interesting thing so far I will say is that There are a lot of partners that are willing To help with monitoring Out there And I'm not going to necessarily, you know, obligate anybody to any of this, but you know, I've talked with game fishing parks, uh east dakota water development district fishing pheasants forever Even ducks unlimited some of those folks are are all willing to you know to help in some way and maybe that help is with the monitoring That is going to be or probably is the Sort of the biggest hurdle in my mind Um with this approach and I and I've certainly heard that from from some of our staff per se Uh, when you know nrcs themselves, we don't do a whole lot of monitoring which again leads to why We are not able to really say what it is that we've accomplished with with some of our program dollars So, you know, I've done a little work Um and talking with some folks about being able to assist with monitoring Again, it depends on what needs to be done and who we need to talk to to help with that monitoring. So You know, if you are in that boat where you're not sure um How to get the monitoring accomplished certainly let me know I can maybe put you in touch with the right people Um or at least point you in the right direction Our staff Will certainly help discuss What monitoring should look like um, but we may or may not be able to help with monitoring ourselves again. It depends on what it is um We have worked out a deal on at least one of our projects with water quality monitoring uh east dakota was kind enough to offer a discounted water uh testing Effort uh for this particular project that was going to monitor water quality. So that Like I said, there's options out there. It's a matter of of matching up the right people and putting them together So if you are in that boat, certainly let us know and uh, we'll certainly try to um Get you in the right direction. So That in a nutshell, um, it's kind of the history or the philosophy behind it. I guess Just to let you know, um We have equip dollars easement dollars CSP dollars are all available Um for this effort This is the first year we've offered CSP um I haven't had anybody contact me yet about trying to include cs Obviously The situation is that we still need to follow all of our program rules. So with csp Right, we need to Um still enroll the entire operation. We still need to use the same enhancements Um those kinds of things, but I believe that we can combine csp easements and equip into a into one project proposal to To try to move that conservation needle inside these project areas so um The other thing that we ran across as I say project areas is there was a lot of questions about what a project area should look like How big should it be? How small should it be? um You know, those are all really tough questions to answer without Uh discussing particular projects I would tell you that they could probably be as small as a township They can certainly be as small as a watershed They certainly should not really follow political boundaries because our our resource concerns don't follow political boundaries And so what I mean by that is it really shouldn't be what we're going to include the entire county of day county. Let's just say Well, that's that's no different than what we're doing with our programs now because the entire day county is eligible the way that it is now This is about going in and and and targeting at least a little bit. So Whether it's watershed, whether it's a few townships because there's a salinity issue in this corner of day county or something like that That's what we're after and the size Really comes down to what is it you're able to monitor So that you can measure that change so I don't think you know, we've we definitely have some projects that cover multiple counties, but not obviously not the entire counties. It just crosses those borders. It's um Just kind of where that project fell out it covers spank day And I think even a little bit of marshall county kind of follows that border along there I think maybe part of brown county as well You know with one of our current projects um So that's just kind of the the area that they wanted to target because of of the salinity issue that existed within that area. So um If you want to discuss target areas or project areas, I'm always willing to do that But really understand it comes down to you and your decisions as to what um What those resource concerns look like in that area and what can you measure and monitor in that area? So that really um is kind of the driving Factor behind how you're going to determine your project area Last year we took a third of our easement dollars and a third of our equip dollars and set them aside We didn't quite make it to a third of the dollars We didn't quite use all the funds last year with the projects that we did fund This year, uh, we'll be setting two thirds aside Uh Our our folks did not want us to dive in kind of head first. I'll say so we kind of stuck our toe in the water last year Uh this year, you know, we're going to try to get waste deep And then uh after the third year, we're going to try to be all in pretty much. So Yeah, this is year two. So we're going to be about two thirds and then next year. Hopefully we'll be at um Using all of our program dollars this way essentially Hey Jeff Yep, go ahead. I did have a quick question. I'm not sure if you saw the Q&A and you I think you kind of answered it a little bit But there's a question that if I get approved for a conservation commission grant In april for livestock watering with managed grazing system with this work as a cis project Um, it has four counties involved and would that be too big? For a cis and you kind of answered that part right Yeah, I'm going to say that for the most part that's probably too big But with that being said Some of the work that that's been done on that uh commission grant application can then be put into this So one of the things we strive for Is to have projects i'll say sort of on the shelf Because there's always different options. So You got the commission grants as an option. We've got cis as an option and then there's also rcpp the regional conservation program So all those have fairly similar uh Thought processes are similar What do I want to say project proposals that it Once you develop it for one it doesn't take a whole lot of retooling to make it available for the next one And that's what we wanted to do Is to give people multiple options of ways to get their projects funded And this to me was another opportunity that we could add to that Toolbox, I guess you would say of ways to get projects funded So hopefully that kind of answers that question um, maybe even a little bit more than it needs to be answered but um One last thing on this document, uh, and then we'll move on is that We developed a process where um, we're going to announce for projects Pretty much every november The due dates will be pretty much every april. So that gives you roughly five six months Uh to put those proposals together, which is we tried to make it a good long time because We feel like there needs to be a lot of thought put into these And so we wanted to make sure we gave plenty of time Also wanted to make sure that we gave plenty of an opportunity that if there was certain data you needed to to uh um You know back up your proposal and that was something that we could help provide we'd be willing to help provide that Uh, then in may uh, we'll make our selections And kind of what's different about our process is that while we'll make those selections in may You won't actually receive any funding until um the following fiscal year. So october Now I I say october and I hope you all understand how the federal government works Uh, we don't always actually get our money in october like we're supposed to So when that money does show up after october 1 We'll start working with you on the projects if they got funded but To explain the thought process is from may when we tell you your project's been selected for funding And say october or november when those funds actually show up That's your opportunity to start Um doing outreach to start letting producers know this is available to start that planning process um So that we can have good conservation plans or good projects within your project Lined up and ready to go for when the funding does come that way when the funding comes Uh, we still have to jump through our hoops, right? We still have to do a ranking, you know cart You've all heard of cart. We got to go through the cart process get that all done Get those contracts obligated And then once those contracts are obligated then the producer can actually start doing the work So, um, you know as much as we try or I would love to try to get away from some of our processes There are some that are just required And so we still have to jump through those So All right, we just had another quick question. Jeff back on the goes back to the monitoring discussion from earlier um You mentioned uh east dakota water development District was going to help with monitoring at a discounted rate. Does nrcs have dollars to assist them with this? So no not directly um, however There are again options of ways to find funding um If you're not familiar with the cca ccga process That is a process where you could apply again to nrcs for technical assistance funds, which then could be used for the monitoring so We do have that available We could do a straight up contribution agreement as well Um, so there are a few options out there Um, but again, some of the partners are willing to do that So they're you know partners might have funds. You might be able to get some funds from nrcs It's a little bit of a Chicken and egg thing obviously With which one you get first and how that comes about but there are there are options of ways that we can try to work with you If we know right if we know that you are needing funds for monitoring We can obviously hopefully Work with you to get those if you do a ccga type situation Try to do our best to make sure that uh We get a good proposal put together for that and try to get that funded as well So there are options, but we don't have anything specifically set aside for cis so If you have conservation commissions funds that can be used for it or you know any other grants nifwith grants knocker grants um, certainly, um Any of those funds, you know provided their rules allow for it, right? Any of those funds could be used to help with the monitoring as well If if allowed So any other questions on kind of the vision that's that that's the history. That's the background. That's the strategy Um that we're trying to employ here. So before I switch And over to the template Just wanted to make sure we kind of had all the questions answered about this Yep, we had we had one other. Um, you have any examples of projects they were doing in Oregon? well, um I do I'm not with me The one that sticks in my head um Because I was actually there for the selection process of this one was that they had uh an area Now they they work they don't work on a county basis. They they work on a watershed basis So they're their structure is a little different on Oregon. So they had a watershed Where there was a lot of crp that was getting set to expire And they put a cis together to provide fencing And you know water infrastructure and those kinds of things to Try to keep that crp from being Broken up and farmed again and being able to offer producers an option to where they could turn that into grazing land Um after the crp expired So they put a cis together for that that particular watershed did with that target was to keep crp Grass as grass and not have it converted back to farmland. So That was one that I know that they approved while I was out there I've got a few more a few more. Um, actually laying on my desk back in South Dakota, but I don't have them with me I did bring them back when we came back from Oregon. So Okay, I was thinking too I could send along They have a Website their their nrcs website that has those examples too, of course we have We have ours with all of our projects going on too that I can I'll send those out in emails afterwards all the South Dakota projects and then the Oregon projects for ideas And the links are right here as well on this vision sheet if you have the vision sheet so And if you don't we can always get that to you as well Yeah, we're trying to create a map So that everybody can see what those projects look like they can see what they're trying to accomplish there should be a A brief write-up of each project that we funded last year on the site as well Um, I think it's pretty well done. I haven't They were still trying to finalize it when I when I left South Dakota and came down here to Nebraska So I I kind of have been left out on the finishing touches, but I think it's actually done. So yeah, it sounds like We had touched base last week about that map We're going to incorporate it into a website and I think if not, yeah, if it's not done already already completed I think she said that by the end of this week, so No, we'll get that out to everybody You know Very good That's all the questions for now Okay, I'm going to switch here. Let me get back to the top Okay, so now did it switch screens for you? We're on the the projects Okay, good. Just wanted to be sure Fire trucks going by Oh Yeah, oh, that's one thing about being in a big town now. Well, I hear fire trucks There's a fire station out for a way and I hear fire trucks It's a little weird Yeah downtown Lincoln. So uh, anyways, so here's the the outline The template that we kind of put together now this is This is kind of a This is strictly a South Dakota thing. I This is not something that Oregon did. They did not have a template as such um And I opted to do a template and opted to do kind of this document in hopes that It would help people put the the proposals together These are not meant to be Really long proposals necessarily And I and I hope nobody takes this the wrong way, but I'm not looking for a lot of fluff in these I'm really looking of of let's get to the point. What is it you're going to try to accomplish? How are you going to accomplish it? What's it? What's it going to take to meet your goals to meet your objectives? Um, what's the budget look like and then how are you going to monitor those outcomes? So it's it's not meant to be Difficult it's not meant to be very long and and verbose kind of a thing Um, but I wanted to lay out the different sections that we wanted. It's that we made sure That we got the details that we wanted to get And so I thought I just quickly kind of go through each one Maybe, you know briefly speak About what it is we want from each one and and kind of go from there So the first couple are pretty easy to cover page It's basically the title of your project Maybe a you know your name and number on it so we know who to contact or who the main point of contact is For the project you can have multiple partners and if you want to list all the partners on this sheet You may but it's meant to be who's the primary person that we're going to be working with And like I said, if you've got multiple partners, that's great That that to me actually makes it a better project if you do have multiple partners so But that's all that is. It's essentially a title page Then the problem statement, um, you know, what is it that you're looking to address? Um, is it water quality in lake mitchell and I'm going to pick on lake mitchell through this a lot because Um, for those that don't know I live in mitchell. I've been helping with the lake mitchell project a little bit So I'm just going to use it kind of as my example Um As as we kind of go through this so you know the biggest thing in lake mitchell is is the phosphorus problem um, so you know you you have a little bit of Two three four sentences about you know, how bad the phosphorus problem is in lake mitchell as an example and just kind of lay that out in detail Then the background, you know This is tell us a little bit about your project area um What are the resource concerns? You know in this region. What are the characteristics of this region? What's the typical operation? Um, that you're you're trying to work with so, you know with lake mitchell, you know, we've got two two situations one is that um The the people that live in and around the lake itself Uh contribute to the problem and then we've got Those folks that are farming and grazing In the watershed above it in fire steel creek watershed Um that you know, we've got cattle Spending a lot of time in the creek. We've got folks that are farming right up to the edge of the creek and therefore, you know sediment carrying phosphorus is Coming off those fields and into the creek and then obviously ends up into the lake So just give us a little background about anything that's going on if you've had a specific weather event Uh A tornado or uh, excuse me a flood Um, or something that has come in and and caused a bunch of destruction, maybe a fire Uh those kinds of things, uh, you know, lay that out in here and just say, hey, you know, we had a Had a major flood come through in 2020 And it washed out a whole bunch of grassed waterways It it caused a lot of scouring to take place and now we're looking to try to address that problem Uh, you know, uh lay that kind of information out in this section The resource this is really just a list. This does this isn't really even have to be a A paragraph as such you can just list the resource concerns that you're looking to address So with lake mitchell, obviously we're looking to you know erosion Um water quality would be kind of the two main ones that we're looking to address in in lake mitchell We're trying to address that phosphorus situations The desired conditions. This is kind of your goal section Uh explain to us how how You're going to implement this project in a way that will show success That you're going to be able to have the success story At the end of this project that we're going to have a reason to hold that barbecue like I was talking about earlier Um, I'm really hoping to change my job into just a permanent party type planner and we're going to a whole lot of barbecues Um with any luck because we're going to be addressing all these resource concerns through this so Probably won't be good for my waistline, but that's okay. I'm always up for a good barbecue Uh Again, this this essentially is the map the description of the geographic region. We're looking for the the overall project area If you have specific priority treatment areas within that project So as an example again lake mitchell and the fire steel watershed, you know, we're going to show the whole watershed as our project area But we're going to focus in on a few priority areas that are right along the creek So, you know, we'll have we'll have I'll just say and I'm making this up as I go. So just understand that We're we're willing to work with anybody within the watershed, but if somebody within a half mile of the Uh fire steel creek itself That'll be our priority area if so if somebody that owns that piece of property is willing to do something They they get extra points that are moving to the top Um, that's those are the folks that we really want to target but anything within the watershed obviously is going to help So, uh, that would be kind of what that section would look like probably a page all in and of itself with just A visual of the map of the project area and any priority areas within that So we can kind of see what that looks like Um alternatives, um, we stuck this in here to help think about nipah essentially Um, this doesn't have to be as complicated as nipah as what it might sound But this as this is meant to be give us give us what's going to happen if no action is taken Um, if we take your action Or is there another is there another route that maybe we could consider as well? So If there's been other alternative alternatives attempted in the past you could kind of list that too and say what those outcomes were Um, but we need to make sure that we get this covered because this is a program requirement So that's what that is meant to meant to be The environmental impacts this is any data that you have um to back up your uh issue Um, so like with lake mitchell. There's been several studies. So you could list those studies. You don't necessarily have to attach them as such um, but you could say this study was done that shows that uh, 50 of the phosphorus in lake mitchell is actually Uh residing on the bottom of the lake and every time the lake is stirred up it agitates that phosphorus which causes the alga blooms um, and then What are the practices that you're going to use to address that? You know, so, you know, again lake mitchell, we would have some buffers We'd have nutrient management. We'd have crop rotation as being some of our main practices Uh, and then you know some supporting practices um Would be cover crops things like that that might use up some of those nutrients uh before it actually got into the uh The creek itself Uh, the communications plan We didn't have this in there last year. We added it this year. Um, and actually In talking with collet um We may have a little bit of i'll say regret of putting it in here as being something that's done um Ahead of time But it is meant to Get you to think about how are you going to involve the public What is it we're going to be able to share with the public? Who's our target audience going to be? One of the things we really kind of want to focus on is the fact that this has an effect on more people than just the producers We're helping So again, let's just pick on lake mitchell and lake mitchell is a great example for this Um, obviously we're going to assist those producers along the creek With with their operations and we're going to make improvements but think about How the whole city of mitchell The county surrounding mitchell, we're all going to benefit if lake mitchell is cleaned up and now becomes a great recreation area Um, the you know, obviously there's a lot of people that would love to spend time on lake mitchell Uh playing in the water boating fishing those kinds of things Most of which tend to get shut down at some point during the year because of the phosphorus problem in the lake And the algal blooms that come along with it so Think think a little bigger than just the producers you're going to help. How how does the general public going to benefit from this? um, and that's kind of what this communications plan is meant to be There is an attachment that clet put together Um, and kind of one of our regrets is the fact that it maybe that is a little bit daunting Um, and so if you do have we're we're working on some ideas to help assist that to be honest with you, so Put something together This is not the end all be all of these things So if you don't have a ton of thought put into this I'm going to tell you not to sweat that this year, but we do still want to have some of your thoughts put on paper And we will if you get selected We'll work with you to to try to actually put this communication plan together So that we have that actually Um for our public affairs staff or any other Folks can help us, you know communicate not only the availability of the project, but the success of the project as well Um partnerships this goes back to what I was saying earlier if you got conservation commission grants if ducks and pheasants if You know, whoever Is willing to help you With your project if east dakota is willing to help with the water quality monitoring or or or something on that order Um, you know listed, you know, we're we're wanting to know Who's all involved in the project? So make sure you list all your partners here Um The prioritizing assistance this gets at our ranking questions If you have some screening or ranking questions, you want to make sure That are used to make sure that these dollars go where they need to go Um, that's what this is meant to be, you know, give us give us what you're trying to target The folks you're trying to target and what those scenarios look like in the form of questions Most of you are familiar. We go through a ranking process We will Even if you don't have these fully developed We will work with you to fully develop them if you get selected for funding But this helps us to know that you actually have some targeted folks some Targeted situations that you're wanting to make sure that those dollars go there. So that's what we're after here The implementation timeline um This goes to this. This is your goals. Essentially. This is um, how many acres are you going to treat what's your um Monitoring plan. I'm going to go back to the top here because it kind of wraps over um, what what's Amount of each practice. Do you need now? These are all estimates. Please remember that there's no way that you know That you're going to implement 5 000 acres of prescribed grazing um In your project it might end up being 4 000 it might end up being 6 322 Uh, you know, so you don't know that so these are estimates, but it gets us to the point of knowing that you are Focused in on grazing management and less on nutrient management. Let's say or crop rotation um, it it goes to what practices you are targeting And the reason that's important is that it shows us that you are using the right practices To get at your resource concern that you are on that right path um, if I've got a a a erosion issue And I'm not Selecting any practices that deal with erosion that means there's a disconnect in your project And so that's what this is meant to to cover. What is it? What's the main practices you're looking to implement that will address your resource concerns The measure measuring and monitoring results is just exactly what it sounds like Tell us what you're going to monitor how you're going to monitor Who's going to do the monitoring how often the monitoring will happen? um, you know, and depending on your project some projects They'll take a sample Uh at the beginning of the project and they won't take another one till the end or maybe they'll take one beginning one in the middle One at the end. There's there's not a lot of monitoring that can be done. Let's just say Soil health, right? Might take a couple years for those microbes to change over and for that to improve. So maybe you're only taking a couple samples throughout Water quality. Maybe you're taking them a couple times a year for all five years of your project Um, so, you know, it that's going to look different depending on what it is you're trying to accomplish So those will really vary but again The beginning and the end showing that improvement throughout the project is really what we're after Uh, the budget I've left the budget somewhat vague Other than we need to know how many dollars you need by program um by year Because obviously that goes to our budget with how many equip dollars we have available how many csp dollars easement dollars um How many of those are all available each year so One thing I tell people about their budget again their estimates Uh, and so what I say to people is that maybe you request five thousand dollars in year one In year two, you've got a request for ten thousand years three is maybe fifteen thousand um Year one actually comes along and you're you're cooking along and you just got a ton of interest and you burn through your five thousand bucks No problem. In fact, you you've got projects that could use money So what we will do We will be I'm pretty sure we'll be able to rob peter to pay paul kind of a thing and that will take some of your Ten thousand dollar request out of year two and move it to year one And we're able to do that because other projects are not going to have success in year one And other ones will so we will float those dollars around a little bit to try to make sure that your project stays on task If you got a lot of momentum, we want to keep that momentum going So we're going to do our best to provide you the funding that you need By stealing from your out years if needed or if possible Now like I said the opposite could be true. You could be that project That gets off to a slow start Which is fine That's going to happen too And you don't use your entire five thousand dollars in year one, you know, you're only going to use about 3500 We'll take your 1500 and we'll we'll put it towards another project that is Having a lot of success and got the ball rolling. So You will see that we have some flexibilities There's going to be a lot of communication back and forth between us as these projects go Making sure that you have the funding that you need To accomplish what you need to accomplish And then appendix a and b Again, these are some things that we're just looking for we're looking for a shape file So that we can put it on the website And those kinds of things and then appendix b is if you get letters of support, they're not required if you have studies data Any of those kinds of things that you feel like you need to include That's what appendix b is for so That in a nutshell It's kind of the the template what we're after out of each one of those I'm I can't stress enough that this is not meant to be cumbersome It's not meant to be something that you spend a lot of time wordsmithing and And writing up some grand proposal. This is this is about getting us this information telling us what you're trying to accomplish How you're going to move that needle and what practices that you're going to use to to move that conservation needle and how you're going to monitor it so Keep that in mind and I'll just stress again We're not shooting for the moon here We're looking to make small changes Because we know we're dealing with mother nature. We're dealing with a very targeted approach And so we're just looking to move that conservation needle. So Realize that you don't have to have a big great grandiose plan That's the one thing that I seem to kind of picked up from last year is everybody's kind of shooting for the moon That's not what we're after and and I don't think that's realistic to expect so keep that in mind So with that that's kind of what I had to cover Blaine. I don't know if there's more questions or not But I'm happy to answer anything that anybody has Yeah, we haven't had any questions yet. Um, yeah, everybody feel free if you have them throw them out there um You kind of answer my question a little bit. I was just curious from the Um from this template here And I know you said obviously you guys You guys do a lot of work. You'll work back and forth for sure If you like if you like the plan and like the idea I guess what that said is there is there any part? Um, you know bullet point that you see kind of the most You know the biggest barrier kind of the most That it's kind of struggled with or should be looked at a little bit harder So there's there's actually two things that I would say one is obviously the monitoring People are struggling with that because that's not something NRCS has done in the past Um, and a lot of projects don't typically call for any kind of of monitoring of those of those resource concerns or measuring those resource concerns That that in a way has kind of been one of the biggest struggles out of all of this And um, if you're struggling with it, please say something. Please ask some questions. I'm not saying I got the answers But I'm certain I can put you in touch with somebody that can help you figure that out um, the other thing would be um describing the problem and this this kind of the Well, it's kind of the resource concern Slash target area and matching those up People struggle with that a little bit people always I love our agency. I love the conservation district. We want to help everybody And typically what I see is people are trying to make The target area is too big because they're worried about excluding somebody And I can appreciate that I I understand where that thought process comes from but realize that If we can have success in this area And even if it's only within a couple of years We can do another project that borders it that builds on it that expands it whatever terminology you want to use To now catch more people To then again do a better job of addressing that resource concern on a on a on a bigger scale But we'll still be able to measure it. It'll still be targeted But it'll expand on each other so Um One of the things that we're going to do as a leadership team is to try to make sure that we don't have too many projects in one area Um, that we don't become spread so thin that we're not again doing a good job of conservation planning. So You will be able to have multiple projects going but we're not going to let you have 10 15 20 projects going In an area because there just won't be enough staff to make that happen. So Um, yeah, that's those are kind of the two big things that I would say blame that people struggle with a little bit And I'm willing to help on either one or find people that can help you appropriately Absolutely great um one other question here since you're on detail in Nebraska should be submitted to somewhere else or still be info that you have on the bottom You can still use the info on the bottom. Um, it'll come to me and I believe it also comes to Jen works if I'm not mistaken Um, oh, maybe it is just me Well, either way, I'll make sure they get where they need to go. Um, Actually with any luck, I'll be done with my detail by the time we start making selections, but we'll see I guess If I'm not I'll make sure they got to get to where they got to be so all right Any other questions from anyone before we wrap up Is jeff or someone else willing to provide a brief review of a proposal prior to submission Yes Yes, absolutely if you want to contact me you can Um, or you can certainly contact your local dc your local resource unit conservationist or even your local Assistant for field operations and they will gladly look them over and have discussions with you about those proposals perfect Good because yeah, we're coming up on april 15th That they're due for this year, correct? Yep. So yeah three weeks away ish. Yep Right around the corner. Yes, sir Okay, before we Wrap it up. There's any other questions I'll chime in now or if you have any questions afterwards Feel free to reach out to me or or jeff and we can Make sure that it gets answered Absolutely But with that that looks like that's all the questions for today Very good. So yeah, thank you for thank you for joining us from sunny nebraska Probably windy nebraska today and yesterday Yesterday was today the flag is the flag right outside my window is just hanging. So there's not much of a breeze today But yesterday was plenty breezy. So yeah Yeah Very good. Well, thanks everybody. I appreciate the opportunity to share that with you and Yeah, any questions or comments? This is a living document as well. We're always tweaking it to make sure that it's right So if you find something to be, you know troublesome, certainly let me know we can see if there's something we can do to change it to make it better Like I said, we're we're going to offer this every year. So Always willing to make it uh adjustments as necessary. So just let us know Perfect Well, all right with that we will wrap it up and end the webinar, but yeah, thanks everybody for joining Um And yeah, let us know if you have any questions. But with that, thank you Jeff for joining us Everybody have a good rest of the day You too. Thank you. Yep. Thank you. Bye. Bye