Oregon Chapter Surfrider Foundation

Portland Organizing Committee

10 March 2003

Minutes

Attendance

Rob Williams

Steve Shipsey

Josh Vermillion

Dave Revell

Sarah Strafford

Tina Torri

Katie Breene

Haley Brown

Garron Watkins

Maya

Greg Misslin

Liz Taylor

Adam Lavinthal

Meeting begins 7:40pm.

Introductions (Rob,10min)

Oregon Conservation Network/OCN – Maya (20 min)

Lobby Day – Monday, March 24^th, 9:30am-4:00pm. First Presbyterian Church, Salem. (workshops, info sessions, speaking points, etc…)

If you are interested in attending or would like more information on the event please contact Rob at Rideoutas@hotmail.com. Or to register you may contact OCN directly at ocn@olcv.org. Please register by March 20^th.

Oregon chapter recently joined the Oregon Conservation Network. OCN is an organization that gathers different groups together who are working on similar projects. With recent cuts in funding, the enviromental issues in Oregon are being neglected. The Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board is in jeapardy of being cut. Wetlands are facing crutial cutbacks. Marine reserves programs have been stalled with the new Govenor (Kulengoski), although Gov. Kitzhaber’s advisory board gave the ‘go ahead’ to continue with identifying and setting up reserves.

SalemWatch is a website proving information on all of this.

In a few weeks OCN will be holding a Lobby Day in Salem. Many governmental representatives will be speaking and listening to our comments. This Lobby Day teaches volunteers to be effective speakers and lobbyists. Each attendee will have the opportunity to be as involved or public as he would like to be.

Westport Clean Water Classic – (Rob, 5min)

March 22-23^rd, Westport WA. All proceeds go directly to Surfrider. OP is generously sponsoring this event.

Volunteer opps:

Sign up to pass out fliers to local shops. Contact Rob at RideOutAS@hotmail.com.
Sign up for the contest and to volunteer at the contest. Contact the Washington Chapter at cleanwaterclassic@hotmail.com.

Mother Ocean Day – (Tina, 5min)

Saturday May 10^th, 2003. Cape Kiwanda, Pacific City, Oregon.

Volunteer opps:

Participate in the beach clean up and paddle out.
Sign up to set up or tear down the booth, or to work at the booth. Contact Tina at Tiamotina@cs.com.

Coral Reef Adventure/OMSI - (Sarah, 5min)

March 6^th – September, 2003. OMSI, Portland OR.

Currently OMSI is showing the Omnimax movie Coral Reef Adventure. Some of the issues the movie addresses are related to marine protected areas which is a big issue of ours.

Volunteer opps:

Sign up to help with booth design and set up.
Once the booth is constructed we will be looking for volunteers to work at the booth, let Sarah (londonfalling_2001@yahoo.com) or Tina (tiamotina@cs.com) know if you are interested.

MPAs/Coastal Workshops – (Dave, 5min)

Recently advisors elected by the govenor gave the ‘go ahead’ to locate areas suitable for protection. There will be coastal workshops along the Oregon coast discussing what a marine protected area is. This is a sensitive issue and we would like for all beach communities to understand the importance of marine protected areas and dispel concerns some communities who rely on the ocean for their livelyhood may have.

Florence - March 27^th, 7-9pm

Astoria – April 1^st, 7-9pm

Cannon Beach – April 2^nd, 7-9pm

Bandon – April 8^th, 7-9pm

Coos Bay – April 9^th, 7-9pm

For more information regarding volunteering, transportation, or lodging with Dave, contact him at drevell@surfrider.org.

Intern Postings – (Dave, 5min)

If you have any contact with universities with law programs, we are looking to post intern possibilities to assist our Blue Water Task Force program. If you are interested yourself, know of any interested students, or have a connection with a school or university to post the postion, please contact Dave at drevell@surfrider.org.

BWTF – (Dave, 5min)

We are the only coastal state to not have a state funded water testing program. We are hoping to remedy this soon. In the meantime we are funding ocean water testing along the coast through grants and donations.

Pacific City and Lincoln City have had great results gathering spare change to support our BWTF program. We would like to start the Jerky Jar change collection program in local surf shops and cafes here in Portland. Markus will be getting us stickers for the jars. We need plastic jars - the beef jerky jars from convenience stores work really well.

We need one volunteer to collect 10 jars. Contact Markus at Portlandsurfider@hotmail.com if you are interested.

Access Areas – (Sarah, 5 min)

We are looking to identify beach access area along the Oregon coast to begin documenting public use. This is useful to prevent future public holdings of these access points.

Let Sarah (londonfalling_2001@yahoo.com) know of any special areas you would like protected.

Opens

Ocean Water Quality – Dave would like to set up a conference call on ocean water quality here in Oregon and what we can do to move this issue forward. Please let him know if you have an interest in joining in on this. Drevell@surfrider.org.
Deep water dumping. We understand discussion has begun on using areas along the ocean coast for refuse dumping. This may be an issue discussed and approved outside of the public eye. We will be kept in contact on this.
Website committee update– These guys will have some mock printouts to share with us at our next meeting.

Upcoming Portland Meetings:

Mondays 4/14, 5/5, 6/9, 7:30pm. Lucky Lab.

Meeting adjourned 8:47pm.