Incorporation and Evaluation of Natural Resource Benefits in Red River Basin Flood Damage Reduction Projects - Technical Paper No. 14

The 1998 Red River Basin Flood Damage Reduction Work Group Mediation Agreement addresses both flood damage reduction and natural resource goals for the Minnesota portion of the Red River Basin. Part III of the Agreement includes natural resource goals from agencies with natural resource management responsibilities in the basin. Some of the reasons for clearly stating these goals are "to assist watershed districts to seek balanced, integrated projects that serve multiple objectives and will provide flood damage reduction and natural resource and water quality improvement" and "to facilitate permit decisions by having clearly stated natural resource and flood damage reduction goals." The Agreement recognizes that flood damage reduction projects can be designed to benefit natural resources and that "such benefits should be recognized, quantified, and accounted for in evaluating net natural resource loss/gain." (FDRWG, 1998, p. 13) In March 2006 the Flood Damage Reduction Work Group authorized the Technical and Scientific Advisory Committee (TSAC) to prepare a technical paper that provided a way to develop and evaluate natural resource enhancement (NRE) components for mediation process based projects. This paper provides background information on natural resource enhancements (Part I), a step-by-step approach to establish NRE objectives (Part II), and presents a practical methodology to evaluate mediation project alternatives to meet the NRE objectives (Part III).