Oneida Lake Watershed 9E

Plan Overview

The Central New York Regional Planning & Development Board (CNY RPDB) is preparing the Oneida Lake Watershed 9 Element Plan. This plan will build on past watershed planning efforts, including the 2004 Management Strategy for Oneida Lake and its Watershed and the 2003 State of the Lake and Watershed Report.

As was true of past plans, this Nine Element (9E) plan will be developed in partnership with the people who live, work, visit, and enjoy Oneida Lake and the creeks and streams around it, with guidance from state and local agencies. Funding for this initiative is being provided by the NYS Department of State, under Title 11 of the Environmental Protection Fund, through a grant to Madison County and the CNY RPDB.

A 9E Plan is a plan that describes a community’s water quality concerns and provides a strategy to address those concerns. 9E Plans are developed in partnership with people who live, work, visit, and enjoy the watershed and its water resources, with guidance from state and local agencies.

What Are the 9 Elements?

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has adopted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) nine-element framework for developing watershed-based plans. Plans must include the following elements to be approved by the DEC:

1. Identify and quantify sources of pollution in the watershed.
2. Identify the water quality target or goal and pollution reductions needed to achieve the goal.
3. Identify the best management practices (BMPs) that will help to achieve reductions needed to meet the water quality goal/target.
4. Describe the financial and technical assistance needed to implement the BMPs identified in Element 3.
5. Describe the stakeholder outreach, explain how their input was incorporated, and include the role of stakeholders in implementing the plan.
6. Estimate a schedule to implement the BMPs identified in the plan.
7. Describe the milestones and estimated time frames for BMP implementation.
8. Identify the criteria that will be used to assess water quality improvement as the plan is implemented.
9. Describe the monitoring plan to collect water quality data that will be used to measure improvements using the criteria described in Element 8.