FORKS — Keeping forests as forests and farms as farms is as important to the planners of Water Resources Inventory Area 20 as keeping salmon in the streams.
While there’s been less contention than in the watersheds to the north, stakeholders in the Sol Duc-Hoh basins see many of the same dangers.
“We believe we have a pretty good water environment out there, and we want to keep it,” said Ed Bowen, a citizen member of the planning group who lives at Lake Ozette.
Rather than mimicking a water proposal from another area, Bowen said, WRIA 20 participants are determined that their plan “is tailored to us.”
Planners hope to draft a plan to take to community and civic groups late next month or early in November, said Valerie Streeter, water quality planner for Clallam County.
“We want to submit it to a lot of public scrutiny,” she said.