PSCD Regional Forestry Program Prioritization Process

The Puget Sound Partnership Action Agenda identifies forests as a primary habitat under threat within the region. One of the biggest threats to the future of forest land is conversion to non-forest uses, often resulting in habitat loss and a reduction in critical environmental services, such as stormwater capture and filtration. Non-industrial private forest landowners (NIPF) have the potential to play a vital role as stewards of our ecological resources.

The Puget Sound Conservation Districts (PSCD) Regional Forestry Program is a program created in partnership with the Puget Sound National Estuary Program to support NIPF landowners by providing them with additional forest stewardship services. PSCD Regional Foresters work within a cluster model to provide forest stewardship planning services to nine conservation district areas in the Puget Sound region. A cluster model allows for a single conservation district to house a technical specialist—in this case, a forester—who provides services to multiple conservation districts that may otherwise be unable to afford to hire foresters themselves.

• Bruce Gregory: San Juan Islands Conservation District
• Cathi Winings: San Juan Islands Conservation District
• Nick Kunz: Skagit Conservation District
• Stacey Dixon: Snohomish and Whidbey Island Conservation Districts
• Ellen Arnstein: King Conservation District
• Mark Mead: Mason, Kitsap, Thurston, and Pierce Conservation Districts
• Margaret Kreder: Mason, Kitsap, Thurston, and Pierce Conservation Districts

PSCD Regional Foresters will provide stewardship services, technical guidance, and education to landowners to reach ecological goals of restoring forest-related ecosystem functions, improving fish and wildlife habitat, protecting water quality, and reducing stormwater runoff. Within the timeframe of July 1, 2021 to November 1, 2022, the PSCD Regional Foresters aim to:

• Reach 95 NIPF landowners in the PSCD region for stewardship planning. 
• Provide program enrollment support to 25 NIPF landowners in county-based Open Space Taxation Programs.
• Assist at least 12 NIPF landowners in securing cost-share funding for forest best management practices through state funded programs and the United States Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service (USDA NRCS) Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). 

PSCD Regional Foresters aspire to create strong relationships with landowners to encourage long-term management decisions that improve forest land retention, health, and vitality in the Puget Sound region. The PSCD Regional Forestry team seeks to establish a Conservation District Forest Stewardship Program that extends beyond the grant's timeline and benefits the public for years to come.

In order to efficiently reach NIPF landowners within our region, PSCD Regional Foresters have completed a geographic prioritization process. This document outlines the decisions made in that process and our prioritized parcel results.

The first step in our prioritization process was engaging relevant community stakeholders to help identify critical resource and social concerns that could affect priority sub-geography regions. The Regional Forestry team asked experts and partners (such as WSU, local tribes, and DNR) what they thought was the greatest need within the Puget Sound forestry sector. Our partners highlighted the following as the top resource concerns:

• Development of forest land to non-forest conditions
• Noxious or invasive weeds
• Forests with only one major species
• Young forests with too many trees
• Fish passage

The Regional Forestry team aimed to identify parcels that would have the most impact on top resource concerns and our goals of reducing forest land conversion, improving fish and wildlife habitat, protecting water quality, and reducing stormwater runoff. To identify these parcels, we focused on three measurable attributes: (1) parcel tax status and size, (2) forest cover, and (3) proximity to local resource concerns.

Parcel tax status and size can indicate whether a parcel is susceptible to conversion. Landowners currently enrolled in a program that provides a property tax reduction for conserving forest land may have previously received forest stewardship services. Landowners who are not enrolled in one of these programs may be at a higher risk of conversion.

Forest cover layers were employed to ensure that selected parcels contain trees and are therefore eligible for forest stewardship services.

Lastly, proximity to local resource concerns was analyzed to evaluate the resulting impact if parcels were converted to non-forest uses. For example, if a 20-acre parcel along a fish-bearing stream was converted to non-forest uses, this may impact our ecological goal of improving fish and wildlife habitat.

These three attributes were analyzed using  ArcGIS , a software platform that utilizes data-driven mapping styles to gain location information that enables spatial analysis. In each county, we used a combination of ArcGIS layers to represent these three attributes, and evaluated them independently to create our priority parcel list that addresses county-specific needs. The three attributes were evaluated in the following ways:

• Local tax parcel data was used for each county
• Parcels were included based on size*
• Parcels were included based on tax status*

*size and tax status vary by county

Various sources for forest cover were used to determine forested parcels, such as:

• National Land Cover Database data
• Local LiDAR-derived canopy cover
• Land cover from Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife's High Resolution Change Detection program

• Various resource concerns were highlighted in different counties depending on local priorities.
• Examples of resource concerns include distance to streams, distance to shorelines, and Washington Department of Natural Resources 2020 Forest Action Plan-defined prioritization zones.

County-specific methods and results are outlined in the following table:

As a result of the prioritization process, 19,609 parcels across nine counties were identified as properties that would have the most impact on the top major resource concerns and our ecological goals. See the map below for parcel locations.

Our selected priority parcels will be used in our PSCD Regional Forestry Program Engagement Strategy as the first tier of landowners to target for marketing and communication outreach. For more information regarding our outreach efforts,  see our full Engagement Strategy here . By engaging these priority landowners and offering our forest stewardship services, we aim to address major resource concerns in the Puget Sound Basin, as outlined by our stakeholders and partners, and work towards achieving our ecological goals.

This project has been funded wholly or in part by the United States Environmental Protection Agency under assistance agreement PC-01J22301 through the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. The contents of this document do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Environmental Protection Agency or the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, nor does mention of trade names or commercial products constitute endorsement or recommendation for use.