Mystic Watershed Collaborative
Steering Committee Meeting
June 26, 2003, 1:00 pm

Attending: Molly Anderson, Molly Mead, Janet Kovner, Mary Werowinski, Jen Hill, Lisa Brukilacchio, Nancy Hammett, Everose Schlüter, Dona Neely, and Paul Kirshen.

I. Announcements

• The meeting began at 1:05 pm.

1. A charrette to decide the future of the Blessing of the Bay Boathouse will take place Saturday, June 28th at noon. Lunch has been donated and the discussion will broadly focus on what people want to see happen in the boathouse area.
2. The money that was supposed to be spent on a farewell event for Molly Anderson will be used to establish a garden at the elementary school located next to the TAB building in Somerville. To establish the garden, both an outdoor water supply and a low fence are needed as well as ripping up some existing asphalt. The idea is to set up three separate plots, with some raised beds to make the garden more wheelchair friendly, as well as a compost pile.
3. Molly Mead announced that there will be a new Dean of Engineering (Linda Abriola) as well as that Lisa has been hired by UCCPS on consultant status (to be switched to staff at a later date) to ensure an effective partnership between UCCPS and MyRWA.

II. Exploration of Connections with the GIS Center
The group discussed how the university can better provide GIS services to community organizations. Ideas included providing training (coaching rather than teaching) sessions, GIS maps, a student – project matching service, and a way to archive student projects (particularly those concerning MWC). In addition, more communication with faculty members at Tufts is needed to better explain how much work the students need to do when making GIS maps. This communication will also provide a better understanding of the skills that are acquired by students when working in a community setting.

III. Project Updates
A. River Institute: Molly Anderson has been working with Dale Bryan to try to shift the River Institute into an academic-year structure that will be more suited for Tufts students. Dale has prepared a proposal that he will discuss with Molly Mead and Rob Hollister.

B. River Use Project: Lisa B spoke with Lynn Weissman who is currently developing and conducting a reconnaissance survey on the Mystic with the help of her intern Guillaume. Lisa stressed the importance of everyone getting their data back to Lynn in a timely manner and that the data will be analyzed during the 2nd and 3rd weeks of July. Lisa asked for help to enter and analyze data and Everose Schlüter volunteered.

C. Publicity: Don Neely gave an update on the Powerpoint presentation, pamphlet, and GIS maps she has been preparing. She requested feedback on which maps were most beneficial to include in the pamphlet and Powerpoint presentation. Dona will provide Nancy with a table of the attributes of all of the maps so that the data can be double-checked. Dona will send Lisa Waters a CD of the presentation and Lisa can link it to the websites of TIE and MWC.

IV. There was a sharing session to bid farewell to Molly Anderson.

• The next meeting was scheduled for July 24th at 2 pm in the Rabb Room. The meeting ended at 2:57pm.