Coastal and small-city officials urge $5 million boost for drinking-water source protection fund

Sustainable Northwest and local coastal officials told the House Committee on Agriculture, Land Use, Natural Resources, and Water that additional state funding is needed to protect small-community drinking-water sources by enabling land acquisition or conservation easements in sensitive watersheds.

Daniel Whalen, government affairs director for Sustainable Northwest, testified in support of House Bill 3341, which would appropriate $5,000,000 to the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board’s Community Drinking Water Enhancement and Protection Fund. Whalen said demand for funding from small water providers exceeded the initial allocation created in 2023: “Demand for the original funding allocation of $5,000,000 being sought by water suppliers in Baker, Wasco, Clackamas, Clatsop, Douglas, Tillamook, and Curry Counties surpasses the currently available funds,” he said, and cited a survey estimating roughly $29,000,000 more would be needed to meet statewide demand.

Local elected officials described specific watershed risks and near-miss private logging sales that underscored the program’s intent. Deanna Schaffer, city manager of Reedsport, described Kerr Lake — Reedsport’s unfiltered municipal source — and said that future sedimentation or pesticide runoff from nearby timber operations could jeopardize the community’s drinking-water quality. She said the city has begun discussions with timber owners about easements or purchase and that the state funds would enable acquisition and implementation of a forest management plan.

Anne Velysis, mayor of Port Orford, told the committee the city bought forest land to prevent a clear-cut upstream of its reservoir and said she used a state revolving fund loan to complete that purchase. “We took out a loan from the state revolving fund as we scrambled to figure out how to buy the land. But as a small community, we are limited in how many loans we can repay,” she said, urging grant funding to avoid repeated emergency borrowing.

Charles McNeely, mayor of Rockaway Beach, and Fran Recht, a Depoe Bay city council member, also supported the appropriation, highlighting local efforts to pursue fee-title acquisition or easements to protect source waters and the program’s ability to leverage federal matching funds such as EPA and USDA programs.

Committee members asked clarifying questions about voluntary participation. Whalen and the mayors repeatedly described the program as voluntary and focused on collaboration with willing landowners. Co-chair Owens emphasized that the program’s genesis and early implementation reflected an explicit willing-seller, willing-buyer framework and said OWEB had initially denied an application when implementation concerns arose, illustrating agency oversight.

No formal action was taken during the public hearing; the bill will proceed through the committee process for further consideration.