Laws and Programs 



SCIENTIFIC ADVISORY GROUP 



Form a board of experts to provide scientific advice to agencies 

 involved in non-point source management, to the legislature, and to the 

 executive. The board would educate these groups as to management 

 ramifications of emerging scientific results, and would assess how 

 available scientific information should best be applied in decision-making 

 under uncertainty. The parent board could work in concert with embayment-specific or 

 issue-specific committees or sub-conunittees which would provide expertise in response to 

 discrete problems. On a continuing basis, the board would assist client groups in 

 evaluating scientifically-based policy decisions affecting the Bay, and would provide 

 guidance in approaching risk-benefit questions and estimating information "return" to 

 research expenditure. 



RIDEM 



Expand the role of the Office of Environmental Coordination to enable the Office to 

 operate as a pro-active strategic planning group responsible for evaluating the impacts of 

 DEM internal decisions and the decisions of hearing officers on other state and local 

 pollution management efforts. Expand OEC staff authority to work with other agency 

 decision-makers in strategic planning and to facilitate advance coordination among relevant 

 institutions. 



• Form a new Water and Land Management Section within the Division of Water 

 Resources which would assume a broad resource management role within the agency. The 

 new administrative body would: 



• coordinate results of all DEM monitoring and research programs; 



• set up a data management system to be used by all DEM Divisions and to be 

 coordinated with the recommended Technical Planning Sector at the Division of 

 Planning; 



• classify wetlands and other water bodies according to a resource value, scarcity, 

 and vulnerability designation process; 



• develop a framework allowing for significantiy strengthened consideration of 

 cumulative effects, as recommended in other sections; 



• develop a water quality characterization process to be used to link biological 

 integrity with effeas of present use and potential use to the maximum extent 

 possible. Waste load allocations and effluent limits should be established to 

 coordinate the simultaneous imposition of point source discharge limits and non- 

 point source controls; and 



• complete water quality certifications, developing guidelines and procedures as 

 recommended in the subsequent section on water quaUty certification. 



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