Set Goals and Identify Solutions - Set Overall Goals and Management Objectives

Once you have identified broad watershed goals with your stakeholders (i.e. answering what do I want to happen as a result of my watershed plan?) you begin to identify the sources contributing to watershed problems, and then refine your watershed goals and develop management objectives targeted at specific pollutants or sources. The management objectives determine how you will achieve your goals. Measurable indicators are important to track progress toward meeting those objectives. You should link some of these indicators to pollutant sources based on their cause-and-effect relationship to then identify the load reductions needed to meet the target. You can use this information to translate your watershed goals into management objectives. Management objectives incorporate the watershed goals but focus on specific processes that can be managed, such as pollutant loading and riparian conditions. For example, perhaps during the scoping phase you knew that there was a problem with aquatic habitat so you established the preliminary goal of restoring aquatic habitat. Now, after the data analysis, you can refine the goal to include a specific management objective, such as restoring aquatic habitat in the upper main stem of White Oak Creek by controlling agricultural sources of sediment. Table 9-1 below provides some examples of translating watershed goals into management objectives.

Table 9-1. Sample Goals Linked to the Sources and Impacts to Define Management Objectives

Preliminary Goal	Indicators	Cause or Source of Impact	Management Objective
Support designated uses for aquatic life; reduce fish kills	Dissolved oxygen Phosphorus Temperature	Elevated phosphorus causing increased algal growth and decreased dissolved oxygen Cropland runoff	Reduce phosphorus loads from cropland runoff and fertilizer application
Reduce flood levels	Peak flow volume and velocity	Inadequate stormwater controls, inadequate road culverts	Minimize flooding impacts by improving peak and volume controls on urban sources and retrofitting inadequate road culverts
Restore aquatic habitat	Riffle-to-pool ratio, percent fine sediment	Upland sediment erosion and delivery, streambank erosion, near-stream land disturbance (e.g., livestock, construction)	Reduce sediment loads from upland sources; improve riparian vegetation and limit livestock access to stabilize streambanks
Meet water quality standards for bacteria to reduce beach closures	Fecal coliform	Runoff from livestock operations, waterfowl	Reduce bacteria loads from livestock operations
Improve aesthetics of lake to restore recreational use	Algal growth, chlorophyll a	Elevated nitrogen causing increased algal growth	Reduce nitrogen loads to limit algal growth