Staffing cuts to NRCS and NOAA could affect Central Oregon avalanche and water supply forecasts
(Update: Adding comments from CO Avalanche Center, OSU professor, Added video)
BEND, Ore. (KTVZ) — Federal staffing cuts to the Natural Resources Conservation Service could have an impact on the accuracy of data used by the Central Oregon Avalanche Center to make its forecasts of danger levels in the mountains.
They are one of many organizations that use data from the NRCS to track snowpack conditions and assess avalanche risks. They rely on SNOTEL data that looks at snow depth, water content, temperatures and precipitation.
“They’re useful for us, because they measure how much snow is on the ground,” Lead Forecaster Gabriel Coler said Thursday.
According to the USDA, the NRCS has been around since the Dust Bowl days of the 1930s. What originally began as the USDA Soil Conservation Service in 1935 is now known as the Natural Resources Conservation Service.
Professor David Hill runs the water resources graduate program at Oregon State University. He says NRCS data is used to make water supply forecasts for the dry season.
"In Central Oregon, water is is not as abundant as it here is over here in the (Willamette) Valley. And it needs to be used for municipal use, agricultural use," Hill said. "So there are farmers and cities and all that that are very vested in understanding how much water is there this season that we can plan on using."
The NRCS office in Portland reported their staff was cut by more than half last month. With fewer employees, the NRCS says some sites could go unserviced and potentially affect the accuracy of their data.
Coler is not just worried about to the NRCS but also to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the parent agency of the National Weather Service.
“We rely heavily on the weather forecast that they put out, especially when we’re having these big events where we’re getting lots of snow,” Coler said.
A Trump official told NBC News about 5% of NOAA's workforce will be let go, about 800 employees.
Hill said, "I use data from the NRCS. I use data from the NOAA. These data streams are super important to advancing science. They help us do a better job of understanding our and our environment. And they're also super important in terms of public safety."
NOAA and the National Weather Service work together to put out weather alerts, warnings and forecasts.
Our Local Alert Weather team at KTVZ News gets information from the NWS office in Pendleton.
When KTVZ News reached out to NOAA recently, a spokesperson declined to comment but said about 25 full-time employees currently work at the Pendleton NWS office.
