We held two public scoping open houses on May 1 and 2, 2001 to explain the National Park Service planning process and to collect comments from the public on eight potential alternatives for providing access to the Potomac River. The alternatives considered a complete range of options from expanded visitor service facilities to no action. Park staff counted 232 members of the public in attendance at the open houses with 141 of those in attendance providing comments during the open house. By the end of the comment period on June 4, we received a total of 336 comments from the public, including 297 e-mails. The goal of public scoping is to identify new issues and help determine alternatives to analyze in the Environmental Assessment (EA). Public Scoping is a beginning step in the planning process and allows for early involvement of the interested and affected public. Since the scoping process is a fact finding rather than a voting process, this newsletter will summarize substantive issues revealed through public scoping rather than provide tallies of the results. The Friends of Belle Haven Marina proposed a new alternative during the scoping process described on page 3. We are in the process of developing the alternatives which will be analyzed in the EA based on these public comments.

George Washington Memorial Parkway (GWMP) is pursuing all reasonable alternatives to avoid the interruption of visitor services during this planning process. We will request that the National Park Service Director exercise the authority to continue marina operations under a temporary contract. This authority is permitted under section 403 of the National Park Service Concessions Management Act of 1998, Pub. L. No. 105-391. The NPS is continuing to develop the Operating Plan and associated EA that will determine the future services to be offered on the Belle Haven peninsula. We are also exploring avenues where we would include an invitation for proposals which would include an assortment of boating activities and facilities at no cost to the Federal Government. We propose to offer this option using the maximum contract term subject to approval of the Secretary of Interior.

In order to gather data needed to complete the EA we will be consulting with various experts. The Virginia State Department of Conservation and Recreation’s Soil Erosion Advisory Service will be conducting an assessment of existing conditions. The NPS’ Concession Program Center will be conducting an audit looking at environmental liability, regulation compliance, and concession contract requirements. Both services come at no cost to the concessioner or the NPS. The timeline for the completion of the EA relies on the collection and analysis of data consultants and may have to be adjusted as needed. We will provide a more detailed timeline for the EA as more information becomes available.

Thank you for your participation and we look forward to working with you in the near future.

Sincerely,

Audrey F. Calhoun

Superintendent, George Washington Memorial Parkway