Commissioner urges evidence-based approach to protect Kootenai County's sole-source aquifer

A commissioner at a Kootenai County meeting urged officials to base choices about protecting the area's sole-source aquifer on data and formal analysis rather than "gut feel," and county staff said the next step is to obtain a contractor quote and scope of work to evaluate protections.

"we do a lot of, you know, anecdotally based decisions, a lot of gut feel. We don't really get into the evidence, you know, the numbers, the science, if you will, in this particular stuff," the Commissioner said, calling for evidence that can back county action.

A county Staff member told the board the county has worked with "EQ" on related issues and that someone named Seth from that group was present for questions, but that "I don't think there was any real definitive data that could say that this evidence points to this." The staff member added that officials "would have to get a quote and a scope of work, from the contractor that would do that and then approach it from that aspect." The staff member also stated that the aquifer is uniquely important locally: "We're the only sole source aquifer in the state."

Commissioners agreed the federal sole-source designation strengthens local options for action and signaled support for moving forward with contractor evaluation and further data collection. The meeting record does not give a timeline or name the contractor; next steps recorded were to solicit the requested quote and scope and to continue coordination with the entity referenced as "EQ."