Integrating Land and Water

Land and water are highly connected resources yet are managed and regulated by different entities. Land use planners and water managers may be interested in better connecting land and water but lack an understanding of how to actualize this connection within their programs and procedures, in both of their jurisdictional and regulatory spheres. The goal of this project was to create a toolbox, Generalized Evaluation Matrix for High-Level Decision Making, of land use and water management integration tools that encompasses the realm of connection points between the two, and­­ assess these connection points according to criteria that help practitioners understand which connection points may be most important to address in their own community. The list of activities in this toolbox is comprised of integrated land use and water management activities from every stage of the development or re-development process. It includes eight criteria against which the activities are assessed to help readers understand which land use and water management integration activities may be most applicable to their local contexts.

To this end, a focus group of land use and water management experts assisted on all aspects of the toolbox creation. In addition to the toolbox, this focus group provided additional valuable insights about integrated land and water management, and how to assess the utility of any given tool for a local context. This paper describes the toolbox development process, each component of the toolbox, and presents the toolbox itself. Three appendices expand on some of the ideas considered during toolbox development and provide further context and resources for this toolbox development process as a whole.