Strength and solidarity among members of the Gila Watershed Partnership has been enough to assuage fears of outside forces taking control of the organization and bending it to their will.

To that end, a motion was passed Wednesday, Dec. 15, to change the partnership's bylaws and allow all eligible members to vote.

Partnership bylaws re-stricted people representing government agencies to associate member status and prohibited them from voting. People have to live within the boundaries of the upper Gila River watershed to be eligible to vote on the organization's activities.

Starting with the January 2005, meeting, government employees will be allowed to vote as long as they meet other eligibility requirements.

"The reason we decided to do it that way was to keep the people from Albuquer-que and Dallas and San Francisco and Tucson and Phoenix from coming in and running the watershed group," partnership member George Lemen said. "At the first couple of meetings, there were 150 people there -- three or four of those were not associated with the government in some way."

Partnership Manager Jan Holder said sometimes all but a handful of people at the monthly meetings work for government agencies like the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Arizona Game and Fish (AGFD) or the U.S. Forest Service (USFS).

The group discussed naming a representative from each state and federal agency with an interest in the upper Gila River watershed an associate member. These associate members would be prohibited from voting.

"One person for each government group -- each state and federal group -- would be representing that group," Lemen said. "Anyone else working for them who lives in the Valley should be able to vote."

Bonnie Winslow from the BLM said a lot of people who work for state or federal agencies may want to attend the meetings and participate as concerned citizens.

Outside of the designated associate member, "Whoever else wants to come to the meetings would be at large," she said.

People may work for a government agency and have specific knowledge based on this work, but they are not always acting as representatives of that agency, Winslow said.

Lemen said there could still be problems by allowing employees of state and federal agencies to vote as at-large members.

"We could have one representative from the BLM, and a group of their employees could get together and take over this thing and make us do their agenda," he said.

"This is supposed to be a group of regular citizens from the watershed. The federal agencies are supposed to be advisory people for this group."

Holder said she didn't think such a situation would ever happen.

Duane Aubuchon from AGFD suggested making the state and federal agencies members, allowing them only one vote.

"The problem that I see is... when we end up with the Forest Service and BLM in one office, we could wind up with six people from each agency," Holder said. "People are interested, and I would hate it that that many people don't get to vote."

Pete Brawley said progress made from the partnership's early days has been largely based on its relationship with various governmental agencies. He expressed concern over turning people away based only on where they are employed.

"This is a strong enough unit; I don't think anyone can come in and take over," Brawley said. "I would hate to see people not show up because... they can't vote."

Heidi Blasius works for the BLM and regularly attends partnership meetings, but she is not the official BLM representative. She said there is often confusion in the public as to whether she is expressing her personal opinion or the position of the BLM.

She said this problem might be exacerbated by designating an official representative from each agency.

Mike Holloran made a motion to, "Throw out the associate membership thing and let everybody be members."

The motion was passed by a unanimous vote.

The partnership also voted on another change to the by-laws that specifies voting for elected positions -- secretary/ treasurer, chair and vice-chair -- will be held annually at January meetings.

In other action:

Brawley informed members of a grant that can be used as matching funds on certain state and federal grants.

The Arizona Department of Agriculture has $3.6 million available this year with a guarantee of more than $1 million for the next five years to be used on projects that benefit foraging wildlife.

Holder said she had to defend some grants with the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality.

"For the first time, I'm able to see questions the reviewers are asking for," she said. "This helps me because I can see what kind of things they're looking for."

The grants are for river cleanup, work on the Central Detention Dam and an erosion control project.

To contact Greg Jones, call 428-2560 (ext. 234) or e-mail him at gjones@eacourier.com.