Current through Register Vol. 50, No. 9, March 1, 2024
RELATES TO: KRS 146.220, 146.241, 146.250, 146.260, 146.270,
146.290, 146.310, 146.350, 146.360
NECESSITY, FUNCTION, AND CONFORMITY: KRS 146.270 authorizes the
secretary to promulgate administrative regulations necessary for the
preservation and enhancement of wild rivers as established in KRS 146.250, and
for control of recreational, educational, scientific, and other uses of these
areas in a manner that shall not impair them. Emphasis shall be given to
protecting aesthetic, scenic, ecological, historic, archaeological, and
scientific features of the areas. This administrative regulation establishes
definitions for certain essential terms used in the wild rivers administrative
regulations, 400 KAR Chapter 1, which are not clearly defined by their
context.
Section 1.
(1) "Access road" means that access
constructed or improved to connect a permitted use within a wild river corridor
to a public road system.
(2)
"Acid-forming substance" means an earth substance that contains sulfide
minerals or other materials that, if exposed to air, water, or weathering
processes, forms acids that could create acid water.
(3) "Acid water" means drainage with a pH of
less than six and zero-tenths (6.0) in which total acidity exceeds total
alkalinity.
(4) "Adverse impact"
means having a damaging, degrading, or destructive effect on a
resource.
(5) "Agricultural use":
(a) Means the use of land for agricultural
purposes such as farming, dairying, pasturage, apiaries, horticulture,
floriculture, viticulture, and animal and poultry husbandry; and
(b) Does not mean fruit, vegetable, and
flower production for personal use.
(6) "Applicant" means the landowner who
applies for a change of use permit to allow a change of land use within a wild
river corridor.
(7) "Best
management practices" means methods, measures, or practices to prevent or
reduce water pollution, such as structural and nonstructural controls and
operation and maintenance procedures that are applied before, during, or after
pollution-producing activities to reduce or eliminate the introduction of
pollutants into waterbodies.
(8)
"Buffer zone" means an area of natural vegetation having a minimum width of not
less than 100 feet, which is retained along each bank of a wild river to
maintain aesthetics, bank stability, appropriate water temperatures, fish and
wildlife habitat, and stream hydraulics, and to filter debris and waterborne
pollutants from surface run-off.
(9) "Cabinet" means the Energy and
Environment Cabinet.
(10) "Change
of use permit" means a permit issued to a landowner by the office to authorize
a change of land use within a wild river corridor.
(11) "Commercial service" means the use of a
wild river corridor for monetary profit, such as for concessions, boat rentals,
shuttle services, guided trips or tours, commercial boat docks, wharves, and
other recreational facilities.
(12)
"Conforming land use" means a land or resource use that conforms to the
provisions and intent of the Kentucky Wild Rivers Act and the management plan
developed pursuant to KRS 146.270 for a given wild river corridor.
(13) "Cultural character" means the
condition, composition, or appearance of an archaeological or historical
feature that contributes to its outstanding, unique, or otherwise significant
value.
(14) "Disturbed area" means
an area having a manmade surface disturbance.
(15) "Existing use" means a land use that is
in existence at the time a wild river is designated by the Kentucky General
Assembly.
(16) "Flood plain" means
the area in a watershed that is subject to flooding at least one (1) time in
every 100 years.
(17) "Kentucky
Wild Rivers Act" means KRS 146.200 through 146.360.
(18) "Landowner" means the owner of a
property or an interest in a property conveyed by lease or other legal
conveyance.
(19) "Land use plan"
means a plan of action submitted to the office as part of a change of use
permit application.
(20) "Log
landing" means a collecting point for holding cut timber.
(21) "Management plan" means the individual
plan adopted by the office pursuant to KRS 146.270 as the official document
guiding the management and protection of a given wild river corridor.
(22) "Natural character" means the condition
or appearance of an area or resources that are expected to exist in nature
undisturbed by human actions.
(23)
"Natural vegetation" means the species, or combinations of species, of plants
that exist, or are expected to exist, in nature undisturbed by human
actions.
(24) "New land use" means
a land use within a wild river corridor that is not in existence at the time a
given wild river corridor is designated by the Kentucky General
Assembly.
(25) "Office" is defined
by KRS 146.210(8).
(26) "Operator"
means the person, partnership, contractor, subcontractor, company, or
corporation responsible for the construction, maintenance, operation, and
reclamation of a permitted use.
(27) "Permitted use" means a nonconforming
land use within a wild river corridor that has been authorized by the office
through the issuance of a change of use permit.
(28) "Permittee" means a landowner who has
obtained a change of use permit from the office.
(29) "Produced water" means water and
pollutants and combination thereof resulting, obtained, or produced from the
exploration, drilling, or production of oil or gas.
(30) "Professional forester" means a person
holding a degree in forestry from a school with an accredited forestry
program.
(31) "Research plan" means
a plan of action submitted to the office for approval prior to initiating a
scientific study within a given wild river corridor.
(32) "Resource removal" means exploration
for, extraction, or removal of a natural resource such as coal, oil and gas,
minerals, rock, gravel, sand, and soil.
(33) "Secretary" means the Secretary of the
Energy and Environment Cabinet.
(34) "Selective cutting (of timber)" means
the selective removal during one (1) entry of single trees from an area so that
a specified minimum residual stocking level is retained and evenly distributed
over the harvest area. The purpose of the cut is to create or maintain an
uneven-aged stand of timber.
(35)
"Significant feature" means an outstanding, unique, rare, or otherwise
significant aesthetic, scenic, botanical, zoological, geological, historical,
archaeological, scientific, or recreational feature identified in the
management plan or by the management agency as occurring within a given wild
river corridor.
(36) "Skid" means
to transport logs by sliding or dragging along the ground.
(37) "Skid trail" means a trail developed for
the purpose of skidding logs from the stump to a log landing area.
(38) "Slash" means the residue left after the
economically usable portion of cut trees is removed from a harvest
area.
(39) "Structure":
(a) Means an aboveground object constructed,
built, or installed for a change of use; and
(b) Does not mean sediment ponds, roads, or
signs.
(40) "Surface
disturbance" means any disturbance of the ground surface that involves the
clearing of vegetation or excavation of soil, rock, or other materials
occurring on or near the ground surface.
(41) "Surface mining":
(a) Means the breaking of the surface soil in
order to facilitate or accomplish the extraction or removal of minerals, ores,
or other solid matter or any activity or process constituting all or part of a
process for the extraction or removal of minerals, ores, or other solid matter
so as to make them suitable for commercial, industrial, construction, or other
use; and
(b) Does not mean those
aspects of deep mining not having significant effect on the surface, and does
not mean excavation or grading conducted solely in aid of on-site farming or
construction.
(42)
"Toxin-forming substance" means earth materials or wastes that, if exposed to
air, water, weathering, or microbiological processes, are likely to produce
conditions that are detrimental to biota or uses of water.
(43) "Underground mining" means those aspects
of deep mining, including surface effects, involving any open pit or any
underground workings from which minerals, ores, or other solid matter is
removed for sale, exchange, commercial, or other use, and all shafts, drifts,
or inclines leading thereto, including all buildings and equipment, above or
below the surface of the ground, used in connection with these
workings.
(44) "Visual intrusion"
means resulting in the disruption, degradation, or impairment of the natural or
primitive appearance of an area in a wild river corridor, as viewed from the
river or other designated public use area, and includes any land use that does
not remain visually subordinate to the characteristic landscape.
(45) "Watershed" means that area enclosed by
a topographic divide from which direct surface run-off from precipitation
normally drains by gravity into the stream above a specified point.
(46) "Wild river" or "wild river corridor"
means a stream segment and adjacent shoreland within boundaries established in
400 KAR 4:100 that are designated in accordance with KRS 146.241.
(47) "Wild rivers system" means the
collective wild rivers as designated in KRS 146.241.