BOISE — Idaho Gov. Brad Little’s proposed budget calls for $6.6 million to continue the state’s response to invasive quagga mussels and expand invasive species monitoring.

The funds would pay for two additional watercraft decontamination stations, another roadside check station, improvements to existing stations, two additional full-time employees and 18 temporary staffers, enhanced surveillance, increased monitoring of water bodies and new equipment and public outreach, state Department of Agriculture director Chanel Tewalt said.

If the legislature approves the expenditure, part of the department’s proposed budget that the legislature’s Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee considered recently, “we will be looking to add some things to the toolbox related to monitoring” such as new technologies and strategies, she said.

Monitoring water bodies for invasive species would “at least double,” Tewalt said. Surveying water bodies several times a year is an example.

Department staff, during routine monitoring last September, found an adult quagga mussel and larvae in the Middle Snake River near Twin Falls. A multi-agency eradication effort was deemed a success, but more testing is planned this spring.

“We will have a very robust presence on the mid-Snake for the next five years, regardless of what we find this year,” Tewalt said.

Quagga and zebra mussels attach to watercraft and equipment. They can cause major damage to irrigation and municipal water systems as well as hydropower infrastructure, and can affect aquatic biodiversity.

The budget proposal would add one watercraft decontamination station at Centennial Park outside Twin Falls — near where the quagga detection occurred — and another at a mid-Snake site to be determined in the spring, Tewalt said.

An additional roadside inspection station also is planned in the state, its location to be determined based on data and legislature input, she said. ISDA now has 19 stations and several roving inspection crews.

The $6.6 million budget item includes about $5 million in one-time expenditures and $1.6 million in ongoing spending for operations.

“This entire plan has really been developed with stakeholder feedback,” Tewalt said. Input has come from other natural resource organizations, municipal leaders, canal companies and “legislators who have worked around the invasive species program for a very long time.”

Goals include putting all necessary tools in place, and communicating to the public the importance of watercraft inspection and decontamination, she said. Vehicles transporting watercraft must stop at the roadside inspection stations.

“Everyone has a part to play,” Tewalt said.