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REGIONAL VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT (REVA) IMPROVING ENVIRONMENTAL DECISION MAKING THROUGH CLIENT PARTNERSHIPS
Citation:
Smith, E R. REGIONAL VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT (REVA) IMPROVING ENVIRONMENTAL DECISION MAKING THROUGH CLIENT PARTNERSHIPS. Presented at Science Forum 2003, Washington, DC, May 5-7, 2003.
Impact/Purpose:
Provide regional-scale, spatially explicit information on the extent and distribution of both stressors and sensitive resources.
Develop and evaluate techniques to integrate information on exposure and effects so that relative risk can be assessed and management actions can be prioritized.
Predict consequences of potential environmental changes under alternative future scenarios.
Effectively communicate economic and quality of life trade-offs associated with alternative environmental policies.
Develop techniques to prioritize areas for ecological restoration.
Identify information gaps and recommend actions to improve monitoring and focus research.
There are two task objectives that reflect the work done by LCB in support of the ReVA Program objectives:
Provide information management, spatial analysis support, and data and information accessibility for the ReVA Program
Provide program management support, technology transfer, and outreach.
Description:
The Regional Vulnerability Assessment (ReV A) Program is an applied research program t,1at is focusing on using spatial information and model results to support environmental decision-making at regional- down to local-scales. Re VA has developed analysis and assessment methods to support multi- criteria decision-making; and tools and methods that can be applied with available monitoring and spatial data in any region and at any scale. Development and use of exposure models enable us to forecast the impacts of alternative environmental decisions allowing analysis of associated trade-offs that may not be apparent within short-term planning horizons and within the context of other changes that are occurring across the landscape (e.g. climate change impacts, resource extraction, spread of non-indigenous species ). Re V A is now working directly with client partners to further develop and test our approaches and tools such that our research results contribute to desired outcomes that protect the environment while sustaining our quality of life.
The goal of this session w.ould be to communicate and demonstrate bow these newly available approaches can support environmental decision-.making at the various scales and to solicit input for further refining and testing ReVA methods and tools Presentations from partners would potentially include Region 3 (Debra Forman, Acting Director. Environmental Data Division), Maryland Department of Natural Resources (Bill Jenkins, Director, Watershed Management and Analysis Division), Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (possibly could get Katie McGinty, Deputy Secretary for the Environment; others have changed with change in administration so not sure of names), Baltimore County Department of Environmental Protection (Don Outen), and the Centralina Council of Governments (Rebecca Yarbrough, Program Administrator; alternatively Lillda Rimer with R4, or Chris Stoneman, team leader for OAQPS Charlotte, NC/Rockhill, SC project). Additionally, a demonstration of our web-based decision-support system could be provided Discussions will be led by Betsy Smith. ReVA program director.