Abstract |
An evaluation of the EPA Region 1 New England Marina Initiative was selected as one of five program evaluations in Fiscal Year (FY) 2008 under EPAs Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation (OPEI) 2007 Program Evaluation Competition. This report presents a description of the New England Marinas Initiative and the questions that the evaluation is designed to answer, the methodology used to answer the evaluation questions, the findings of the study, and useful conclusions and recommendations. The purpose of the evaluation is to assess the effectiveness and transferability of the New England Marinas Initiative. In 2001, EPA launched the New England Marinas Initiative to address the potentially significant environmental impacts of marinas. The regionally coordinated initiative is designed to improve marina environmental performance by implementing an effective regional education and outreach campaign that improves awareness and compliance, increases the use of best environmental practices (BEPs), and enhances the current assistance provider network to help achieve sustained industry-wide environmental support. The evaluation was conducted between September 2007 and May 2009 based on behavioral data collected between 2001 and 2004 as well as information collected after 2004. The key findings of this evaluation were developed in response to seven key evaluation questions regarding regulatory compliance improvements, increased use of BEPs, usefulness of program activities and materials, improvements to the programs data collection instruments (i.e. marinas checklist of regulatory compliance and BEPs), increased environmental health of marina communities, improvements to program structure, and interest in applying the program in other EPA Regions and states. |