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INTEGRATED COASTAL MONITORING PROGRAM FOR THE GULF OF MEXICO
Citation:
Meier, E., J K. Summers, AND G. Steyer. INTEGRATED COASTAL MONITORING PROGRAM FOR THE GULF OF MEXICO. Presented at Coastal Zone 99, San Diego, CA, July 24-30, 1999.
Description:
The Gulf of Mexico Program (GMP) Office in cooperation with Gulf State agencies, EPA Regions 4 and 6, EPA's Office of Water and Office of Research and Development (ORD), and the GMP principal partners are developing an integrated coastal monitoring program for the Gulf of Mexico. The strategy for this monitoring program will be developed and implemented in three phases: (1) coastal watersheds (estuarine focus); (2) near coastal waters (inner continental shelf); (3) "blue water" regions (deep waters) beyond the barrier island sand within the EEZ. The goals of this effort are to: integrate existing federal, state, local and private sector monitoring activities into a statistically-based sampling design that will provide data to support a regional assessment support implementation of the monitoring requirements in the Federal Clean Water Action Plan for gulf coastal watersheds; support Gulf state monitoring and modeling assessments in priority Gulf coastal watersheds and contiguous near coastal waters; develop and implement a statistically-based sampling design for monitoring near coastal waters; develop and implement a monitoring program for the "blue waters" of the Gulf; provide public access to Gulf coastal monitoring data and information; provide monitoring data to support development of an annual report card on the ecological health of the Gulf of Mexico; and initiate international cooperation with Mexico and Cuba to extend the effort to international coastal waters. Initial activities will focus on simple monitoring objectives to demonstrate the concept of integrated monitoring and assessment and allow existing monitoring programs and organizations to become comfortable with the approach. Integration of monitoring activities across the five Gulf States will require input and buy-in from individual organizations the federal, state, local and private sectors. The GMP is currently working with the ORD's Gulf Ecology Division (GED) in Gulf Breeze, Florida, and repres