Portfolio IV: Coastal Communities

Achievements

Listed below are a number of tangible achievements resulting from Maryland Sea Grant's investment in this area. What all these achievements have in common is the joining of academic inquiry with important policy issues and human concerns. For example, links with the EMECS conference, or with the Chesapeake Bay Commission (explained in the Fisheries portfolio), have led to valuable input into the policy arena by experts in a range of disciplines, including philosophy, economics, anthropology and of course the biological and physical sciences.

Maryland Sea Grant's core funds have catalyzed this connection, by making it possible for these multidisciplinary experts to engage directly in public policy debates and planning efforts, including management regimes for coastal seas like the Chesapeake Bay. The resulting work has helped policy makers understand the issues that face them in a more comprehensive manner, making clear, for example, the economic dimensions of their decisions, whether they concern land use, marine resource use or water quality. Further, by elucidating such otherwise vague concepts as "sense of place," these thinkers have helped articulate why these perceptions have considerable political traction in the region - which they clearly have, as noted by a number of political leaders and policy experts.

In addition to the core projects that have supported this work, Maryland Sea Grant has played an important catalytic role in a number of important and often high-profile issues. Sea Grant administrators and staff have, for example, been called upon to help facilitate contentious debates between regulators and resource users. They have been asked to present expert testimony on fisheries management issues and tax policy. They have been asked to help lead important advisory groups, such as blue ribbon panels appointed by the governor to investigate important marine-related and watershed-related issues. In short, Sea Grant staff have themselves played integral roles in the research-to-policy process, whether in the area of blue crabs, exotic species, environmental finance, chemical contaminants or other marine resource-related issues.

With Program Development funds, Maryland Sea Grant has helped to launch important studies focused on Bay communities, studies which in a number of instances have led to larger efforts, funded by the National Science Foundation and others. A case in point is a small Program Development award to the University of Maryland Department of Anthropology to study how coastal communities perceive certain key issues, including poultry waste and other forms of "pollution." Their analysis has uncovered interesting perceptual differences between such key groups as watermen, farmers, environmentalists, regulators and technical experts. The continuing aim of their work, which has now begun to find publication in professional journals, is to help bridge the communication gaps that divide these differing members of the Bay community by pinpointing specific areas of misunderstanding - due, for example, to varying interpretations of the same set of terms.

Because of its reputation as a neutral forum for important and often contentious issues, Maryland Sea Grant has received requests for assistance from the Chesapeake Bay Program, a multi-state/Federal partnership tasked with efforts to clean up and restore the Chesapeake Bay. With funding from the Bay Program, and working in an extremely collaborative manner with a number of stakeholders, Maryland Sea Grant teamed up with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay to stage a series of focus groups in Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia, aimed at determining public perceptions of "pollution." The focus groups determined, for example, that there was a poor understanding of the problem and of the efforts at addressing it. For example, distinctions were

To help clarify some of these misconceptions, and working directly with the Bay Program's Toxics Subcommittee, Maryland Sea Grant then led the effort to produce a plain-language brief for a broad public on the complex issue of chemical contaminants in the estuary. Similarly, working with support from the Bay Program, Maryland Sea Grant has produced a series of information briefs on exotic species, as well as a brief on blue crab management, in direct cooperation with the Chesapeake Bay Commission and its Bi-State Blue Crab Advisory Committee. In addition to these printed briefs, which are also available on the Maryland Sea Grant web site, the communications group received funding from the Bay Program to reversion its half-hour documentary on non-indigenous species into two shorter, more targeted videos, suitable for classroom and meeting use. (Note that these efforts are also described in the topical portfolios on chemical contaminants, exotic species and fisheries.)

Here is a list of some of the specific products and accomplishments resulting from work in this area, followed by a brief discussion of impacts.

• A commissioned book resulted from the Sea Grant-sponsored EMECS philosophy track, entitled Saving the Seas: Values, Scientists and International Governance, published by Maryland Sea Grant. A valuable collection of essays, Saving the Seas has been well reviewed by experts in the field.
• A video, The Madrigal Sea, which documents a staged enactment of an international summit on coastal seas science management. This video has been used in public policy classes to teach conflict resolution.
• The establishment of an Environmental Finance Center, with assistance from the EPA, an effort recognized as a finalist in the Kennedy School's awards for Innovations in Government at Harvard University.
• The publication of a practical guide, Financing Alternatives for Maryland's Tributary Strategies, supported by the Governor of Maryland and resulting from a special Blue Ribbon Panel, staffed by Maryland Sea Grant and the EFC.
• More than two dozen case studies of communities facing obstacles and devising options for environmental protection.
• A video entitled, From Obstacles to Options: The Charrette Process as a Tool for Policy.
• The publication of a report on the value of recreational boating in Maryland, a key element in the setting of marine-related tax policy in the state, as described below.
• An economic analysis of the causes and impacts of marine debris, Economic Aspects of Marine Debris (Haab and McConnell et al.).
• The assembly of an impressive array of information under the heading of Chesapeake Futures, an effort spearheaded by the Chesapeake Bay Program's Scientific and Technical Advisory that has devised possible scenarios for the year 2030, based on policy choices.
• A range of plain-language briefs, videos and other materials aimed at helping citizens understand basic information related to complex and often controversial issues, such as chemical contamination, exotic species, oyster restoration and blue crab management.