We are happy to welcome Marina Cazorla, the Coastal Programs Manager for the California Department of Parks and Recreation in Sacramento, as the PMEP Steering Committee’s newest member! Before working for the parks department, Marina worked with the California Ocean Protection Council, the State Coastal Conservancy, and the Coastal Commission, as well as with an association of environmental philanthropies supporting coastal conservation in Mexico. She holds a B.A. from Claremont McKenna College and a Master’s degree from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. One of her fondest college memories is meeting novelist Haruki Murakami. She currently pursues pandemic hobbies, including failed gardening, happy chickens, and a new camper trailer.

PMEP is excited to share NOAA’s Office of Habitat Conservation and the Recreational Fisheries Initiative Request for Proposals for projects within coastal Fish Habitat Partnerships that protect or restore habitat AND engage recreational fishing partners. The National Fish Habitat Partnership and individual Fish Habitat Partnerships provide strategic opportunities to advance priority habitat conservation projects while also engaging recreational anglers.

The goals of this funding opportunity are to support Fish Habitat Partnerships’ habitat restoration work and to enhance collaboration with the recreational fishing community.

As one of 20 Fish Habitat Partnerships around the nation, PMEP is happy to facilitate projects within coastal Washington, Oregon, and California to pursue this funding.

For information on how to propose a project, click here.

Photo Credit: Squirrel_photos from Pixabay.

The Pacific Marine and Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership (PMEP) is seeking project proposals that benefit nursery habitats for PMEP focal species within smaller estuarine and nearshore waters along the West Coast.

To apply for funding, interested applicants should complete and submit the online application. Please read the full Request for Proposals for instructions regarding what information to include and the preferred format for information. Incomplete or late applications will not be considered. The deadline for project proposal submissions is 5:00PM PST, Friday, October 30, 2020.

Access the full Request for Proposals here.

The Pacific Marine and Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership (PMEP) is partnering with the Friends of South Slough Reserve to develop a synthesis of eelgrass restoration techniques along the U.S. West Coast to inform the restoration community, promote successful restoration of eelgrass, and provide greater clarity regarding the conditions where mitigation would (and conversely would not) be an appropriate intervention as opposed to other management strategies.

This Request for Proposals seeks to identify a contractor to complete this synthesis and report. The work will include compiling and synthesizing restoration and mitigation techniques, successes, and failures along the U.S. West Coast through literature reviews and interviews with restoration practitioners and researchers.

The Request for Proposals can be accessed here.

How to Respond

Please read the full Request for Proposals for instructions regarding what information to include and the preferred format for information. Incomplete or late proposals will not be considered. The deadline for proposals submissions is Friday, July 31, 2020 at 5:00PM PDT.

PMEP partners met in Arcata, California in late January to develop their annual workplan, refine PMEP’s strategic plan, learn about local restoration projects and affirm their’ shared vision for healthy estuarine and marine nearshore fish habitat along the West Coast. We also gave John Bragg, of South Slough National Research Reserve, a special sendoff, thanking him for his years of service to PMEP. Thanks again, John! Enjoy your retirement!

The Pacific Marine & Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership (PMEP) is pleased to announce its FY2019 funded projects. The three projects, Eelgrass Expansion in the Morro Bay Estuary, Assessment and mapping of seagrass and macroalgae kelp habitats, and Mattole River Estuary Middle Slough Restoration, represent important conservation priorities of PMEP.  The projects have been selected for funding through the National Fish Habitat Partnership. $124,118 has been awarded to PMEP to fund these projects through the Fish and Aquatic Conservation Program of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for the following three projects. Read more about these projects at here.

PMEP has issued a Request for Proposals for Nearshore Science support for our nearshore project. PMEP seeks to identify a contractor to conduct literature reviews, compile available information, and collaborate with regional experts including the PMEP nearshore regional working group to develop a “State of the Knowledge” report on West Coast nearshore habitats. The full RFP can be found at the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission website here.

PMEP hosted a Data Tools Cafe at the 9th National Summit on Coastal and Estuarine Restoration and Management, held in Long Beach in December 2018. The session introduced PMEP to restoration practitioners, researchers, and resource managers as it highlighted the many functions and uses of PMEP data tools.  The session featured hands-on exercises to get participants familiar with the data tools. Participants walked through the Estuary Explorer tools, finding which estuaries on the west coast are at low-risk for habitat degradation, where tidal forested wetlands are located, and where wetland restoration would most benefit federally managed species. These questions showed the value of the data tools to habitat conservation and restoration planning, minimizing impact on Essential Fish Habitat, and assessing the benefits of projects to species and habitats. The session exemplified PMEP’s collaborative structure by including speakers from The Nature Conservancy, NOAA Fisheries, Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development, Estuary Technical Group, and the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission.

The Pacific Marine and Estuarine Fish Habitat Partnership has plotted its course for the next five years. Its recently approved 2018-2022 Strategic Plan identifies three overarching priorities for work over the next five years:

1. Protect, restore and enhance fish habitat in California, Oregon, and Washington Estuaries with an emphasis on juvenile rearing areas.
2. Protect, restore, and enhance fish habitat in the nearshore Pacific Ocean.
3. Increase Connectivity between habitats within PMEP’s geographic scope.

We will accomplish this work through the collaborative partnerships we have built over the last decade. The full Strategic Plan 2018-2022 can be found here.

PMEP welcomes Joan Drinkwin of Natural Resource Consultants as the new PMEP Coordinator. Joan specializes in designing and implementing strategic conservation programs and projects. She is an experienced coordinator with over 10 years of experience in the non-profit sector as programs director and executive director. She regularly coordinates committees, facilitates meetings, and organizes effective gatherings of stakeholders and scientific experts. She is a recognized leader in the field of abandoned, lost and discarded fishing gear and is regularly called on for consultation from practitioners worldwide as well as Intergovernmental Organizations (FAO, IWC).

Joan has managed on-the-ground nearshore restoration projects as well as developed and directed strategic restoration programs. She has developed invasive species management plans, organizational strategic plans and communications plans. She has extensive grant acquisition and development experience. Prior to joining NRC, Joan was Programs Director (and Interim Director) for the Northwest Straits Marine Conservation Foundation, where she managed the Northwest Straits Initiative’s internationally recognized Derelict Fishing Gear Program. Joan has worked extensively throughout the Salish Sea region on marine conservation policy and on-the-ground and in-the-water projects. She brings strong communications and development skills to all her projects and is deft at communicating scientific information to lay audiences both in writing and speaking.

You can reach Joan at info@pacificfishhabitat.org.