Action Habitat-2.2: Habitat Projects
Identify, prioritize, and coordinate partner opportunities and funding to implement habitat restoration projects.
Action Description and Statement of Need
This action will enhance regional coordination and implementation of habitat restoration projects. Priority habitats for restoration include salt marshes, seagrass beds, tidal shorelines, rivers, riparian shorelines, floodplains, wetlands, ponds, and lakes. Restoration projects are designed to improve water quality, natural water flow and sediment regimes, and health of native freshwater and marine life. Habitat restoration also supports resilience by increasing flood protection from storms and higher sea levels. Restored and resilient habitats improve community access and health and economic prospects for commercially important harvests.
Habitat restoration in the region has generally been opportunistic, with practitioners implementing projects as they arise when willing landowners, staff capacity, and funding align. Salt marsh practitioners participating in the Salt Marsh RAMP have made significant progress on collaboratively prioritizing restorations based on condition, value, and migration potential; this coordination can serve as a model for other habitat types. NBEP will continue to support or fund smaller projects, but this action will accelerate coordinated and holistic efforts directed at system or sub-watershed scale improvements. Recovery of ecological systems and natural processes in a degraded watershed requires restoration at the appropriate scale (Wohl et al. 2015).
NBEP will maintain priority restoration project databases and coordinate funding opportunities for priority projects through existing federal sources like EPA and NOAA, and state sources like the RI Coastal and Estuarine Habitat Restoration Program and Trust and the MA Coastal Resilience Grant Program.
NBEP will also coordinate outreach and project support to local watershed or lake and pond associations to help implement restoration projects. These groups are local experts in providing outreach and education to their communities and many are ready to partner and collaborate on habitat restoration projects.
Potential Projects
Coordinate among groups pursuing priority habitat assessment, planning, and restoration in the greater Narragansett Bay region.
Maintain priority project lists for major estuarine, riverine, and riparian habitat types/ecosystems in the Narragansett Bay region.
Support states, municipalities, and local NGOs with planning, project identification, and prioritization.
Maintain a resource library of Quality Assurance Project Plans (QAPPs) and other project documents as a resource for practitioner reference.
Outputs
Coordination meetings and tools for groups pursuing restorations in the same areas
Annually updated list of priority estuarine and freshwater restoration projects
Additional fully funded requests for proposals for freshwater and estuarine habitat projects
Additional completed restoration projects from approved restoration plans.
Education and invasive species removal events and programs
Outcomes
Accelerated system or sub-watershed scale habitat improvements
Activated and coordinated local partners in restoration and outreach projects
More engaged watershed or pond groups with more members
More estuarine and freshwater systems meet both habitat and recreational use standards and sustain healthy wildlife and human use
Indicators
Sea Level Rise, Nutrient Loading, DO, Chlorophyll, Water Clarity, Benthic Habitat, Seagrasses, Salt Marsh, Aquatic Life Use, Estuarine Fish Use, Recreation Use, Open Space, Marine Beaches, Shell Fishing Areas, Land Use, Impervious Surface, Stream Invertebrates, Coldwater Fish
NBEP role
Convene, Synthesize and communicate science
Implementing Partners
EPA Region 1, Save The Bay, TNC-RI, TNC-MA, Mass Audubon, WRWC, Old Colony Planning Council, MA DER, NBNERR, RIDEM, RINHS, MA EOEEA, SRPEDD, RI Saltwater Anglers Association
Location
Narragansett Bay region
Timeline for initiation
Ongoing
Estimated costs/potential funding sources
$10M+
NBEP 320/SNEP, NBEP BIL, EPA SNEP, MA DER, NOAA, NFWF, USDOT, USDOE, RIDEM, MassDOT, Private Foundations