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Sorry for any cross-listings.<br><br>
This is the announcement for a conference my organization is holding
November 4-6, 2004. Attached is the conference post card.
Please direct any comments back to this e-mail address.<br><br>
Rachel<br><br>
<br>
<div align="center"><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=4>For
Immediate Release 8/2/04<br><br>
Citizen Environmental Monitoring in Appalachia: building an environmental
monitoring program for validity, impact, and sustainability<br><br>
Holiday Inn and Convention Center<br>
Bristol, VA<br>
November 4-6, 2004<br><br>
</font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=3>The Rural Action
Appalachian Forest Resource Center, Southern Appalachian Man and the
Biosphere, Land Trust for the Little Tennessee, National Forest
Foundation<br><br>
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The Appalachian Forest Resource Center (AFRC) is pleased to announce its
partnership with Southern Appalachian Man and the Biosphere (SAMAB) in
holding the Citizen Environmental Monitoring in Appalachia conference in
the fall. The conference will take place in Bristol, VA, November 4-6,
2004 at the Holiday Inn and Convention Center. Focus of this event
will be around citizen environmental monitoring of water, invasive and
exotic species, and forest health and sustainability. <br><br>
Citizen environmental monitoring or CEM is data collection and in some
cases analysis of that data done by local volunteers. The information
gathered by volunteers should answer questions of interest to the
community and can be used for a variety of purposes including setting
background levels, establishing environmental trends, raising a red flag
of possible problem areas, educating communities, and influencing policy
and management practices. This conference will be addressing the use of
volunteers to monitor water quality as well as the presence and abundance
of invasive and exotic species. In addition, it will open a
discussion into what makes a forest healthy and how volunteers can
monitor whether it is being managed in a sustainable manner.
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purpose of this conference is to bring together people from across
Appalachia to learn about the usefulness of CEM and effective ways it can
be used to create environmental awareness in communities and to achieve
groups’ goals. Target audiences include land trusts, watershed groups,
land managers, government agencies, community organizations, researchers,
environmental educators, recreation groups, volunteers, foundations and
policy makers. While the conference agenda has not been finalized, there
are many topics that have been earmarked to receive attention. Some of
these topics include recruiting and retaining volunteers, getting agency
buy-in, regulatory uses of volunteer collected data, emerging
technologies in water monitoring, monitoring for control of invasive and
exotic species, and monitoring for forest health and sustainability. To
receive notification of the conference details and registration
requirements contact Rachel Orwan or Caitlin Cusack at
</font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=3 color="#0000FF"><u>rachel@ruralaction.org</u></font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=3>
</font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=3 color="#0000FF"><u>caitlin@ruralaction.org</u></font><font face="Times New Roman, Times" size=3>
or call (740)767-2090.<br><br>
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