The well-being of our coasts is a national issue. More than 50 percent of the nation's population lives on the coast, and nearly 60 percent of the nation's gross national product comes from coastal counties. Yet we have not done a good job of representing the fact that the issues that are important for our coastal communities are important for the nation.
Part of the problem may be in how we communicate. As a coastal resource management community, we have established a familiar vocabulary full of scientific jargon and acronyms that we use to present the many issues challenging our coastlines. We have assumed that if we present the problems, people will become part of the solution.
Perhaps we haven't been communicating in simple language or with a message that gets people to act to improve the problems.
In the cover story of this edition of Coastal Services, you will read how coastal managers around the Chesapeake Bay are embracing commercial marketing techniques to focus their message to change people's behavior.
Effectively communicating coastal issues is even more critical as our nation—and the world—face accelerated cycles that will cause extreme events in climate and weather.
We as coastal managers need to be helping build resilient coastal communities, which include everything from infrastructure to the economy, to culture and the environment. It includes everything from disaster mitigation to sustainable ecosystems to adaptive economics.
One way to be resilient is to study and thoroughly understand an ecosystem's history in order to decide how best to adapt to the range of variability that a system naturally undergoes.
This edition also features a look at Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve's historical ecology project, which is helping reserve staff members plan for and set restoration goals.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is examing its own history this year as it celebrates 200 years of science, service, and stewardship. To learn more about how NOAA has impacted our everyday lives throughout its history, go to http://celebrating200years.noaa.gov/. As always, we hope you find these articles interesting and informative.
-- Margaret A. Davidson
