While I write this, Hurricane Fay has just moved across Florida and the northern Gulf of Mexico dumping rain in the double digits, and Gustav is looming. As we head into the two busiest months of the Atlantic hurricane season, many people’s thoughts are on their short-term preparations—stashing adequate water, food, plywood, and other personal emergency supplies.
But what about the longer-term preparations that our communities, states, and federal government need to undertake to ensure that our coastlines are more resilient in the face of sea level rise and other impacts from climate change?
In this edition of Coastal Services, we feature an article on how coastal resource managers in Massachusetts are working to help the state’s 78 coastal communities become StormSmart by giving them the information and tools they need.
The website they have created can be shared or tweaked by coastal communities around the country to help prepare for and bounce back from a hurricane, flooding, or other natural disaster.
Creation of community-specific tools for other regions also is underway, beginning with the Gulf of Mexico, where 70 percent of this nation’s repetitive flood losses occur.
The cover story of this edition of Coastal Services examines farming marine ornamental species and the efforts Rhode Island coastal managers have undertaken to encourage this lucrative aquaculture niche.
Readers also can learn how Florida is capturing recreational boater behavior in a GIS (geographic information system) that may enable coastal decision makers to better manage the resources that attract boaters to Florida in the first place.
The common thread to all these stories is money. Marine ornamental species aquaculture, recreational boating, and natural hazards all make or cost our coastal communities significant amounts of money.
This is the common thread throughout almost all of coastal management. Let us not forget that 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.
We need to be reminding folks that the well-being of our coasts is a national issue: it is the golden goose of our national economy.
-- Margaret A. Davidson
