Notice of Intent: Identification and Assessment of Degraded Wetland Areas

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(1) This project will be accomplished through the Rocky Mountains Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU). Currently, the NPS does not have a database of existing impacted wetland systems that can be accessed in response to future funding made available from park, regional, national, or external sources. The purpose of this project is to define and demonstrate a process for inventorying and evaluating potential wetland restoration opportunities at NPS units in the Intermountain Region that can be rolled up to a Servicewide effort for future funded opportunities. The project will serve as a prototype, providing a prioritized list of IMR wetland restoration opportunities, including cost estimates, that is discoverable through a regional database. (2) (3) The Recipient will involve graduate students, working together with the NPS, to increase the understanding of current degraded wetlands systems within the Intermountain Region, and approaches to restore these degraded systems to a desired state. (4) (5) This project promotes the education and training of a new generation of natural resource restoration practitioners for our national parks. The public purpose is the transfer of experience and knowledge in environmental conservation, specifically degraded wetlands mitigation, to graduate students who will share this understanding with his/her community, consider public land management as a future career option, and bring fresh perspectives to the NPS during the project and after. (6) Outcomes from this project will also serve as the starting point for a Service-wide wetland mitigation banking initiative the NPS Water Resources Division is creating. This initiative is intended to provide assistance for establishing public/private partnerships that will acquire private sector funding for restoration of degraded wetland systems in parks. (7)

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