Fostering Chesapeake Stewardship Goal Implementation Team (GIT 5)

Upcoming Meetings
No upcoming meetings.
Scope and Purpose
With 17 million people living in the Chesapeake watershed, public participation is a vital piece of the restoration effort. The Fostering Chesapeake Stewardship Goal Implementation Team’s charge is to increase citizen action, support environmental education for all ages, and assist citizens, communities and local governments in undertaking initiatives to conserve treasured landscapes. The team hopes to reconnect the public with nature and foster a shared ownership of the Chesapeake’s diverse resources. This approach will build public support of restoration and conservation efforts and increase citizen engagement and active stewardship.
The Fostering Chesapeake Stewardship Goal Implementation Team (GIT 5) is pursuing the 2014 Chesapeake Watershed Agreement goals and objectives to:
Stewardship Goal: Increase the number and diversity of local citizen stewards and local governments that actively support and carry out the conservation and restoration activities that achieve healthy local streams, rivers and a vibrant Chesapeake Bay.
- Citizen Stewardship Outcome: Increase the number and diversity of trained and mobilized citizen volunteers with the knowledge and skills needed to enhance the health of their local watersheds.
Public Access Goal: Expand public access to the Bay and its tributaries through existing and new local, state and federal parks, refuges, reserves, trails and partner sites.
- Public Access Site Development Outcome: By 2025, add 300 new public access sites, with a strong emphasis on providing opportunities for boating, swimming and fishing, where feasible.
Environmental Literacy Goal: Enable students in the region to graduate with the knowledge and skills to act responsibly to protect and restore their local watershed.
- Student Outcome: Continually increase students’ age-appropriate understanding of the watershed through participation in teacher-supported, meaningful watershed educational experiences and rigorous, inquiry-based instruction, with a target of at least one meaningful watershed educational experience in elementary, middle and high school depending on available resources.
- Sustainable Schools Outcome: Continually increase the number of schools in the region that reduce the impact of their buildings and grounds on their local watershed, environment and human health through best practices, including student-led protection and restoration projects.
- Environmental Literacy Planning Outcome: Each participating Bay jurisdiction should develop a comprehensive and systemic approach to environmental literacy for all students in the region that includes policies, practices and voluntary metrics that support the environmental literacy Goals and Outcomes of this Agreement.
Land Conservation Goal: Conserve landscapes treasured by citizens in order to maintain water quality and habitat; sustain working forests, farms and maritime communities; and conserve lands of cultural, indigenous and community value.
- Protected Lands Outcome: By 2025, protect an additional two million acres of lands throughout the watershed—currently identified as high-conservation priorities at the federal, state or local level—including 225,000 acres of wetlands and 695,000 acres of forest land of highest value for maintaining water quality.
Publications
Call for Stewardship Co-Chair
This voluntary position leads and coordinates the work of the Stewardship Workgroup, with support from the GIT 5 coordinator and staffer. This is an opportunity to work with a broad team of partners within the Chesapeake Bay watershed representing government and nongovernment entities, to have significant impact on shaping and achieving commitments to public stewardship, and to diversifying the people who participate in and benefit from these efforts.
View detailsWatershed Agreement
Land Conservation Goal
Stewardship Goal
Public Access Goal
Environmental Literacy Goal
Workgroups and Action Teams
Members
Wendy O'Sullivan (Chair), Superintendent, NPS Chesapeake Bay Office, National Park Service (NPS)
1750 Forest Drive Suite 130
Annapolis, Maryland 21401
Email: wendy_o'sullivan@nps.gov
Phone: (202) 374-9051
Britt Slattery (Coordinator), Fostering Chesapeake Stewardship Goal Implementation Team Coordinator, National Park Service (NPS)
Wuillam Urvina (Staffer), Stewardship Goal Implementation Team Staffer, Chesapeake Research Consortium
Jimmy Looper (Staffer), Stewardship Goal Implementation Team Staffer, Chesapeake Research Consortium
Shannon Sprague, Education Workgroup Coordinator, NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office
1750 Forest Drive Suite 130
Annapolis, Maryland 21401
Email: shannon.sprague@NOAA.GOV
Phone: (410) 267-5664
Tom Ackerman, Vice President for Education, Chesapeake Bay Foundation
Philip Merrill Environmental Center
6 Herndon Avenue
Annapolis, Maryland 21403
Email: TAckerman@savethebay.cbf.org
Kacey Wetzel, Director of Programs for Outreach & Education, Chesapeake Bay Trust
Suzanne Etgen, Executive Director, Anne Arundel County Watershed Stewards Academy
975 Indian Landing Rd
Millersville, Maryland 21108
Email: setgen@aacps.org
Phone: (410) 222-3831
Joel Dunn, President and CEO, Chesapeake Conservancy
716 Giddings Ave
Annapolis, Maryland 21403
Email: jdunn@chesapeakeconservancy.org
Phone: (443) 321-3610
Aurelia Gracia, Fostering Chesapeake Stewardship Goal Implementation Team Coordinator, National Park Service (NPS)
Ashley Traut, Greater Baltimore Wilderness Coalition
Michael Weyand, City of Gaithersburg
Ben Alexandro, Chesapeake Conservation Partnership
Brittany Omoleye-Hall, Education Coordinator, National Park Service (NPS)
National Park Service, Chesapeake Bay
410 Severn Avenue, Suite 314
Annapolis, Maryland 21403
Email: brittany_omoleye-hall@nps.gov
Amanda Knobloch, Patuxent Environmental & Aquatic Research Laboratory (PEARL)
Anthony Bobo, Jr., Jr., Bureau of Land Management
Lisa Gutierrez, Director of Boating Facility and Access Planning, Maryland Department of Natural Resources
Tawes State Office Building
580 Taylor Avenue
Annaoplis, Maryland 21401
Email: lgutierrez@dnr.state.md.us
Phone: (410) 260-8778