This grant provides funding to west virginia department of environmental protection (wvdep) for its wetland program and to fund a project to build capacity and leverage public support for wetland…

This grant provides funding to west virginia department of environmental protection (wvdep) for its wetland program and to fund a project to build capacity and leverage public support for wetland conservation. The project focuses on supporting a strengthened and sustainable west virginia wetland program that effectively monitors wetlands and communicates' wetland condition and function information to the public, policymakers, and regulators. This grant will fund personnel, travel, supplies, and several subcontracts that will be used to complete specialized tasks related to water quality analysis, GIS analysis, and outreach activities. Activities:activities to be performed include 1) the revision and update of important planning documents including wvdep's wetland program plan and monitoring qapp; 2) the completion of the first stage of wvdep's probabilistic monitoring program (baseline condition) and launch of the second stage (change detection); 3) the regulatory rollout of wetland functional assessment proceeds without major problems related to wvdep's wetland functional assessment tools; 4) the incorporation of updated site biodiversity ranks and annual source layers into the wvram (west virginia rapid assessment method) GIS tool; 5) the posting of training videos for wetland assessment field techniques and data entry/scoring onto wvdep's website; 6) the upload of new statewide maps onto the NWI (national wetlands inventory) wetlands mapper and statewide wetland condition and function ranking maps are uploaded onto wvdep's website; and, 7) the provision of two 6-hour educator workshops and training of 40 educators in hands-on wetland outdoor curricula and disadvantaged census tracts.subrecipient:no subawards are included in this assistance agreement.outcomes:this project focuses on supporting a strengthened and sustainable west virginia wetland program that effectively monitors wetlands and communicates wetland condition and function information to the public, policymakers, and regulators. Anticipated deliverables include an updated wetland program plan and an updated wetland monitoring qapp. Primary beneficiaries include residents of west virginia.