Human Environment Linkages in the South Florida Coastal Ecosystem: Cumulative Effects of Natural and Anthropogenic Stressors. Review of Progress to Date

Bartell, Steven; Cummins, Kenneth; DeAngelis, Donald; Dickson, Kenneth; Miller, Steven; Ortner, Peter; Weisberg, Robert

INTRODUCTION: In September of 1995 the Center for Marine and Environmental Analysis at the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science initiated a complex and ambitious research project funded by the NOAA Coastal Ocean Program (COP). Approximately twenty different principal investigators at seven different institutions have participated to date. The project describes itself as an integrated system of process-oriented ecosystem and seascape level models supported by laboratory and field research that together support an integrated decisions-support framework for the managers and policy-makers of the South Florida Ecosystem Restoration effort and enable comprehensive ecological risk assessment. The explicit objective and litmus test of success is stated to be "policy relevance." Following the guidelines and rationale of a Request for Proposals issued by the COP, the project was organized into specific tasks: Task 1-characterizing anthropogenic and natural stressors in the region; Task 2- developing and validating new indicators of stress for key organisms or ecological processes; Task 3-characterizing ecosystem level stress effects; and, Task4-developing and applying tools (models) for ecological risk assessment and ecosystem management of the South Florida Coastal Ecosystem. The purported geographic region extended from Biscayne Bay through the upper Keys reef tract south to Long Key which it was argued represented a closely coupled system encompassing a stress gradient from urban to agricultural to pristine. The stresses to be investigated included salinity, temperature, nutrients, turbidity/sedimentation, hurricanes/storms and fishing pressure but specifically not organic or inorganic anthropogenic pollutants. The project has already received substantial funding from NOAA (ca. $1.2M dollars) and is scheduled to receive another $1.4M dollar increment in April1997. In its first year and a half it has focused first upon Tasks 1 and 2 and then upon Task 3. Most of Task 4 has barely begun. Before finalization of a Year 3 Work plan and issuance of any FY1997 funding the project leadership (CMEA) and the funding agency (the NOAA/COP) felt an outside peer review was both appropriate and necessary. A Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) was formed (see Appendix 1) to conduct this review. This is intended to be a "standing committee" and its' members have agreed to return for subsequent annual reviews. All but one of the TAC members attended a formal program review held in Miami in mid-November 1996. Over a two day period the numerous principal investigators gave detailed presentations of their work to date and their plans for Year Three. In addition there followed an extensive question and answer session between the T AC and the Task Leaders. This report represents a synthesis of the individual impressions of the various committee members who attended the program review. As requested by the CMEA it is organized first into General Comments and General Recommendations and then individual Subtask Comments and Recommendations. Except where specifically noted comments and recommendations represent a consensus amongst the committee members present. As directed the TAC focused its attention first upon overall project logic. management and cohesiveness and second upon individual project relevance or appropriateness. In addition the T AC was asked to make recommendation on the changes required to fulfill project objectives. An annual standing T AC review is not considered to be a substitute for or in any sense equivalent to a rigorous peer review of individual projects. The document that follows was submitted in draft form to CMEA project leadership and the final version reflects their request for additional clarification. It is being simultaneously submitted to COP and CMEA with the assumption that the latter will distribute it to all of the relevant principal investigators.