West Coast Regional Planning Body Support – Final Recommendations and Status

Greetings West Coast Ocean Network,

Thanks to the hard work of Todd Hallenbeck, we have finalized a set of recommendations describing how the West Coast Ocean Data Portal plans to provide support to the West Coast Regional Planning Body (RPB).

We are starting a new chapter for the WCODP, both because of this new focus on supporting the RPB, but also due to the departure of our fantastic Portal coordinator, Todd Hallenbeck, at the end of March.

Andy Lanier and Steve Steinberg, co-leads of the WCODP ACT, have stepped up their participation to take over the coordination tasks to assist the WCODP Working Groups as well as general coordination with key West Coast entities, such as the RPB and the West Coast Ocean Partnership.  Allison Bailey, Sound GIS, will be focusing on technical tasks related to the RPB recommendations.

The RPB is currently moving forward to identify their highest priority issues for marine planning on the West Coast.   They are also identifying sub-regions that will focus planning on relevant issues within the larger coastwide context.  The WCODP will be coordinating closely with the RPB to help meet their needs for geospatial data and geovisualization products.