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Thursday, 2:00pm

Share approaches, principles, and processes that enable collaborative groups to reach consensus on prescriptions and get to implementation.

Topics to be covered:

• Using principles to design restoration prescriptions
• Tips on structuring field tours and other activities for collaborative design of restoration and stewardship projects.

Facilitation Team

• Dennis Fiore, Fire Management Specialist-Fuels, Bureau of Land Management
  

• Lynn Jungwirth, Executive Director, Watershed Research & Training Center

• Mike Petersen, Executive Director, The Lands Council, The NE Washington Forestry Coalition

• Emily Platt, Executive Director, Gifford Pinchot Task Force
  
  

Moderator

Karen DiBari, Western Collaborative Assistance Network Coordinator, National Forest Foundation

Recommended Readings

Guides and Fact Sheets
Stages of Collaboration (USDA Forest Service, 2006)
Describes the basic steps required to move a collaborative process forward.

Challenges to Collaboration (USDA Forest Service, 2006)
Identifies common barriers that challenge collaborative groups and processes.

Keys to Successful Collaboration (USDA Forest Service, 2006)
Discusses important components of successful collaborative processes.

Collaboration: A Guidebook for Environmental Advocates
The document’s main audience is conservation groups, however it offers “how to” information about participating in collaboratives that is valuable beyond this sector.

International Association of Public Participation Spectrum of Participation
A useful reference tool regarding types of public involvement in decision-making, along with associated outcomes.

Tools and Best Practices
Best Practice: The Value of a Simple Field Exercise
Collaborators on the Glaze Forest Restoration Project (Deschutes National Forest) spurred discussion, focused learning, and increased understanding through a simple field exercise.

Best Practice: Formalized Agreement between Collaborative and the Forest Service
The Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition (Colville National Forest) formalized the process by which the collaborative would review projects and provide feedback to the Forest Service, and defined clear guidelines regarding member responsibilities to the process.

Best Practice: Governance Documents for Collaboratives
Includes sample governance documents from two collaborative groups (Tongass Futures Roundtable and Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition).

Best Practice: Multi-agency MOU Coordinates Landscape Restoration
The Uncompaghre Plateau Project entered into a multi-party memorandum of understanding to coordinate restoration efforts over 1.5 million acres.

Tool: Forest Service Handover Memo
In order to smooth the transition between departing and incoming Forest Service staff with regard to collaborations and other community relationships, the Forest Service developed a “handover memo”.

Tool:  Adaptive Management Requires Collaboration
The Department of Interior released a technical guide in 2007 regarding adaptive management to help agency personnel deal with uncertainty in management decisions. Collaborating with stakeholders is an important component of the adaptive management process.

Reports regarding Federal Policy
Opportunities Exist to Enhance Federal Participation in Collaborative Efforts to Reduce Conflicts and Improve Natural Resource Conditions (GAO 2008)
A discussion of collaborative successes and challenges, with recommendations for how Federal agencies can improve their support of and involvement in collaboration.

Federal Land Agencies to Create a Collaborative Management Environment: Collaboration Action Team Progress Report (2008)
Discusses progress and continued barriers to Federal agency collaboration with communities.

Rural Voices for Conservation Coalition, Collaboration issue paper
Includes definitions of important terms, a discussion of the benefits of collaboration, and recommendations to strengthen Federal policies for collaboration.

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Dennis Fiore

Dennis Fiore, Fire Management Specialist, has been a working for the BLM and Forest Service, in Central Oregon, for the past 6 years.  He specializes in vegetation management, within the wildland urban interface, in the context of risk and hazard from wildfires. His mission is to build a bridge between our government agencies and the communities they represent, by creating a better understanding through improved communication.

Lynn Jungwirth

Lynn Jungwirth was born and raised in a milling and logging family in a small timber town in Oregon. She received a BA from the University of Oregon in 1971. She has been an activist on social issues in forest towns for twenty years. She has worked with various community groups interested in rebuilding forest dependent communities in northern California. Currently she is the Executive Director of the Watershed Research and Training Center (WRTC) in Hayfork, Ca. The mission of WRTC, which is a community-based organization, is to promote sustainable ecosystems and sustainable communities through research, training, education and economic development. She served on the Collaborative Stewardship Taskforce of Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck and on the Board of Directors for the National Network of Forest Practitioners. Lynn also chaired the Communities Committee of the 7th American Forest Congress from 1996 to 2000.

Mike Petersen

Mike Petersen has been Executive Director of the Lands Council, a conservation organization based in Spokane Washington, for over 6 years.  He is helping the City of Spokane write their Climate Action Plan and he was appointed to the Spokane Sustainability Task Force. Mike sits on the Boards or Committees of a number of groups, including the Northeast Washington Forestry Coalition, the Coeur d’Alene Forest Coalition, and the Kootenai Forest Stakeholders Group.   He is a founder and Board member of the Northwest Climate Change Center, Board member of Farm Power, and serves on the Washington State Agricultural Pilots Project. Mike has an MS in Mechanical Engineering from Colorado State and over 25 years in environmental advocacy. Mike has a weekly environmental radio show in Spokane.

Emily Platt

Emily is the Executive Director of the Gifford Pinchot Task Force. The Gifford Pinchot Task Force works to protect and restore the biodiversity of southwest Washington and has successfully stopped all ancient forest logging and roadless area projects on the 1.3 million acre Gifford Pinchot National Forest (GPNF) for the last ten years. Emily has led the Task Force through a new phase of work that includes collaboration and partnering with rural communities. Before joining the Gifford Pinchot Task Force, Emily worked on environmental and social justice campaigns in Spokane, San Francisco and Baltimore on issues including dam removal, pesticides, and discrimination. Emily graduated from the Green Corps program in 2001 and earned a BA in English Literature from Gonzaga University.

Karen DiBari

Karen DiBari joined the National Forest Foundation staff in September 2006 as Western Collaborative Assistance Network (WestCAN) Coordinator. Karen has 16 years of experience working and volunteering for nonprofit conservation organizations on a variety of issues, and has also worked for state and local government. Prior to joining the NFF, she served as Deputy Director of the Alaska Marine Conservation Council (AMCC), a community-based organization of fishermen, subsistence harvesters, marine scientists, small business owners and families working to protect the natural diversity and integrity of Alaska's marine ecosystems. Karen graduated from the University of Montana with a Master's of Environmental Studies, and earned a B.A. degree in Geography from Dartmouth College. She lives in Missoula with her husband and son, and loves exploring the mountains and rivers of the Rockies with them. Karen greatly values the opportunity WestCAN gives her to support collaborative efforts across the West in their work to forward restoration and stewardship of public lands.