Findings
Better Tools
FINDING: We need better ways to determine the health of our beaches.
The patient seems to be ill, but our blood pressure monitor is broken and
most of our other medical instruments are missing (or haven't been invented
yet!). The need for a rapid or ideally, a real-time water quality indicator
was alluded to above. Insufficient and conflicting information make it difficult
to draw meaningful conclusions about the health of our nation's beaches.
The only way to know the extent to which our coastal and ocean resources
are at risk is to have adequate and accurate information. It's also the only
way to make sound decisions and develop appropriate policies.
This is the same message the State of the Beach has been reporting for nine
years. Other national studies confirm our findings:
- In an evaluation of state coastal management program effectiveness in
protecting natural beaches, dunes, bluffs, and rocky shores, Bernd-Cohen
and Gordon (1999) concluded: "there is insufficient nationally compatible
outcome data to determine on-the-ground effectiveness."
- The Heinz Center's 2002 State of the Nation's Ecosystems report stated
that, of the 16 indicators used to describe the condition and use of
America's coasts and oceans, partial or complete data were available
for only nine of the indicators. Of these, only five had a data record
long enough to judge trends, and only three had a federally adopted reference
point or other type of benchmark for comparison. For seven indicators,
no data was reported. In five of these cases, some data existed, but
were of uncertain coverage or consistency and had not been aggregated
for national reporting. Two indicators required additional refinement
or other development before reporting was possible.
- The Heinz Center's 2003 report The Coastal Zone Management Act: Developing
A Framework For Identifying Performance Measures And Indicators recommended
that "Congress... should require NOAA to develop a common set of measurable
outcome indicators that will help coastal managers evaluate the effectiveness
of state coastal management programs in achieving national policy goals
established by the [Coastal Zone Management] Act."
Beach health information is so lacking that, in many cases, the health of our
nation's beaches is nearly impossible to determine.
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