ANEP: About Estuaries - Charlotte Harbor

About Estuaries:
Insights on the NEPs - Charlotte Harbor

The Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program is a partnership of citizens, elected officials, resource managers, and commercial and recreational resource users working to improve the water quality and ecological integrity of the greater Charlotte Harbor watershed. A cooperative decision-making process is used within the program to address diverse resource management concerns in the 4,700 square mile study area.

The Charlotte Harbor Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan was adopted by the program's Management Conference on April 13, 2000 and updated on March 24, 2008. The development of the Management Plan began in 1995 when Charlotte Harbor was accepted into the National Estuary Program.

Four committees comprise the Management Conference: Policy, Management, Technical Advisory, and Citizens Advisory. Each serves a specialized role to support the program goals and objectives. Hundreds of people participated, dedicating thousands of volunteer hours to build consensus for the actions in the program's management plan and its update.

The Management Conference identified four problems as the region's priority problems. While they vary geographically in extent and severity, they are common regional issues

Hydrologic Alterations: Adverse changes to amounts, locations, and timing of freshwater flows, the hydrologic function of floodplain systems and natural river flows.

Water Quality Degradation: Pollution from agricultural and urban runoff, point source discharges, septic tank systems and wastewater treatment systems, atmospheric deposition, groundwater and other sources.

Fish and Wildlife Habitat Loss: Degradation and elimination of headwater streams and other habitats, conversion of natural shorelines caused by development, cumulative impacts of docks and boats, invasion of exotic species and cumulative and future impacts.

Stewardship Gaps: Limitations in people’s knowledge of choices and management decisions that will lead to sustainability within their community. These gaps include overarching issues such as public outreach, advocacy and data management

These problems can also be viewed as symptoms or consequences of more basic processes, such as land uses and land use management.
The Management Conference also developed a total of 15 quantifiable objectives for the four priority problems. As a first step for action to achieve these objectives, over 500 projects have been implemented by more than 100 organizations to implement this management plan.

Please visit our website at http://www.chnep.org