Papers from a recent Regional Ocean Governance Symposium hosted at Seton Hall Law School in April 2013 have been published in a special online issue of the Sea Grant Law and Policy Journal at http://nsglc.olemiss.edu/sglpj/archive/vol6.1/.
The Director of the Monmouth University Urban Coast Institute, Tony MacDonald, and Professor Marc Poirier from Seton Hall Law School helped to organize the Symposium and wrote the introduction to the Journal, noting that the Symposium builds on the call in the National Ocean Policy for a regional approach for ocean planning, as well as the efforts of New Jersey and the governors of the Mid-Atlantic states through the Mid-Atlantic Regional Council on the Ocean (MARCO) to cooperatively address critical issues relating to management of ocean resources and the economic benefits they support. On September 24-25, 2013, Monmouth University hosted a meeting of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Planning Body, the joint federal-state body that is charged by the National Ocean Policy to develop an ocean plan for the region.
The Symposium was supported by a grant from the by National Sea Grant Law Center and was organized by the New Jersey Sea Grant Consortium, Monmouth University Urban Coast Institute, Seton Hall University Law School, and the Environmental Law Institute. The special law issue provides an overview of current regional management efforts prepared by the Environmental Law Institute and includes papers by experienced practitioners and law students addressing other critical issues for the region, including innovative legal approaches that can enhance ecosystem management; lessons learned from public lands management approaches that can serve as a guide for ocean efforts; and approaches for incentivizing off-shore wind energy development and advancing ocean habitat protection.
UCI Director Tony MacDonald, Esq., observed,”With ever-increasing demands for use on the Mid-Atlantic ocean to support fisheries, expanding maritime commerce, off-shore wind energy regional and cooperative approaches will be needed to avoid conflicts and support compatible, sustainable use.”
The Urban Coast Institute is also working with MARCO to develop a Mid-Atlantic Ocean Data Portal, an online toolkit and resource center that consolidates available data and enables state, federal, and local users to visualize and analyze ocean resources and human use information, such as fishing grounds, recreational areas, shipping lanes, habitat areas, and energy sites, among others. For more information on the Portal, see http://portal.midatlanticocean.org/portal/.
The UCI was established in September 2005 as one of the University’s Centers of Distinction. UCI’s mission is to serve the public interest as a forum for research, education, and collaboration that fosters the application of the best available science and policy to support healthy and productive coastal ecosystems and sustainable coastal communities.
For more information, contact UCI Director Tony MacDonald at 732-263-5392.