Past Events

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Past Training Events

2008

Wetland Permitting Workshop for County and Municipal Staff

Date: March 25-27, 2008
Location: Jackson, Harrison, and Hancock Counties

Brochure
Agenda

Plant Identification Class: Wetland and Transitional Habitats of the Mississippi Gulf Coast

Date: March 11-14, 2008
Location: Jackson County, MS

Brochure
Agenda

Diamondback Terrapin Working Group Gulf Coast Regional Meeting

Date: February 7, 2008
Location: Five Rivers Delta Resource Center, Spanish Fort, Alabama

Brochure
Agenda

2007

Land Use Planning for Sustainable Community Development

Christine Olsenius, Exectutive Director of the Southeast Watershed Forum will facilitate a workshop for the City of Moss Point to assist community leaders with cost-effective land use strategies that provide for economic growth and quality of life. The Land Use Planning for Sustainable Community Development workshop encouraged community leaders to consider which natural resources should be preserved and where to locate future development. By the end of the day participants had developed a land conservation plan to protect the community's green infrastructure as well as a set of land use practices and strategies to help implement the plan.

Date: December 5, 2007
Location: The Scruggs Center

Agenda

Summary

Coastal Resource Funding and Technical Assistance Fair

The Coastal Resource Funding and Technical Assistance Fair was the grand finale to our summer grant workshop series. The event was designed to network local government and environmental nonprofit staff with funding agencies to help support coastal resource projects such as smart growth, heritage improvements, hazard mitigation, and natural resource protection. For a complete list of participating agencies, please see the attached brochure.

Date: August 17, 2007
Location: Mississippi State University Coastal Research and Extension Center

Agenda

Presentations
FEMA
Gulf of Mexico Program
NOAA's Community-Based Restoration Program
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Fish and Wildlife Foundation
Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium
National Park Service

New Approaches to Floodplain Management for Coastal Communities

New Approaches to Floodplain Management for Coastal Communities was designed to encourage participants to develop a framework for implementing floodplain management strategies to help decrease the cost of natural disasters, increase community resiliency, and reduce negative impacts from flood events to local coastal resources.

Participants in this event discussed the principles of the No Adverse Impact (NAI) approach to floodplain management. These principles included hazard identification and mapping, planning, regulations and development standards, mitigation, infrastructure, emergency services, and outreach. Please see below for a copy of the workshop agenda and relevant presentations.

Date: July 19, 2007
Location: University of Southern Mississippi's Gulf Coast Research Laboratory

Agenda

Presentations
Coastal Hazards
Federal and State Legal Issues
Local Regulations
Mitigation Planning

Creating Success: Scoping, Researching, Writing, and Tracking Grants

Creating Success was designed to provide grant writers with skills and technical assistance needed to find and secure grant funds to support coastal resource projects in their communities. Workshop participants learned how to customize proposals to match a granting agency's interest, develop budgets for grant proposals, manage grant awards, and establish success criteria for grant funded projects.

Date:June 26, 2007
Location: Mississippi State University Coastal Research and Extension Center

Agenda
Presentation

Success Starts at the Top: What Decision-Makers Need to Know and Support to Maximize Funding for Coastal Resource Projects

This workshop was designed to provide decison-makers with information, tools, and technical assistance needed to find and secure grant funds to support coastal resource projects in their communities.

Target audiences for this event included agency directors and program managers, city and county department heads, elected and appointed officials, and environmental nonprofit executive directors. Workshop participants explored how and why funding agencies offer grants, learned techniques to better articulate funding needs, and discussed how to leverage grants and partnerships. For details about the agenda and information about where to find funds for coastal resource projects, please see the links below.

Date: June 1, 2007
Location: D'Iberville City Hall

Agenda
Presentation
Resources for Grant-Seekers

Firewise Awareness Workshop

Fire plays an important role in the natural management of forested habitats. As communities develop areas adjacent to forested areas, the risk of incurring losses due to wildland fire increases. The purpose of this workshop is to provide decision-makers with tools to asess community vulnerability to wildland fire and to encourage sound land-use planning, creative mitigation, and supportive community infrastructure to reduce the occurrence of fire losses. To learn more about this workshop, please refer to the attached brochure.

Date: May 22, 2007
Location: East Jackson County/Orange Grove Community Center

Marsh BirdTraining Workshop

This is a 3 day field-intensive marsh bird identification class taught by Dr. Mark Woodrey of Mississippi State University and the Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (GNDNERR) and Dr. Courtney Conway of the University of Arizona and the U.S. Geological Survey. The workshop is designed to train participants to identify the common calls of secretive marsh birds using the National Marsh Bird Monitoring Protocol.

Date: May 1-3, 2007
Location: North Inlet-Winyah Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve in Georgetown, South Carolina

Mississippi Coastal Wetland Plant Identification Class

This FREE 3.5 day field-intensive plant identification class is taught by Dr. Robert Mohlenbrock, renowned botanist from Southern Illinois University. Dr. Mohlenbrock travels across the country studying plants and teaching plant identification techniques to various environmental agencies and organizations. To date he has taught more than 204 plant identification classes in 29 states!

Target audiences for this event included federal and state agency personnel, land managers, nonprofit association staff, and ecotourism operators.Participants in the Mississippi Coastal Wetland Plant Identifcation Class visited a number of coastal habitats across Mississippi's coastal counties. Studentslearned to identify the key plant species of each habitat type based on visual characteristics. An extensive plant list and plant identification keys was provided. Most of the class time is spent in the field (rain or shine!) identifying plants with the instructor.

Date: April 16-19, 2007
Time: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. (Monday-Wednesday), 9 a.m.-12 p.m. (Thursday)
Location: Stennis Space Center, Natural Resource Management Building #9801 (Click here for directions.)

Mississippi Coastal Saltwater Fish Identification Workshop

This workshop benefits marine enforcement personnel who need to correctly identify saltwater fish and shark species and apply associated recreational fishing regulations. The event includes an overview of Mississippi's fishing regulations as well as lectures and classroom activities related to the key characteristics of saltwater fish and sharks common to Mississippi and bycatch reduction and turtle excluder devices.

Date: March 28, 2007
Location: Gulf Coast Research Laboratory
Cost: FREE

2006

Identification and Management of Invasive Terrestrial and Aquatic Plants Common to Coastal Mississippi

This 1.5 day invasive plant identification and management class focused on common terrestrial and aquatic invasive plants such as Cogon grass, Chinese tallow, Privet, Torpedo grass, Water hyacinth, Giant salvinia, and Alligator weed...to name a few. Researchers shared current information and data about identification, tracking, and management of invasive plants in Coastal Mississippi.