National Military Fish and Wildlife Association - Invasive Species Working Group: Announcing NISC Communities of Practice

Announcing NISC Communities of Practice - Register for Sessions

Dear federal invasive species practitioners,

The National Invasive Species Council (NISC) Secretariat has established two NISC Communities of Practice (NISC COPS) designed to support enhanced communication for Council decision making. The NISC Policy and Law COP focuses on issues relevant to federal policies, regulations, and other guidance that impact invasive species and federal efforts to address them. The NISC Science and Technology COP focuses on issues related to advancing federal science and technology capacities to solve the most pressing invasive species concerns.

The purpose of the NISC COPs is to:

Communicate NISC leadership priorities to the federal agency community and seek input relevant to these priorities from technical experts across the whole of the federal government;
Provide a venue for sharing pressing concerns that may have inter-departmental implications and that may need to be elevated to NISC leadership for attention/action;
Facilitate the sharing of success stories and lessons learned that may have inter-departmental applicability and contribute to even greater returns on federal investments; and
Promote effective communication and coordination among the federal community of invasive species experts to create opportunities for greater efficiency and effectiveness as measured by on-the-ground successes.

NISC COP sessions will be scheduled on the third Wednesday of the month from 3:30-5 pm (Eastern) and alternate on a monthly basis between Policy/Law and Science/Technology. They will be hosted on WebEx with an open invitation to federal agency staff, and will generally be 60–90 minutes in duration. The format will include an opening introduction to the selected theme followed by discussion structured on a series of topic-specific questions.

The preliminary list of themes and discussion dates include:

March 21 – Policy/Law: Streamlining NEPA for effective eradication and control
April 18 – Science/Technology: Scientific and technical challenges limiting rapid detection of potentially invasive species
May 16 – Policy/Law: Institutional arrangements for effective early detection and rapid response
June 20 – Science/Technology: Scientific and technical challenges limiting rapid identification of species in the “early detection” context
July 18 – Policy/Law: Regulating the development and use of advanced biotechnologies for the eradication and control of invasive species
August 15 – Science/Technology: Scientific and technical challenges to rapid reporting of invasive species occurrence data in open-access information systems

Interested staff can register for these COP sessions at: https://goo.gl/forms/TKTw3BMAFW9BSSer1

Spread the word. Please distribute this information to relevant staff within your department or office (please note that these sessions are for federal government employees only). If you did not receive this email directly from the NISC Secretariat, please contact us if you'd like to be on our distribution list.

If you have any questions or comments, please contact the NISC COP leads at the Secretariat:

Policy/Law: Stas Burgiel, Assistant Director for Policy and Program Coordination
stanley_burgiel@ios.doi.gov, 202-208-4163

Science/Technology: Jeff Morisette, Chief Scientist
jeffrey_morisette@ios.doi.gov, 970-787-0008

~~~

National Invasive Species Council (NISC) Secretariat

1849 C Street, NW, Room 3524, Washington, DC 20240 USA

o +1.202.208.4163, c +1.202.297.5143, stas_burgiel@ios.doi.gov

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