Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
restoration project implementation. Inclusion of these activities, investments, and
studies, which are certainly restoration related, would have diluted this chapter's focus
on ecological restoration as an independent field of economic, social, and institu-
tional activity.
Restoration Organization and Employment Generation in Humboldt
County—Steady Growth with Time
Ecological restoration represents an increasingly important part of the Humboldt
County economy. In 2002, restoration provided a total of 300 jobs or 208 full-time
equivalents (FTEs); by 2007, restoration employment had grown to 549 jobs or 247
FTEs. Restoration employment is distributed across three primary sectors—public,
private, and tribal. These sectors are characterized by the programs they administer,
the lands they restore, and the jobs they generate.
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The sectors themselves reflect the
historical evolution of restoration work in the area, the existing patterns of landowner-
ship and settlement, the array of federal and state public lands management agencies
as well as regulatory agencies in the region, and the robust civic culture of the North
Coast. The web of relationships that binds people and organizations involved in resto-
ration provides cohesiveness as well as flexibility to the restoration sector. Although
distinct sectors exist, they are by no means mutually exclusive; financial resources,
technical capacity, scientific expertise, heavy equipment, labor, regulatory oversight,
coordination, and local environmental knowledge are some of the elements that flow
within and between them. This section describes each sector's nature, structure, and
contribution to restoration employment in Humboldt County.
Public Sector
There are two primary ways of organizing restoration work on public lands. The first
way involves the public land management agency taking full responsibility for all
tasks related to a restoration project, except for project implementation, which may be
contracted out to a private contractor. Although there are some important exceptions,
restoration work in Redwood National Park, the Six Rivers National Forest, Humboldt
Redwoods State Park, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service units in Humboldt County
is generally carried out in this manner. This approach is extremely staff intensive and
generally does not involve extensive collaboration with other nodes on the restoration
network, except for the private contractors who are hired to implement the projects.
The second primary way of organizing restoration work is for the public agency to
enter into a multiyear, cooperative agreement with a nonprofit organization in which
separate task orders are drawn up for each individual restoration project. The Bureau
of Land Management (BLM) has embraced this approach. Since the mid-1990s, the
BLM has entered into multiyear cooperative agreements, under the authority of the
Cooperative Assistance Agreement Act of 1977, with the Mattole Restoration Coun-
cil, the Mattole Salmon Group, and the Redwood Community Action Agency. These
cooperative agreements stipulate that local community partners participate in the
