NOAA IN THE CAROLINAS 2005 ANNUAL MEETING
SUCCESSFULLY DEMONSTRATES THE "ONE NOAA" VISION.

The 2005 NOAA in the Carolinas annual meeting brought a wide range of NOAA employees together in Asheville, NC in early November. The meeting focused on the OneNOAA vision. NOAA offices and programs in North and South Carolina have already collaborated on many cross line office, interdisciplinary projects, for example: improving rip current safety; developing better flood and storm-surge models, predicting climate change impacts, and identifying changing coastal demographics and impacts on the coastal environment. The agenda included: 1) a keynote address by Scott Rayder, describing the agency’s strategic vision and priority goals; 2) plenary presentations of partnership projects in the Carolinas that exemplify the OneNOAA vision; and 3) moderated working groups to constrain what it means to work as a corporate OneNOAA on a regional level, and to identify new regional partnerships. There were 37 participants. Five states and all NOAA line offices were represented.

The meeting was hosted by the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) and its director Thomas Karl. NCDC was a gracious host, and kicked off the meeting with a comprehensive tour of the facilities. NCDC is the world's largest active archive of weather data. NCDC produces numerous climate publications and responds to data requests from all over the world.

Meeting objectives were to better serve public needs through more efficient, effective, and accessible NOAA services and products, understand and embrace a OneNOAA vision and enhance the regional role in planning and budgeting process (PPBES).

The first outcome of the meeting was a common understanding regarding regional efforts at multiple levels; national influence on the region level and vice versa; regional participation in PPBES; and a regional culture and approach to OneNOAA.

The second outcome was that 4 new “big ideas” were developed that are highly relevant at the regional and national levels. They include the Coastal Inland Flood Observing and Warning Project (CIFLOW) in the Carolinas, Coastal Erosion and Inundation, Impacts of Hydrologic Change on Ecosystem Health and Water Use, and Environmental Quality. Objectives and partners were identified for each “big idea”.

In addition, 10 immediate new partnerships and projects were discussed and enabled by the meeting. They included: 1) CaroCOOPS/CORMP observing programs: new partners with Weather Forecast Offices (WFOs) across region to build on Carolinas Coast project; seek to partner with the modernized cooperative observer program (NERON) to add coastal ocean stations to mostly land-based system, 2) CIFLOW: new partners with WFOs, NC State University, and Sea Grant; new Sea Grant extension specialist going to National Severe Storms Laboratory (NSSL); will coordinate with Southeast River Forecast Center (SERFC), 3) SC WFOs: new partners with NC and SC Geological Survey to develop and use landslide probability maps, 4) NC National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS): System-wide Monitoring Program integrate with other Integrated Ocean Observing Systems (IOOS) in NC (e.g., CORMP, Lower Cape Fear River Program), 5) Coastal Services Center (CSC): GIS training at CSC offered to all NOAA partners; coordination of storm surge programs and models including NWS national team; discuss more at Hurricane Conference, 6) Pivers Island planning: CSC and NWS would like to join; potential Sea Grant partnership, 7) Sea Breeze: need outreach by CSC; potential link for NWS and Sea Grant (NC/SC), 8) NCCOS: looking at new NWS partnership (Charleston and others) and NSSL; recent spread of sea turtle disease from tropics to NC may relate to climate change; similar issue may relate to recent lionfish invasion, 9) OneNOAA Outreach Efforts: NOAA-wide exhibit at NC and SC Seafood festivals; use NOAA in the Carolinas web site as link for new partners, 10) NC Height modernization: CORMP and NERRS will likely partner to provide observations.

Key messages to NOAA leadership and Regional partners were also developed at the meeting.

The next step is for specific initiatives and associated costs to be developed. Once they are, these initiatives will be briefed to appropriate NOAA leadership.