Gary Thompson and Jeremy Lopez attended the 2004 Citizen Monitoring Conference in Madison on August 20 th and 21 st. Hosted by the DNR, the conference included everything from citizen amphibian surveyors to worm watchers, transmission line representatives, waste water treatment managers, concerned citizens, university professors and DNR and other state agency staff. The basic premise was to help the DNR figure out how to better use the wealth of data collected in their more than 150 monitoring programs. During these times of limited funding, DNR doesn’t have the staff resources to monitor our natural resources; they rely on citizen-driven programs. This reality, of course, ties in nicely with the VSN Land Inventory, Water Quality Monitoring and other projects.

There were many very interesting presentations covering state, national and international monitoring programs of all types. Individuals related their experiences working with agencies and volunteers. Everyone was trying to figure out how to make citizen data more useful to professionals and professionals more useful to citizens. The conference was a good opportunity to network with others interested in resource monitoring. It confirmed for us the importance of Citizen Based Monitoring in the statewide resource management process. It also provided good exposure to operating programs and resources available to organizations wanting to become part of the process.

One of the highlights was information on the Wisconsin Nature Mapping project (www.wisnatmap.org). This web based project allows people to document the location of plant and wildlife observations that are then mapped on a state level. The data can be used in natural resource management, scientific studies and environmental education. Anyone may log on and record observations simply by clicking on a location map. Three user levels provide for differing data integrity-- professional, trained nature mapper or general public. Log on as general public to get a feel for the site and record data.

A common discussion theme was the need for data users and citizen data collectors to work together and find creative ways to collect quality data that can be easily used. Data users need to clearly articulate what data they need and why. Citizen data collectors must follow strict collection guidelines, a “Quality Assurance Project Plan,” for the data to be used for regulatory purposes. Data collected by citizen monitors can vary widely in collection method and output data formats. It was interesting to note that this problem is not just about citizen data versus DNR data, but exists within the DNR, between EPA and DNR, etc. We heard often, “the data collected just does not talk.” Many state and national initiatives are working to improve the data compatibility problem.

The conference concluded with the attendees creating a mission and vision statement for a citizen monitoring network and a priority list of recommendations for maintaining successful citizen monitor groups. These included creating a statewide board consisting of data collectors and data users to share information, identify monitoring priorities, monitoring funds and DNR data gaps. The recommendations were presented to DNR. View the recommendations, proceedings and presentations at www.atriweb.info/conference/.