WakeNature Partnership

Presentation to the

Municipal Park Directors

of Wake County

2008 October 2

Open Space & Parks in Wake[ map 1 showing all public open space in Wake, including

Army Corps,State Parks, etc  plus major rivers and lakes ]

Municipal & County Owned[ map 2 showing all public open space in Wake owned by

Wake County or a municipality,  plus major rivers and lakes  - on other words, remove the Army Corp, State Parks, etc lands ]

Natural Heritage Sites[ map 3 showing SNHAs and one dot for each EO, plus

major rivers and lakes ]

WakeNature Partnership[ map 4, which is created by overlaying map 3 on map 2

and REMOVING any of the map 2 elements not intersected by the map 3 elements ]

Our Mission

WakeNature Partnership will organize and provide resources to identify ecologically valuable, protected open spaces within Wake County and to build capacity for appropriate, long-term stewardship of those areas.

Who are we?NC Museum of Natural Sciences

NC Natural Heritage Program

NC State University

NC Wildlife Resources Commission

Triangle Land Conservancy

Wake Audubon

Wake County Environmental Services

Wake County Parks, Recreation, & Open Space

Why are we doing this?

People who use ecologically valuable areas in parks and open spaces would like them conserved.

County and municipalities have invested in these areas, but funding for stewardship is limited.

We’d like to help leverage the substantial, untapped resources we have in this region.

Our vision: best practice conservation management

Natural resources inventories

Management plans

Active stewardship

Other Places Doing This

Charlotte / Mecklenburg, NC

Chicago Wilderness Consortium, IL

Cleveland Metro Parks, OH

East Bay Regional Parks, Oakland, CA

Fairfax County Parks, VA

Marin County Parks, CA

What have we been doing?Beginning to identify ecologically valuable areas.

Piloting our ideas by partnering with Wake County.

Planning database for all Wake County open space.

Developing service-learning connections with NCSU.

Seeking additional partners and volunteers.

Identifying Ecologically Valuable Areas

Natural Heritage Program

NC Wildlife Action Plan Priority Species Habitat

On-site inventory

Natural Heritage SitesJurisdiction # Sites Jurisdiction # Sites

Cary 4 Rolesville 1

Garner 1 Wake County 19

Holly Springs 1 Wake Forest 8

Knightdale 1 Wendell 2

Raleigh 51 Zebulon 2

Demonstration Project: Marks Creek

Establish an example process for later efforts to emulate or learn from.

Started inventory in February, 2008.

Goal is a draft management plan in early 2009.

Chris Snow will talk about this.

Willing partners we’d like to involve

Willing partners we’d like to involve

You and your staffs.

Volunteers and interns.

NCSU students and faculty.

What are we asking of you?Open a conversation.

How can we work together?

Can we modify partnership to work better for you?

What would you like to see or do next?

Contact Information

George Hess :: NC State University

919.515.7437 :: george_hess@ncsu.edu

Gary Blank :: NC State University

919.515.7566 :: gary_blank@ncsu.edu

Chris Snow :: Wake County Parks, Recreation, & Open Space

919.856.6677 :: csnow@co.wake.nc.us

Jamie Ramsey :: Wake Open Space & Parks Advisory Committee

919.821.9059 :: cadra4@aol.com