Annual Conference Proceedings...Michael Barbour . 2020 OFWIM Annual Conference 2020 Vision: Looking...

2020 OFWIM Annual Conference 2020 Vision: Looking To The Future

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OFWIM 2020

October 5th & 6th, 2020

Annual Conference Proceedings

Virtual

Conference


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2020 Conference Planning Committee Amy Ewing

Andrew Treble

Becca Scully

Beth Stys

Brittany Bajo

Chelsea Krause

Don Schrupp

Dyan Pursell

Jordan Hartman

Karen Horodysky

Keith Hurley

Lynn Barrett

MaryEllen Wickett

Sabra Tonn

Susan Watson

Michael Barbour


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Special thanks to our

2020 Sponsor!

WELCOME TO OFWIM

2020!

Visit us on

WWW.OFWIM.ORG

https://www.facebook.com/OFWIM1993

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Organization-Fish-Wildlife-Information-Managers-3859778?gid=3859778&mostPopular=&trk=tyah&trkInfo=tarId%3A1410981014732%2Ctas%3AOrganization%20of%20Fish%20and%20Wildlife%20Information%20Officers%2Cidx%3A1-1-1

http://www.ofwim.org/



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SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE

Monday, October 5th

PDT MDT CDT EDT

7:30 AM 8:30 AM 9:30 AM 10:30 AM Virtual Meeting Opens

8:00 AM 9:00 AM 10:00 AM 11:00 AM Welcome Session

9:00 AM 10:00 AM 11:00 AM 12:00 PM Break

9:10 AM 10:10 AM 11:10 AM 12:10 AM COVID -19 Panel Discussion

11:00 AM 12:00 PM 1:00 PM 2:00 PM Break

11:30 AM 12:30 PM 1:30 PM 2:30 PM Session 1

12:45 PM 1:45 PM 2:45 PM 3:45 PM Break

1:00 PM 2:00 PM 3:00 PM 4:00 PM Session 2

2:15 PM 3:15 PM 4:15 PM 5:15 PM Adjourn for the day

Tuesday, October 6th

PDT MDT CDT EDT

7:30 AM 8:30 AM 9:30 AM 10:30 AM Virtual Meeting Opens

8:00 AM 9:00 AM 10:00 AM 11:00 AM Student Session/Session 3

9:15 AM 10:15 AM 11:15 AM 12:15 PM Break

9:30 AM 10:30 AM 11:30 AM 12:30 AM Business Meeting

11:00 AM 12:00 PM 1:00 PM 2:00 PM Break

11:30 AM 12:30 PM 1:30 PM 2:30 PM Session 4

12:45 PM 1:45 PM 2;45 PM 3:45 PM Break

1:00 PM 2:00 PM 3:00 PM 4:00 PM Session 5

1:50 PM 2:50 PM 3:50 PM 4:50 PM Closing Remarks


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MONDAY, OCTOBER 5

Welcome

MDT/CDT/EDT

8:30/9:30 /10:30 AM Virtual Meeting Opens

9:00/10:00/11:00 AM Welcome to OFWIM 2020: Virtual Style Chelsea Krause, OFWIM President-Elect

9:10/10:10/11:10 AM Leveraging an Effective Geospatial Strategy to Promote Responsible Outdoor Recreation Participation During a Pandemic

Michael Bialousz, ESRI, National Account Manager - Environmental, State Government

10:00/11:00 AM/12:00 PM Break

COVID -19 Panel Discussion

10:10/11:10 AM/12:10 PM Raffle

10:15/11:15 AM/12:15 PM Keith Hurley, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission

10:30/11:30 AM/12:30 PM Chris Gerecke, Timmons Group

10:45/11:45 AM/12:45 PM Jeffrey B. Trollinger, Asst. Chief, Aquatic Wildlife Resources Division, VA DWR

11:00 AM/12:00/1:00 PM Gabriel Kamener, Information Manager, Gaiser Lab, Florida International University

11:15 AM/12:15/1:15 PM Open Forum

12:00/1:00/2:00 PM Break

Session 1

12:25/1:25/2:25 PM Raffle

12:30/1:30/2:30 PM Tide Won't Clean your Data, but this Tool Will.

Sabra Tonn, Arizona Game and Fish Department

12:55/1:55/2:55 PM Distributing Data with an R Package

Powell Wheeler, North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission


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1:20/2:20/3:20 PM Making life easier with progressive web applications

Keith Hurley, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission

1:45/2:45/3:45 PM Break

MONDAY, OCTOBER 5 (continued)

Session 2

1:55/2:55/3:55 PM Raffle

2:00/3:00/4:00 PM The State of Florida Ecological Report Card: A Landscape-Level Design for Conservation

Nicole Burns, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

2:25/3:25/4:25 PM Web-enabling the State Wildlife Action Plan for New Mexico

Ginny Seamster, New Mexico Department of Game and Fish

2:50/3:50/4:50 PM Tracking Health! (...Animal Health!) Chris Gerecke, Timmons Group

3:15/ 4:15/5:15 PM Adjourn for the day

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 6

Student Session/Session 3

MDT/CDT/EDT

8:55/9:55/10:55 AM Raffle

9:00/10:00/11:00 AM Tracking Long-Term Fish Abundance Trends: A New River Case Study

Logan J Sleezer, Virginia Tech

9:25/10:25/11:25 AM Field Validating a Suitable Habitat Model for the Gasconade River

Brittany Bajo, Tennessee Tech

9:50/10:50/11:50 AM OFWIM's strategic thinking effort: what we learned in 2019-2020

Karen Horodysky, Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources

10:15/11:15 AM/12:15 PM Break


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Business Meeting

10:25/11:25 AM/12:25 PM Raffle

10:30/11: 30 AM/12: 30 PM Business Meeting

12:00/1:00/2:00 PM Break (Silent Auction Closes)

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 6 (continued)

Session 4

12:25/1:25/2:25 PM Raffle

12:30/1:30/2:30 PM Automating Anadromous Fish Counts with Artificial Intelligence

Sam Haffey, Four Peaks Environmental Science & Data Solutions

12:55/1:55/2:55 PM Interagency Cooperation Facilitated by Centralized Data Storage: An overview of the 3-Species and Rio Grande Chub/Sucker Web Applications

Dr. Shannon E. Albeke, WyGISC - University of Wyoming

1:20/2:20/3:20 PM Laboratory Inventory Management System (LIMS): Collect, track, aggregate, and query data from the field, during and after analyses using existing long-term cyberinfrastructure

Nicholas William Case, WyGISC

1:45/2:45/3:45 PM Break

Session 5

1:55/2:55/3:55 PM Raffle

2:00/3:00/4:00 PM Making disparate data discoverable and accessible: the

Samantha L. Ewers, University of Wyoming; Wyoming


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University of Wyoming's DataCorral

Geographic Information Science Center

2:25/3:25/4:25 PM OFWIM Annual Conference Archive - A Title Slide Review of the Last Decades Presentations

Don Schrupp, Colorado Division of Wildlife (retired)

2:50/3:50/4:50 PM Poll for Best Presenter/Closing Remarks


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Interagency Cooperation Facilitated by Centralized Data Storage: An overview of the 3-Species and Rio Grande Chub/Sucker Web Applications Dr. Shannon E. Albeke, WyGISC - University of Wyoming Co-authors: Benjamin J. Writer, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center; Samantha L. Ewers, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center Abstract: Monitoring and assessment of declining, threatened or endangered fish populations can be a difficult and costly endeavor. Developing a standardized data management system for these species can benefit natural resource agencies in their management goals. In 2002 the Inland Cutthroat Trout Protocol (ICP) was developed to provide an integrated GIS database detailing occupied habitat and specific demographic information important to the persistence of Westslope cutthroat trout (Oncorhynchus clarki lewisii). Since this initial population assessment, the ICP has been applied to Yellowstone, Colorado River, Bonneville, Rio Grande, Greenback and Lahontan cutthroat trout, as well as Redband trout. Following the ICP model, we worked closely with fisheries managers to develop two distinct web applications to capture and manage fisheries summary information, the 3-species and the Rio Grande Chub/Sucker (RGCS) applications. We first developed a protocol to match each species’ demographic information, careful to maintain consistency of captured data, thus facilitating a common database schema. We developed the application under the ASP.NET MVC framework, housed under the Umbraco Content Management System. We created C# web APIs to handle data entry and retrieval, coupled with ESRI Map Services and JavaScript libraries, leveraging SQL SDE databases, for edits to spatial features. These two systems are the first to capture data for these species across jurisdictional boundaries, thus providing an integrated management framework. This system and methods can be readily expanded to other species as needed. Future steps include the development of data dashboards for on-demand summary statistics. Biography: Dr. Shannon E. Albeke is a Senior Research Scientist and faculty member within the Wyoming Geospatial Information Science Center (WyGISC) at the University of Wyoming specializing in GeoSpatial Data Science and Landscape Ecology since 2010. His primary research focuses around applied GIS, programming and statistics. His teaching centers on database management and applied GIS methods using primarily open source software. Shannon earned a B.A. in Environmental Sciences with minors in Geography and Geology in 1997 from the University of Colorado – Boulder. He then began an 8-year career as an Aquatic Habitat Biologist for the Colorado Division of Wildlife, and by necessity, learned how to be a GeoSpatial Data Scientist. In 2006, he resigned from CDOW to become a PhD student at the University of Georgia, earning his PhD in 2010.


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Field Validating a Suitable Habitat Model for the Gasconade River Brittany Bajo, Tennessee Tech Abstract: While conservation efforts have dramatically grown over the last few years, freshwater mussels remain one of the most imperiled groups of aquatic organisms. Our understanding of a mussel’s sessile tendencies, clustered distribution in high density beds, benthic habitat preference and sensitivity to temporal and spatial disturbances allows us to draw inferences about the limiting hydrogeological features of a river system. Thus, hydrogeological statistical models may provide insight into mussel distribution patterns, narrow down causes of mussel declines, and highlight suitable areas for reintroduction. The Gasconade River of Missouri is an exceptional candidate for such a model in that it contains known mussel communities and has opportunities for management and restoration. We present a spatial niche model that identifies distinct reaches in the Gasconade River that are fundamentally suitable for freshwater mussel assemblages. To validate this model, bank surveys were performed to determine mussel bed presence and species richness for suitable reaches. The presence of mussel beds outside of suitable reaches indicates we are not identifying habitat suitability properly. The Gasconade River habitat model accurately predicts freshwater mussel assemblage presence in the downstream reaches of the system, but is not as effective in the river headwaters. Our results indicate that the hydrological and geological variables of the headwaters may be interacting with the river system differently. Biography: Brittany Bajo is a Michigan native who graduated with a bachelor’s degree in aquatic biology from Grand Valley State University. After graduating from GVSU Brittany moved to Colorado and worked as a technician on several projects including the reintroduction of the Greenback Cutthroat trout and chytrid fungus monitoring for Boreal Toads. Her experience with disease ecology led her to a lab manager position with the University of Tennessee where she worked in a chytrid fungus laboratory with a wide variety of frogs, toads, and salamanders. In August of 2019 she accepted a master’s position at Tennessee Tech where she is currently building a suitable habitat model for freshwater mussels of the Duck River, TN.


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Leveraging an Effective Geospatial Strategy to Promote Responsible Outdoor Recreation Participation During a Pandemic Michael Bialousz, ESRI, National Account Manager - Environmental, State Government Co-author: Sunny Fleming, ESRI, National Solution Engineer Abstract: Outdoor recreation participation strategies have long been supported by GIS tools and content, and this has only continued to grow and evolve during COVID-19. As citizens all over the world find safety and solace in the outdoors during the pandemic, how do we understand, plan and act in order to provide citizens with a great experience and protect our natural resources? Esri’s technology takes agencies beyond the map by providing solutions to understand where people are coming from and what they’re seeking. Planning tools are available to evaluate where to send resources so our outdoors can remain safe and how best to engage with outdoor participants. Then, resources for acting on these insights to promote a multitude of opportunities, provide participants with near-real-time data before they even arrive, and offering mechanisms to engage around available recreational assets. In this session we’ll go over ways in which states are responding by leveraging Esri’s configurable maps and apps, readily available authoritative content, and Hub Initiative Templates for Outdoor Recreation. Participants will also learn the new streamlined ways that solutions can now be deployed. Biography: Mike Bialousz is Esri’s National Account Manager for state government environment and natural resources. Mike has more than 25 years of experience working in GIS and mapping, including management level positions in the private sector and Pennsylvania state government. All of Mike’s experience has involved implementing GIS for natural resources challenges and he has also taught GIS at several Pennsylvania colleges and universities for the past 13 years. Sunny Fleming is Esri's National Solution Engineer for state government environment and natural resources. Sunny's academic background is in botany and plant ecology. Her work background includes seven years in state government implementing GIS at Tennessee's Division of Natural Heritage and streamlining workflows and addressing challenges within Tennessee State Parks.


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The State of Florida Ecological Report Card: A Landscape-Level Design for Conservation Nicole Burns Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission Abstract: Florida has rich and diverse ecosystems that are home to thousands of native and endemic species. The Landscape Conservation Project, building upon foundational initiatives from the past 20 years, is working to create a conservation strategy that protects Florida’s invaluable flora and fauna through a spatially broad, landscape-level lens. , Several components have been developed and realized, but of focus is the Report Card. This component is designed to score the ecological health of Florida’s natural resources by assessing and assigning numerical value to ecologically important indicators, and then giving an overall “grade” to the ecosystem. The various resources being evaluated are “Conservation Assets”, that are scored using ecosystem “Indicators”, which are measured at a state-wide level by quantifiable characteristics and then compared to a desired “Target” for each indicator. The conservation assets, indicators, and targets have been carefully chosen through thorough research, evaluated for applicability by a multi-criteria comparison, and vetted through a series of stakeholder-focused workshops. The result is a “good/fair/poor” grade that can be easily digested by conservation managers and stakeholders alike. With the current status and desired target for all conservation assets, monitoring protocols and management strategies can be identified and implemented that would help in reaching the targets, while maintaining or improving Florida’s natural resources. Biography: Nicole Burns is a Biologist for the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute (FWRI), a division of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC). Her role at FWRI is in the Landscape Conservation Project, where since 2018 she has worked to design a report card to score the ecological health of Florida’s natural resources, while also providing ways to improve resource monitoring and management. Prior to joining FWC, she received a B.S. in Biology and Spanish from Denison University in 2014, and she received an M.S. degree in Biology from the University of Guam Marine Laboratory in 2018 where she researched active restoration techniques of staghorn corals.


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Laboratory Inventory Management System (LIMS): Collect, track, aggregate, and query data from the field, during and after analyses using existing long-term cyberinfrastructure Nicholas William Case, WyGISC Co-authors: Samantha L. Ewers, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center; Shannon E. Albeke, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center Abstract: Tracking of field and laboratory samples and their associated data has long been a desired tool of resource managers and researchers alike. Several proprietary software platforms exist to assist with these tasks. However, their annual licensing costs, coupled with the often-narrow types of trackable samples (e.g., DNA or chemical analyses only), made the use of proprietary software untenable. The Lab Inventory Management System (LIMS) was developed as an end to end system of software and hardware designed to capture and track data, from the initial sample collection, through each subsequent analysis, and after research has long since concluded, regardless of the sample origin or types of laboratory analyses run. Samples may have many relational types as they can be separated, replicated, aggregated, and destroyed. LIMS tracks these samples within the various UW labs using an ASP.Net web app and existing UW system architecture assets (web, SQL, and file servers). LIMS resolves the computational burden of decoding these complex histories by using a Neo4j graph database to effectively be an indexing service that allows for the rapid retrieval of context from the sample to the project level. I plan to describe the overarching solutions, lessons learned, and some of the details of how we made LIMS flexible, reliable, and fast—leveraging the advantages of unstructured data storage, combined with the resilience of traditional related data. Biography: Nicholas Case has been a part of WyGISC since 2018, working as a Geospatial Developer. He is the development arm of the EPSCoR Micro project's Data Team and responsible for creating and maintaining the Laboratory Inventory Management System (LIMS) designed to track samples starting from the field through analyses. Nicholas obtained his bachelor's degree of arts and sciences in anthropology from San Diego State University and an associate's degree of science in geography from San Diego Mesa College. He is currently a master's student in the GIST program focusing on learning new methods and technologies that enable researchers and decision-makers to glean information from data that may not be readily visible on its own.


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Making disparate data discoverable and accessible: the University of Wyoming's DataCorral Samantha L. Ewers, University of Wyoming; Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center Co-authors: Nicholas W. Case, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center; Dylan G. Perkins, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center; Shannon E. Albeke, University of Wyoming, Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center Abstract: Ongoing major environmental challenges require an interdisciplinary solution. The ability to generate large quantities of disparate data continues to increase, but the ability of researchers, and the public, to access, explain and communicate the data lags behind. Because each discipline has its own professional standards and metadata requirements, integrating these data is challenging. To fulfil the data sharing, archiving, and synthesis of a major science grant that brought together the disciplines of geophysics, hydrology, and ecology, we built a geospatial tool to facilitate work across these disciplines as well as provide access to the public. We developed the University of Wyoming DataCorral to facilitate the storage and sharing of data collected across an array of disciplines that vary spatially and temporally. We provide discovery, access and visualization via the Data Discovery Tool (DDT). This tool is built upon both traditional relational SQL databases for robust storage and a graph database to facilitate semantic searching of data. The DDT includes several methods for discovering datasets including spatially via a map or semantic keyword search. Upon discovering a dataset, users can filter and aggregate the data spatially and temporally, view the information via plotting functions, or export the data for personal use. Data visualizations can occur as time series, drivers and responses, or as maps. Additionally, these visualization tools can be used for K-12 curriculum development, which can be accessed via the Education portal. In this presentation we share the background, workflow for integrating multiple types of data and the different methods of exploring data within the application. Biography: Samantha Ewers is a Geospatial Specialist for Wyoming Geographic Information Science Center at the University of Wyoming. She joined WyGISC in 2014 as a data manager for an NSF EPSCoR grant in spatial hydrology and geophysics and now spatial microbial diversity. Samantha’s primary focus has been to perform data management for academic research projects and research groups. She also assists with development and maintenance of data management for projects and applications across WyGISC. Samantha is a member of Women in GIS and holds a Bachelor’s in Civil Engineering from North Carolina State University.


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Tracking Health! (...Animal Health!) Chris Gerecke, Timmons Group Abstract: The Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) has a substantial role in tracking and reporting on the status of animal health in the State and working with partners to address animal health priorities. The Animal Health program in PGC has grown substantially over recent years and will continue to grow over the next several years through staffing and increased capabilities. To address these needs, PGC and Timmons Group partnered together on a “discovery” project to:

- better define the needs for new systems that will address growing overall data needs,

- conduct research into what other states are doing, and - collaborate with the four labs in Pennsylvania to assess the use of their current

system (Pennsylvania Animal Diagnostic Lab (PADL))

This presentation will review the results of PGC's discovery and how the steps taken during discovery help set-up the resulting implementation project for success. Biography: Chris's focus on any given workday is creatively solving business, technology and geospatial challenges. Chris’ comprehensive knowledge of Esri, open source, and best-of-breed solutions, enables Timmons Group to provide application development, geospatial consulting, and implementation services for a growing list of clients. Chris directs the enterprise solutions group at Timmons Group which prides itself on developing intuitive technology solutions to generate significant Return on Investment (ROI) for their clients. Chris has been a member of OFWIM for years dating back to his first OFWIM conference in 2000 and has presented at OFWIM for the past several years.


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Automating Anadromous Fish Counts with Artificial Intelligence Sam Haffey, Four Peaks Environmental Science & Data Solutions Abstract: Adult anadromous fish count data are essential components of industry, conservation, and restoration efforts, especially throughout the Federal Columbia River Power System (FCRPS). Hydroelectric projects of all sizes are increasingly being required to provide fish passage and passage data including enumeration of passing fish by species. Typically, human observers enumerate adult fish passage in real-time or from recorded video. These methods are labor‐ and time-intensive, relying on humans to watch hours of fish ladders devoid of species of interest. Furthermore, data entry errors can impede management efforts and lead to regulatory challenges. We demonstrate the efficacy of using a computer vision system to enumerate passing fish at count windows in the FCRPS. We used a computer-equipped camera to track passing fish and count them at four hydroelectric facilities within the FCRPS during the 2019 and 2020 fish passage seasons. Our tests show that a computer vision system can be used to improve count accuracy and increase efficiency at fish count windows. We discuss how continued data collection can improve the performance of the system to the point where it can completely automate anadromous fish counts. This technology has the ability to improve fishery management efforts by increasing count accuracy, streamlining cumbersome data collection and distribution processes, and expanding fish counts to scenarios where human-staffing proves challenging. Biography: Sam Haffey is an environmental and software engineer with 23 years of experience. He is a licensed Professional Engineer in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and New York. Sam’s technical expertise includes development and management of environmental software systems. He has designed and developed systems that provide real-time data acquisition for monitoring performance standards, automation of quality control and compliance assessment logic, and online data visualization. These systems keep project teams informed and enable timely decision making for adaptive management strategies. Sam lives in Seattle with his family and pets where they enjoy city life and easy access to the Cascade Mountains and Olympic Peninsula.


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OFWIM's strategic thinking effort: what we learned in 2019-2020 Karen Horodysky, Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources Abstract: OFWIM initiated a strategic thinking effort in the fall of 2019. The goal was for OFWIM to ask key who, what, why, and how questions in the context of the past, present and future. OFWIM looked for answers to these key questions from our membership, records, and committees during the 2019-2020 year. While the original structure and goals of OFWIM remain mostly unchanged over time, there have been some notable adjustments. For example, OFWIM no longer focuses on identifying data standards or tracking technology trends, nor does it prioritize outreach to other organizations. OFWIM members currently value the networking structure that a small, specialized organization like OFWIM provides. The annual meeting is the most relevant activity OFWIM offers. In fact, over half of members do not participate in OFWIM outside of the annual conference. OFWIM members have always primarily come from state government agencies, and most of our current members would like to see more states involved, along with more NGOs. Lack of time is the most common challenge our members see for OFWIM as we move into the future. A small organization like OFWIM faces the extra challenge of finding members with enough time to contribute to standard organizational operations, let alone the development of new goals or processes. OFWIM needs to grow its membership to replace members who will retire in the future and to generate new participation on committees and as officers. The 2020-2021 year will focus on committees and members generating simple action items that will help OFWIM move successfully into the future. Biography: Karen Horodysky promotes the use of technology in natural resources management by supporting the creation of efficient and effective solutions for fisheries and wildlife biologists. She currently works as a Wildlife Data Scientist and Certified Scrum Product Owner with the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources. Karen has been a member of OFWIM since 2014 and served as OFWIM President in 2019-2020.


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Making life easier with progressive web applications Keith Hurley, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission Abstract: While not all that new anymore, progressive web applications (PWAs) are starting to gain steam in the mobile web world. Progressive web apps aim to provide the native application experience that end users desire while being developed and delivered through traditional web-style programming. By using PWA technology I was able to package a number of existing utilities available to fisheries division staff members on the staff website in a user-friendly PWA that seamlessly installs to their mobile devices and is operating system and device independent. The best part of this project is it required little to no changes of the existing code base or additional programming while increasing the usability of the utilities to our staff. Biography: Keith is a Fish and Wildlife Specialist – Database Manager with the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission. He holds a B.S. from South Dakota State University in Fish and Wildlife Science and a M.S. in Zoology (Fisheries Ecology) from Southern Illinois University in Carbondale. Current job duties include creation, maintenance, and operation of fisheries division databases; data-mining of divisional data stores; coordination of the statewide creel project; statewide fisheries research; fisheries human dimensions research; divisional oversight of IT budget and purchasing, and whatever other odd jobs that can be assigned that might possibly involve the use of electrons and a keyboard.


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COVID -19 Panel Participant

Gabriel Kamener, Information Manager, Gaiser Lab, University of Florida

Biography: Gabriel Kamener is an Information Manager in the Gaiser Lab at Florida International University. Gabriel is responsible for managing ecological-monitoring data for projects such as the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP), documenting and improving workflows, providing technical support to research staff (primarily in working with data in relational databases and R), and assisting with data collection in the field. He has managed ecological field sites in the Ocala National Forest for the University of Florida and United States Forest Service and has also contributed to multiple research and conservation projects with Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and Archbold Biological Station. Gabriel received a B.S. in Biology from University of Florida in 2015, and he completed an ecological-data-management fellowship with the Environmental Data Initiative in 2018. He enjoys hiking, mountain biking, and nature photography.


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OFWIM Annual Conference Archive - A Title Slide Review of the Last Decades Presentations Don Schrupp, Colorado Division of Wildlife (retired) Abstract: OFWIM has an archive of its Annual Conference Archives available online at: http://http://www.ofwim.org/meetings/conference-archives/ covering meetings from its inception in 1993 through last years presentations at the 2019 meeting in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Notably, the original presentations for OFWIM's meetings from 2010 through 2019 are also online. As part of efforts to develop a "OFWIM Strategic Thinking" document I was asked to review past OFWIM Proceedings to profile the range of presentations given an OFWIM Annual Conferences over the years. As a spin-off of that work, I offer here a 'Graphic Tour' of the titles slides for the presentations of the most recent decade. Biography: Don Schrupp is a retired Wildlife Ecologist, having worked for the Colorado Division of Wildlife, as its Wildlife Inventory Coordinator (overseeing CDOW's Wildlife Resource Information System [WRIS]) until his retirement in 2006. He has been an OFWIM contributor from its inception in 1993, and has served in a number of its officer positions, including being OFWIM President in 2000. He has also served on many of OFWIM's committees, being current active in the OFWIM Conference Planning Committee and Communications, Outreach and Membership Committee.


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Web-enabling the State Wildlife Action Plan for New Mexico Ginny Seamster, New Mexico Department of Game and Fish Co-authors: Dr. Matt Wunder, New Mexico Department of Game and Fish; Richard Norwood, Natural Heritage New Mexico; Rayo McCollough, Natural Heritage New Mexico Abstract: State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs) are important conservation planning documents that also qualify state wildlife agencies to receive State Wildlife Grant funds for work focused on Species of Greatest Conservation Need (SGCN) and conservation actions identified in their SWAPs. The New Mexico Department of Game and Fish, in collaboration with Natural Heritage New Mexico and Iterative Consulting, has developed a website (nmswap.org) intended to facilitate easy access to information on all the key components of the SWAP for New Mexico (NM). The website consolidates hundreds of pages of information and many tables and figures from the hard copy SWAP down to an easily navigable series of webpages focused on the key SWAP elements: SGCN, habitats, ecoregions, threats, conservation actions, and conservation opportunity areas. I will review the major components of the website, including the web map that enables investigation of the spatial components of NM’s SWAP, and several of the pathways provided for users to easily access information about species, habitats, and ecoregions in NM. I will also review search functionality that simplifies identification of conservation actions that are relevant for specific ecoregions, habitats, or SGCN and is especially relevant for developing grant proposals related to SGCN. Finally, I will discuss the ways in which NM’s new SWAP website relates to other conservation planning tools in NM that contribute to a broader Conservation Information System (CIS) for NM. This system is in development and will ultimately provide access to many sources of information on flora and fauna in NM relevant at different spatial scales. Biography: Dr. Ginny Seamster is the Share with Wildlife/BISON-M Coordinator at New Mexico Department of Game and Fish (NMDGF). She has been with NMDGF since 2015. In addition to maintaining the BISON-M website and database, she oversees Share with Wildlife, a grant program that funds wildlife research, education, and rehabilitation projects annually. Prior to joining NMDGF, she completed a three year post-doctoral position at New Mexico State University. This entailed modeling climate change effects for multiple species and developing a pilot web-based map that facilitated spatial and test-based queries for NMDGF documents. She completed her Ph.D. in Environmental Sciences and B.S. in Biology at the University of Virginia.


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Tracking Long-Term Fish Abundance Trends: A New River Case Study Logan J Sleezer, Virginia Tech Abstract: Adequately diagnosing imperilment of species and communities as a basis for conservation requires spatially explicit contemporary and historic reference data. Freshwater fishes represent one of the most imperiled groups of vertebrates, but both contemporary and historic catch data on these taxa are limited. Even where these data exist, comparisons between contemporary and historic catch data are hindered by discrepancies in fish sampling effort and collection protocols. To aid in local fish conservation prioritization, I applied a novel fish abundance metric, designed to aid in comparison of community data derived from disparate sampling protocols, to a fish community dataset representing 61 years of sampling across the upper and middle New River basin in the Appalachian region of the United States. Using this metric, I classified resident species as spreaders and decliners, tracked spatiotemporal trends in community uniqueness and diversity, and mapped these landscape-level phenomena to identify potential areas of future conservation focus. Results indicated mass declines in native species and an overall trend towards loss of unique and diverse communities. These declines would not have been detected using more commonly-applied occurrence-based methods. As such, application of my unique abundance metric may provide an avenue for earlier detection of declining population trends in similarly data-poor community conservation scenarios across the world. Biography: Logan graduated with his Master of Science in Fisheries and Wildlife Sciences from Virginia Tech in June of 2020. He is currently employed as a temporary lecturer in the Department of Physical Sciences at Emporia State University, his undergraduate alma mater. Logan plans to seek more permanent employment in the field of freshwater conservation and/or geospatial analysis at semester’s end.


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Tide Won't Clean your Data, but this Tool Will. Sabra Tonn, Arizona Game and Fish Department Co-authors: Matt King, Arizona Game and Fish Department Abstract: The HDMS has built a custom web application through which our Scientific Collecting License holders can submit their data. Users can upload an Excel template of observations, get instant visual feedback on locations, perform data quality control right inside the application, see previously submitted data, and submit directly to our database. Through our lean process, the one area we saw the biggest need for improvement was cleaner and better quality data coming into our program from external sources. This tool is enhancing our data workflow from receipt to distribution, and our ability to make better and more efficient conservation decisions. In addition, we wanted to make sure there was a benefit to the user. The user can see all previously reported data, search for species or years of submission, and even download a geopackages of any or all of their data for use in external GIS applications. Biography: Sabra Tonn is the HDMS Program Supervisor. She earned her B.S. in Biology from Northern Arizona University. She has been with the Arizona Heritage Program for 29 years. She has championed efficiencies and collaborative applications, such as the Online Environmental Review Tool and iMapInvasives. She has been a member of OFWIM since 2002 and served as President in 2007. Matthew King was the HDMS Systems Manager at the Arizona Game and Fish Department. He earned his M.S. from University of Arizona, and has been involved with several research and conservation projects across the Southwest over the last 10 years. He has a keen interest in data visualization and is an avid user of R and GIS.


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COVID -19 Panel Participant

Jeffrey B. Trollinger (Jeff), Assistant Chief, Aquatic Wildlife Resources Division, Virginia

Department of Game and Inland Fisheries

Jeff was moved to his current position in June of 2018. Prior to this he served as the Director of Wildlife Services and prior to that he was Deputy Director in the Bureau of Wildlife Resources for 8 years. Prior to that he was the Program Manager for the

Department’s (VDGIF) Watchable Wildlife Program for 10 years. He has worked with for

the Department since 1987 where he began as an undergraduate at Virginia Tech. Jeff is originally from Luray, Virginia. He moved to Blacksburg in 1982 to pursue his education and graduated from Virginia Tech with a B.S. in Wildlife Management in 1987. He received his second B.S. in 1995 in Human Resource Management from Bluefield College and a Graduate Certificate from the University of Wisconsin-River Falls in Wildlife Recreation and Nature Tourism in 2009. He was transferred to Richmond in 1995 after accepting a full-time job with VDGIF. The Wildlife Diversity Division recognized him in 2007 for outstanding efforts in developing the Virginia Birding and Wildlife Trail.

In 2009, he was recognized with the Department’s Wildlife Biologist of the Year Award and

in 2010 the Virginia Chapter of the Wildlife Society presented him with the Henry S. Mosby Professional Award. He has co-authored four publications for which he has received

several regional and national awards, and he has been featured in the Department’s

award winning video “A Look Outside.” In addition, he co-edited a publication with the

Colorado Division of Wildlife on Wildlife Viewing and Photography Blinds. He was a

founding member of the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies’ Wildlife Viewing and

Nature Tourism Working Group, the national professional organization for wildlife viewing programs. Over the past 19 years, he has developed skills in public information, public relations, event planning, urban wildlife concerns, fish and wildlife databases, and working with wildlife volunteers. Jeff is married to a wonderful husband and they have three four-legged children. In his spare time he reads science fiction, maintains the gardens at his home, goes birdwatching, and travels back to the mountains as often as possible.


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Distributing Data with an R Package Powell Wheeler, North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission Co-authors: Kevin Dockendorf, North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission Abstract: The Inland Fisheries Division (IFD) of the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission has several online databases that the field staff use to store data. Unfortunately, the queries for these databases often produce results that are messy and difficult to analyze and IFD does not have a paid IT position to help improve the output. Since the R programming language is becoming more common among field staff, we developed an R package that can store and distribute more useful versions of the data from our databases. R packages are typically used to store functions, but we discovered they very useful for storing data for the following reasons: First, R packages accumulate data sets by running scripts on raw data files and then saving the data in the package. These scripts can also do the work of manipulating and cleaning-up the data before saving. In addition, the scripts can export CSV files to benefit traditional spreadsheet users. Second, the developers can perform automated tests on the R package to ensure the data has not been damaged or lost. Third, users can call help on the data sets to retrieve metadata. This metadata can include the source of the data, the date the data was updated, as well as helpful hints. Fourth, R packages store data very efficiently and often require less than 10% of the hard drive space than the spreadsheets produced from the database queries. Finally, data stored in R packages is immediately vulnerable to analysis by established R users. Biography: Powell Wheeler is originally from southwestern Virginia. He grew up loving the sport of fishing, so it was an easy decision to attend nearby Virginia Tech and study Fisheries Science after high school. After completing his undergraduate degree, he continued his education by completing a master’s degree from the University of Florida. He has been employed as a district fisheries biologist with the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission since 2002 and is stationed near Asheville. He has been a home Linux user for the last 10 years and and R user for the last four years. Currently, his favorite hobbies are cruising thrift stores to add to his DVD collection, and finding, repairing, and using manual typewriters.


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OFWIM ANNUAL BUSINESS MEETING 2020 OFWIM Virtual Conference · via WebEx

October 6, 2020 The Organization of Fish and Wildlife Information Managers conducts its annual business meeting each year at the OFWIM conference. It is important to the future of the organization to maximize participation by current and future members. The business meeting is generally combined with lunch to encourage more involvement. However, this year, since the conference was virtual, we were unable to provide lunch. Each of the OFWIM officers and committee chairs makes a report on what has been accomplished over the past year. This also is when we openly discuss our goals for the next year, which is why contribution by as many members as possible is so important. Next we have elections to fill officer vacancies. We hope that you will join us for the 2020 OFWIM business meeting. More importantly, we hope that you will provide input into the future of this organization as well as consider serving on an OFWIM committee or even running for an officer position.


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OFWIM Business Meeting Agenda Virtual Annual Conference

October 6th, 2020

1. Call to Order – Becca Scully (in place of Karen Horodysky) 2. Determination of Quorum (10% of registered members) 3. Old Business

a. Approval of 2019 Business Meeting Minutes (posted on website) b. Officer Reports

i. President – Becca Scully (for Karen Horodysky) ii. Secretary – Susan Watson

iii. Treasurer – Michael Barbour iv. Member-at-Large – Andy Treble

c. Committee Chair Reports i. Communications, Membership & Outreach – Julie Simpson

ii. Conference Planning – Chelsea Krause iii. Elections, Nominations & Awards – Jim Husband iv. Training & Education – Michael Barbour

4. Approval of Bylaws and Procedures Manual update – Becca Scully a. Discussion b. Vote

5. Awards a. Innovation Award – Jim Husband b. Service Awards – Becca Scully (for Karen Horodysky)

i. Andy Treble - Member-at-Large ii. Michael Barbour - Treasurer

6. Elections – Jim Husband a. President Elect Nominee

i. Dyan Pursell b. Member-at-Large Nominee

i. Amy Martin Ewing c. Treasurer Nominee

i. Michael Barbour d. Election results and installation of new officers

7. President’s Service Award for Karen Horodysky – Chelsea Krause

8. New Business – Chelsea Krause a. New President’s Message b. 2021 OFWIM Annual Meeting location and dates

9. Comments and Discussion

10. Adjourn


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Officer Reports President – Karen Horodysky

It has been another great year for OFWIM, despite all of the unexpected changes to our

professional and personal lives amidst the global pandemic. The Executive Committee

began the 2019-2020 year by kicking off OFWIM’s “mini” strategic thinking effort. The goal

for this year was to investigate how OFWIM has evolved since its beginnings by

researching our members, records, and committees. We were able to acquire all of the

desired information thanks to everyone who participated. Special thanks go to the heavy-

lifters in this effort: the ExCom members and committee chairs, MaryEllen Wickett and

Don Schrupp (who helped dig through our records), Keith Hurley (who provided input on

the membership survey), and all members who took the membership survey. Initial

results are compiled and we hope the 2020-2021 year will be spent coming up with some

simple action items that will guide us into the future.

The ExCom did a great job keeping up with their duties and the logistics of running the

organization. As Past-President, Becca Scully organized and led efforts to update

OFWIM’s Bylaws and Procedures Manuel. Chelsea Krause jumped into her role as

President-Elect and chair of the Conference Planning Committee. Michael Barbour

(Treasurer) helped us set up more efficient ways of banking and managing our funds, as

well as an OFWIM SurveyMonkey account and our new meeting registration platform,

Cvent. Susan Watson (Secretary) learned how to navigate our membership database and

worked with me to make sure I sent membership renewal notices out at the right time and

to the right people…and she took a LOT of meeting notes! Andy Treble (Member at Large)

worked with Beth Stys to solidify our meeting plans for the meeting after Fort Collins and

finalize a contract with Unicoi State Park in Georgia. It was a pleasure to work with this

fabulous team. Thank you all for your dedication!

Our committees have been busy this year, too. The T&E Committee continues to provide

valuable information about external training opportunities to our members. The CMO

Committee investigated new ways to submit newsletter articles through our website,

facilitated new memberships or membership renewals, and produced Vyond promotional

videos for OFWIM (thanks, Heather Konell!). Check them out on our website! The ENA

Committee recruited members to run for office and put a lot of effort into figuring out how

to do virtual student fundraising for our student scholarship fund. The Conference

Planning Committee made some awesome plans for our Fort Collins meeting and then

embraced the shift to planning a virtual meeting. These are just some of our committee


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accomplishments – for a more complete picture, make sure to read our committee

reports. The work that our committees do is essential to keeping OFWIM running, so

thank you committee chairs and members for your hard work!

I am constantly impressed by the enthusiasm and energy of our members as they

contribute to OFWIM. If you are not currently involved in OFWIM between annual

meetings, please consider joining a committee. The work is rewarding and the

community of colleagues is priceless. I am thankful for my time as President and look

forward to continued service to this organization.


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Officer Reports

Secretary – Susan Watson

1. Recorded the minutes of monthly Executive Committee (ExCom) meetings

a. Distributed minutes to ExCom members

b. Posted archival copies to the OFWIM Groupsite ExCom Folder, under the file cabinet’s Committee Folders

2. Maintained the OFWIM membership database

a. Entered new 2020 members (7 as of 9/11/20)

b. Recorded 2020 membership renewals (47 as of 9/11/20)

c. 2019 memberships will expire after 2020 Conference (25 as of 9/11/20)

d. Created updated email distribution lists as needed. Supplied member information to President for welcome and renewal letters; invited new members to join Groupsite

f. Maintained electronic copies of all 2020 membership renewals processed by the Treasurer

3. Served as Vice Chair of the Communications, Membership, and Outreach Committee

a. Maintained current member email distribution list

b. Sent email notices (newsletters and announcements) to members via the email distribution list (6 mailings as of 9/11/20)

c. Recorded minutes of monthly committee meetings; posted archival copies to the OFWIM Groupsite Communications, Membership & Outreach Folder, under the file cabinet’s Committee Folders

4. Business Meeting Minutes a. Will compile 2020 Business Meeting Minutes, to be submitted and posted to the

OFWIM website as Minutes of Business Meeting under 2020 Conference Archives.


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Officer Reports Treasurer - Michael Barbour

Summary Account Activity for 1 September 2019 – 31 August 2020

Checking Account

Beginning Balance $45,537.50

Ending Balance $39,950.38

Credits Amount

Membership Dues $340

Conference Registration $6,901.35

PayPal transfer $3,788.48

Interest Credit $66.54

$11,096.37

Debits Amount

Conference $12,092.62

Groupsite $600

Turbobridge $259.09

Miscellaneous Expenses $4,649.22

$

Miscellaneous expenses include Student Scholarship Fund expenses, AFWA

membership fee , sponsorship of the 2020 Southern Division of the American Fisheries

Society Meeting, license fees for SurveyMonkey and Vyond, and miscellaneous supplies.


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PayPal Account

Beginning Balance $2,097.47

Ending Balance $917.24

Credits Amount

Membership Dues $1,590

Conference Registration $439

Conference Sponsorship $1,000

PayPal Here (Raffle & Silent Auction) $186

$3,215

Debits Amount

WebEx $32.48

PayPal Fees $82.27

Conference $492

Transfer to Bank Account $3,788.48

$4,395.23

Current account balances (as of 1 September 2020)

Bank account $39,033.14

PayPal $917.24

Total $39,950.38

Transferred checking account from First Lockhart (small community bank in Texas) to

TIAA Bank (online bank). The checking account is now an interest-bearing account.

Filed IRS 990-N e-Postcard March 2020


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2019 Annual Meeting Final Accounting

Revenue

Registrations $12,750

Sponsorships

Timmons Group $1,000

ESRI $1,000

VA DGIF $1,000

Brandt $1,000

Big Fin Scientific $500

WV DNR $250

Miscellaneous $13.62

Total Revenue $17,513.62

Expenses

RegOnline Fees $577.46

Venue & Meals $7,402.59

Swag $1,916.39

Travel Grants $1,600

Transfer to Scholarship Fund $1,275

Miscellaneous Expenses $252.64

Waived Sponsor Registrations $1,600

Invited Speaker Expenses $300

Remote Access $0

Total Expenses $14,924.08

Net Total $2,589.54


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Student Scholarship Fund

Expenses

Student Scholarship $1,500

Registration Fee Waivers $450

Travel Reimbursement $1,000

Student Membership Waiver $30

PayPal Here Fees (Raffle) $5.96

Income

Raffle $488

Silent Auction $126

Registration Revenue $1,275

Transfer for 2nd Scholarship $2,320

Balance $5,543.99


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Officer Report Member-at-Large – Andrew Treble

It was an honor to work alongside the other members of OFWIM’s executive committee

this year as the Member-at-Large. Some of the activities I was involved in over the past

year include:

1. Participating in monthly OFWIM Executive Committee calls

2. Participating in monthly Conference Planning Committee Calls

3. Working with the Conference Planning Committee with on-the-ground logistics

conference planning in Fort Collins before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, then

switching to a virtual meeting in 2020 and shifting Fort Collins to 2021.

4. Working with the Conference Planning Committee to select Unicoi State Park, near

Helen, Georgia, as the site for the 2022 Annual Meeting.

5. Reviewing Rebecca Scully’s hard work on overhauling OFWIM’s bylaws and

Procedures

6. Reviewing Karen Horodysky’s hard work on OFWIM’s Strategic Thinking effort and

participating where I could.

I wish the incoming member-at-large lots of luck and plan to continue my involvement

with the conference planning committee, providing on-the-ground support for the 2021

Conference.


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Committee Reports

Communications, Membership, & Outreach

Chair: Julie Defilippi Simpson Vice-Chair: Susan Watson (Secretary) Website Manager: Karen Horodysky (backup Dyanne Cortez) Newsletter Editor: Jordan Holtswarth Social Media Manager: Open Membership Manager: Susan Watson (Secretary) Travel Grants Manager: Julie Prior-Magee Historian: Donald Schrupp Additional Members: Heather Konell, MaryEllen Wickett, Chris Gerecke, Mike

Bialousz

2020 Accomplishments

In Accordance with the OFWIM CMO 2019 “Goals and Objectives”:

1. Manage and communicate information to OFWIM members a. Newsletters – newsletters were published and distributed to OFWIM

members by direct email and posted on the OFWIM website and Groupsite in March, June, and September 2020. Highlights include:

i. March issue - an in-depth review of the annual conference including a photo spread and award winners. This issue featured the FUTURE of a three part interview series where we interview members that represent the Past, Present, and Future of the group. There was an infographic on membership benefits. There was also a letter from the President, an announcement of 2020 awards, and an early announcement of the 2020 conference.

ii. June – This issue featured the PRESENT in the three part interview series where we interview members that represent the Past, Present, and Future of the group. It also included a challenge for members to provide copies of missing proceedings from previous meetings and a call for newsletter items that noted the online form. First call for abstracts, notification of the virtual meeting, call for Innovation Award Nominations and Student Research Scholarship Award, and a preview of our 2021 conference in Fort Collins, CO.

iii. September – Pending publication. This issue features the PAST in the three part interview series where we interview members that represent the Past, Present, and Future of the group. There is also an


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update from Captain Jack, raffle items and silent auction, officer election materials, and conference information.

iv. Ongoing features of the newsletters include Captain Jack adventures and committee and membership lists. We are very pleased with the 2020 features and would like to heartily thank all contributors. On a continuing note of some frustration, despite encouraging members to submit technical articles, we rarely receive such submissions from non-award winners. For an organization that is so technical in nature, this is disappointing. We think the newsletter would be an easy way to share a lot of information about data management and we believe members would enjoy that yet there seems to be little interest in doing so.

b. Online Communications – made information available to members via email list, OFWIM public website, and OFWIM Groupsite.

c. Email Lists – maintained an email list of current members plus members from the previous two years.

2. Develop, maintain, and enhance effective communication tools to facilitate the exchange of information with members and non-members.

a. Public Website – Karen Horodysky has taken over as the primary website master and is doing an excellent job developing the website to improve navigability and accessibility. We continue to receive positive feedback on the new membership functionality and additional resources added last year. We have developed an online form for newsletter submissions this year. Dyanne has retired but continues to help Karen Horodysky as needed.

b. VYOND video – Heather Konell has created two Vyond videos titled “What is OFWIM?” and “Why Join OFWIM?” that are now available in the OFWIM website and YouTube Channel. This year, Heather also created a video to advertise the Virtual 2020 Conference and Business Meeting.

c. Award nomination forms – The fillable forms for the student scholarship and Innovation Award nominations continue to be very useful.

d. Groupsite – Groupsite, our social media tool for OFWIM members only, is used for discussion forums, posting announcements, sharing calendar events, and file storage. This year CMO continued work on organization and cleanup of Groupsite files, with these efforts being led by Dyanne and MaryEllen. We have 72 Groupsite members, a decrease of 11 since last year.

e. LinkedIn – we have 149 members on our public LinkedIn Group, an increase of 10 members since last year. CMO will be investigating our use of social media more in the coming year and will review the continued use of this platform as part of those larger scale efforts.

f. Facebook – The Facebook page has been maintained with regular updates along with the website. The page currently has 130 likes, an increase of 35 since last year.


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g. OFWIM Publications – Updated versions of the individual and organization membership forms, poster, brochure, and introductory flyer were created and posted to Groupsite, www.ofwim.org, and/or shared in the newsletter.

3. Encourage new OFWIM membership and support continuing OFWIM membership renewals.

a. Online payment and membership– Continue to use PayPal as the best option to allow the convenience of paying for a membership via credit card. These features were available to the membership in summer 2017 and continue to be very well received by the membership.

b. Annual Conference – encouraged both members and non-members to attend the virtual annual conference. There was a concerted effort to share conference announcements with external groups such as member agencies, Atlantic Coast Fisheries News, FITS, etc.

c. Renewals – maintained individual membership renewals from previous year to current year. Sent out renewal reminders to past OFWIM members according to the Membership Rules and Renewal Protocol.

d. Summary of OFWIM membership from this year (as of 9/08/2020) plus the past 7 years:

e. Administer travel grants. With the virtual conference, there were no travel awards this year.

4. Professionally complete the duties of the committee. a. Conference calls – the committee met monthly via conference call to

discuss ongoing committee business. Notes were taken during each meeting, circulated among members for comment, and posted to the OFWIM Groupsite.

b. Procedures Manual – the Committee reviewed the CMO Section of the draft Procedures Manual.

c. ExCom Committee Chair calls – the Committee Chair attended all of the quarterly “Committee Chair Updates” Executive Committee conference calls to update the ExCom on the CMO’s activities.

2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 Individual Memberships

36 39 38 34 18 25 18 19

Organizational Memberships

8 9 10 9 7 8 7 9

Total 84 85 99 92 65 81 57 68



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d. Annual report – prepared this annual report of the CMO’s 2020 activities for presentation during the annual conference business meeting, inclusion in the annual conference proceedings, and posting on OFWIM Groupsite.

Committee Reports

Conference Planning Chair: Chelsea Krause Members: Amy Ewing, Andrew Treble, Becca Scully, Beth Stys, Brittany Bajo, Chelsea Krause, Don Schrupp, Dyan Pursell, Jordan Hartman, Karen Horodysky, Keith Hurley, Lynn Barrett, MaryEllen Wickett, Sabra Tonn, Susan Watson, and Michael Barbour

This was an interesting year for the Conference Planning Committee! This group met once a month via conference call from December 2019 to September 2020. The conference venue and lodging were reserved in the fall of 2019 and this group was able to jump right in by deciding on a 2020 meeting theme and session types. However, as COVID-19 progressed and the country continued to shut down, the planning committee started entertaining the idea of holding a virtual conference. A survey was sent out to active members gauging interesting in attending the virtual conference. The response was clear that the virtual conference was the way to go. The group quickly switched gears and started reviewing platforms for the remote conference and meeting. The months leading up to the meeting were focused on call for abstracts and finalizing the agenda that accommodates multiple time zones.

With all the challenges we have faced this year, we have a great program lined up for this meeting. Another exciting addition is a panel discussion on COVID-19. We will be hearing from a few of our members on how they work has changed in the past year. We think that will be a great addition to our virtual conference and discuss some of their unique stories.

I would like to thank the 2020 members of the Conference Planning Committee and the ExCom for all of their input and hard work over the past year. I was always blown away by the engagement and discussion on all of our calls. It made being the chair very rewarding.

Recommendations for 2020 Conference Planning: Work with your local “experts” and shape the conference/activities around their

suggestions.


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Delegation of tasks by skill and interest – For example: generating promotional materials, seeking out sponsors, developing post ideas for Facebook, recruiting local partners, etc.

Continue to expand and polish the presentation of documents produced by this committee.

Consider advertising platforms for materials generated by this committee – perhaps work more closely with the Communications, Membership, and Outreach Committee.

Continue to brainstorm and personally reach out to local “partners” who may never otherwise hear of an OFWIM meeting, making sure to include people you actually know.

Continue to reach out to related organizations that are relatively local to the location of the annual meeting (e.g., sponsor a related organization’s annual meeting).

Continue to increase sponsorship recruitment and consider finding a local co-sponsor to improve outreach.


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Committee Reports

Elections, Nominations, and Awards

Chair: Jim Husband

Vice-Chair: Beth Stys

Members: Kevin Oxenrider, Sabra Tonn, Jessica Perkins, Dyan Pursell, John Taylor, Kyle Kaskie, Ross Scott, Mack Frantz

The Elections, Nominations, and Awards Committee (ENA) is responsible for developing and implementing various awards and recognition programs for OFWIM, and for developing a slate of candidates for the annual elections. Included in this work is implementation of the student scholarship application, in which university students studying in wildlife biology fields can attend an OFWIM conference to gain experience in the professional world.

Accomplishments:

Student Research Scholarship: Due to the COVID Pandemic, the ENA Committee Suspended the 2020 Scholarship. ENA expects to resume scholarships in 2021.

The 2019 Student scholarship winners both gave presentations at the OFWIM 2020 virtual conference. Their second $500 research award had been provided to them prior to the 2020 conference. They will still receive the registration waiver and up to $1,000 for travel reimbursement to attend the 2021 OFWIM Conference.

The ENA committee has developed web-based raffle and silent auction to continue to raise student scholarship funds, even though the virtual meeting platform. The ENA committee requested that each OFWIM committee provide a themed “basket” for the targeted raffle/silent auction. Additional donations were included in a general raffle, targeted raffle and silent auction. To minimize distractions and potential technical issues, all raffle (general and targeted) tickets had to be purchased prior to the conference. As per usual conference practices, each conference registrant received one free general raffle ticket.

Innovation Award: The Innovation Award provides recognition for the outstanding use of technology and/or collaboration to advance fish and wildlife information management. This year we had one nomination. The award goes to Arizona Game and Fish Commission submission by Sabra Tonn. The Arizona Game and Fish Commission’s efforts centered on


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development of the Arizona Scientific Collecting License Data Submission Web Application a tool that automates, collects and analyzes data submissions from holders of scientific collections permits. Arizona Game and Fish Commission will receive a 1-year free membership as part of the award.

New Officers: The committee worked hard recruiting new officers and had success in

forming a slate of nominees for 3 positions that will be open on the Executive Committee

in the upcoming year. The committee was able to locate 1 candidate for President-Elect

(Dyan Pursell), 1 for Member-At-Large (Amy Ewing) and 1 for Treasurer (Michael

Barbour). Balloting has commenced and the new officers will be named at the virtual

Conference Business Meeting.

Best Poster and Best Presentation Awards: The ENA Committee provided a poll for meeting participants to vote for best presentation. The winner will be announced soon after closure of the conference. The OFWIM 2020 virtual conference did not have a poster session, so there is no voting/winner for best poster.

Service Awards: Service awards were prepared and presented by the Committee. Service Awards were presented to:

• Karen Horodysky: President 2020 • Michael Barbour: Treasurer 2018-2020 • Andrew Treble: Member-At-Large 2020


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Committee Reports

Training and Education Committee

Michael Barbour, Chair

Members: Amy Ewing, Susan Steffen

The Training and Education Committee held 7 conference calls since the OFWIM 2019

Meeting.

We are working with Keith Hurley on developing Bite-Size R, a series of short videos

aimed to provide beginners training into R, a free software environment for statistical

computing and graphics. Several introductory videos have been completed, and will be

made available to OFWIM members when the first grouping is completed.

We posted three OFWIM vYond videos on the OFWIM YouTube channel: Who we are,

Membership, and Virtual Meeting 2020. The Python webinars hosted by Don Katnik in

preparation for the 2014 Conference workshop were also posted to the YouTube channel.

TEC or other OFWIM members have posted 29 notices of external webinars in the Groupsite discussion topic for external webinars since the 2019 meeting.


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Officer Candidates

Vote at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ofwim-2020-officer-elections Candidate for President-Elect Dyan Pursell, Missouri Department of Conservation Dyan Pursell is a GIS Specialist in the Science Branch of the Missouri Department of Conservation. Dyan has been in the GIS field since 2004. She has a BA in History and a MA in Geography from the University of Missouri. Dyan spent the first 11 years of her GIS career at Missouri Resource Assessment Partnership (MoRAP) before moving to MDC. Her major duties include providing GIS expertise to a variety of research programs, developing LiDAR projects, and creating custom tool kits for non-GIS users. When not at work, Dyan spends her time reading, knitting, and learning different languages while she’s taking road trips with her husband Scot. Candidate for Treasurer (3-year position) Michael Barbour, Arizona Game and Fish Department Michael Barbour is an HDMS Data Specialist with the Arizona Game and Fish Department. He is responsible for curating biological information on special status wildlife species occurrences from all sources for the needs of Arizona’s Heritage Data Management System (HDMS). He also acts as State Administrator for Arizona’s iMapInvasives program and maintains the iMapInvasives database for Arizona. He received B.S. degrees in Biology and Wildlife Management from Virginia Tech, and an M.S. in Wildlife Ecology from the University of New Hampshire. He completed a Ph.D. research project in Zoology (Wildlife Management) with the Cooperative Wildlife Research Laboratory (CW RL) at Southern Illinois University.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/ofwim-2020-officer-elections


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Candidate for Member-at-Large Amy Martin Ewing, Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources Amy Martin Ewing currently serves as Environmental Services Biologist and Wildlife Information Manager Services (WIS) Program Manager at the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources (DWR). Amy is responsible for reviewing projects, policies, and permits for impacts upon wildlife, wildlife habitats, and programs for which DWR is responsible, including threatened and endangered species protection. Amy represents DWR on the inter-agency team that oversees wetland and stream mitigation banking in Virginia as well as other inter-agency committees, including the Virginia Forest Conservation Partnership. In addition, Amy guides and oversees the work of DWR’s WIS staff: a data scientist focused on internal biological data projects, and an information biologist focused on external education and updating of internal wildlife information. Amy received her B.S. in Wildlife Management from Virginia Tech in 1996 and her M.S. in Environmental Science from the Center for Environmental Studies (CES) at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2002. As an Environmental Biologist, Amy is able to work on her two passions: wildlife management and environmental protection. In support of her goals, Amy works closely with DWR’s GIS and WIS programs to ensure that the agency is appropriately managing, updating, and serving wildlife data to the environmental community, our partners, and our constituents. Amy first became an OFWIM member in 2001 and has served on the ExCom before as Member-At-Large and Secretary and also previously led the Data Standards and Technology Trends Committee. Amy has presented numerous times at OFWIM, been a session moderator, Beth’s Vanna for the raffle, and has participated as a member of the Conference Planning Committee a number of times.


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2020 Conference Registered Attendees Albeke, Shannon WyGISC - University of Wyoming [email protected]

Aulenbach, Steve USGS [email protected]

Bajo, Brittany Tennessee Technological University [email protected]

Banach, Michael Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission [email protected]

Barbour, Michael Arizona Game and Fish Department [email protected]

Barrett, Lynn Tenn Wildlife Resources Agency [email protected]

Bayer, Jen USGS [email protected]

Bialousz, Mike ESRI [email protected]

Blasius, Becky Department of the Interior-Bureau of Reclamation [email protected]

Brooks, George Virginia Tech [email protected]

Burns, Nicole Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission [email protected]

Case, Nicholas WyGISC [email protected]

Clark, Elizabeth Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency [email protected]

Cornwell, Scott NYSDEC [email protected]

Cortez, Dyanne [email protected]

Dockendorf, Kevin NC Wildlife Resources Commission [email protected]

Ewers, Samantha University of Wyoming [email protected]

Ewing, Amy Va Dept of Wildlife Resources [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]



















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Knowles, Jimmy Bureau of Reclamation [email protected]

Konell, Heather ACCSP [email protected]

Flower, Carolyn Arizona Game and Fish Department [email protected]

Frankland, Brent Colorado Parks and Wildlife [email protected]

Frantz, Mack WVDNR [email protected]

Friedrich, Meryl West Virginia Division of Natural Resources [email protected]

Gerecke, Chris Timmons Group [email protected]

Gundlach, David DOI/USBR/LCR MSCP [email protected]

Horodysky, Karen Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources [email protected]

Hurley, Keith Nebraska Game and Parks Commission [email protected]

Husband, James Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources [email protected]

Jones, Christopher San Bernardino Valley Municipal Water District [email protected]

Kamener, Gabriel Florida International University [email protected]

Kauphusman, John AZ Game & Fish Department [email protected]

Keller, Cherie Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission [email protected]

Kelly, James Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency [email protected]

Fleming, Sunny Esri [email protected]

Fleming, Julie Missouri Department of Conservation [email protected]

Krause, Chelsea City of Sioux Falls [email protected]

Lauzon, Christopher Canadian Wildlife Service - ECCC [email protected]






















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Loubere, Kendra Arizona Game and Fish Department [email protected]

Meehan, Amy Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife [email protected]

Middaugh, Chris Arkansas Game and Fish Commission [email protected]

Morgeson, Clinton VA Department of Wildlife Resources [email protected]

Moy, Tracy Arkansas Game and Fish Commission [email protected]

Orzel, Emma Canadian Wildlife Service [email protected]

Perkins, Jessica WV Division of Natural Resources [email protected]

Petre, Sally Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency [email protected]

Prior-Magee, Julie U.S. Geological Survey [email protected]

Pursell, Dyan Missouri Department of Conservation [email protected]

Roberts, Phoebe Colorado Parks and Wildlife [email protected]

Rudd, Nathan Bureau of Reclamation [email protected]

Sauby, Kristen Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission [email protected]

Schrupp, Don Colorado Division of Wildlife (retired) [email protected]

Scott, Ross South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks [email protected]

Scroggins, Craig Missouri Dept of Conservation [email protected]

Scully, Rebecca USGS [email protected]

Seamster, Virginia New Mexico Department of Game and Fish [email protected]

Simcox, Brandon Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency [email protected]

Simpson, Annie U.S. Geological Survey [email protected]






















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Simpson, Julie ASMFC [email protected]

Sizemore, Travis US Bureau of Reclamation Lower Colorado Region [email protected]

Sleezer, Logan Emporia State University [email protected]

Spicci, Tony Missouri Department of Conservation [email protected]

Stratz, Collin Inland Empire Resource Conservation District [email protected]

Struckhoff, Alicia Missouri Department of Conservation [email protected]

Stys, Beth FWC [email protected]

Terrell, Kate USFWS [email protected]

Thomas, Meagan Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources [email protected]

Tonn, Sabra Arizona Game and Fish Department [email protected]

Treble, Andrew Colorado Parks and Wildlife [email protected]

Trollinger, Jeff VA Department of Wildlife Resources [email protected]

Vencill, Alexander South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks [email protected]

Watson, Susan Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources (formerly VA Dept. of Game & Inland Fisheries) [email protected]

Wheeler, Powell NC Wildlife Resources Commission [email protected]

Wickett, MaryEllen Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife [email protected]

Wilke, Greg Pacific States Marine Fisheries [email protected]

Wilkerson, Tami Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission [email protected]

Williams, Mari PSMFC/NOAAF NWFSC [email protected]

Wise, Lindsey Institute for Natural Resources [email protected]






















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Annual Conference Proceedings...Michael Barbour . 2020 OFWIM Annual Conference 2020 Vision: Looking...

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Transcript of Annual Conference Proceedings...Michael Barbour . 2020 OFWIM Annual Conference 2020 Vision: Looking...