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Business Meeting (Virtual) 2019

Wednesday September 11th, 2019 5 PM ET

Attendees: Caroline Ridley, Anjali Kumar, Charlotte Levy, Emily Graves, Nicole Zimmerman, Rich Pouyat

Agenda:

  1. Introductions

 

  1. State of the Section
    1. Treasury is in good condition, offering additional travel awards went well.
    2. Currently we have over 350 members on our email list, and almost 200 registered
      members.

 

  1. Elections
    1. Elections will be for Chair-Elect and Secretary.
    2. Nominations will be open through October 2nd, 2019
    3. Voting will be open for 1 week: October 4th through October 11th
    4. Send nominations to Anjali Kumar (kumar.anja@nullgmail.com)

                                         
i.    Please include contact information for the nominee

                                        
ii.    Self-nominations are welcomed as well as nominating others

                                       
iii.    Candidates for each position will be asked to write a short response to why they want to
serve in the position and provide a short bio

    1. Job descriptions for the By-laws:

                                         
i.    The Chairperson-Elect shall arrange the program for all meetings and activities of the Section,and
shall assume the duties of the Chairperson whenever that person is unable to
act. The Chairperson-Elect is to assume the position of the Chairperson
after one year’s duty unless the active Chairperson is reelected. The
Chairperson-Elect shall serve for a term of one year and shall be eligible for
reelection.

                                        
ii.    The Secretary shall keep the records of the Section, including a current membership and
mailing list. The Secretary will communicate Section activities through an
electronic newsletter. The Secretary shall serve for a term of one year, and
shall be eligible for reelection.

    1. The Chair will be the current Chairperson-Elect Caroline Ridley and Past-Chairperson will be Anjali Kumar

 

  1. Quick recap of events held at the Annual Meeting
    1. General agreement that this year’s events were successful. Science Policy 101,
      legal Defense, and Local Policy Issues events especially stood out as
      adding a lot of value and being well attended.
    2. Science Policy 102 was less successful. Caroline suggests that “next year, we
      leave the policy career stuff in Career Central, but everything else
      needs a home elsewhere in the meeting program”. Sarah reminds the group
      that the different coffee break formula next year may help with this.

 

  1. Brainstorming
    for 20    20 ESA Annual Meeting
    1. Salt Lake City, UT ; August 2nd to 7th, 2020.
      Theme: Harnessing the ecological data revolution
    2. We will make the advocacy and taking action event a workshop or special session as the
      inspire deadline is coming up too soon. Anjali will be taking suggestions
      for undergraduates, graduates, agency, and early career folks in the area
      of science policy.
    3. Field trip/event combo possible

                                                             
i.     Field trips are on Friday this year

                                                           
ii.     Sarah reminds that SLC has the sharpest gradient between urban/wild in the country.

                                                         
iii.     USFS Regional office only an hour away

                                                         
iv.     Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest very close to conference center

    1. Mixer: definitely will do again, suggest Squatters Pub
    2. Participate in potential Human Dimensions Collaborative, inspire session to talk
      about our work and goals.
    3. There is a lot of interest in a local science policy session in Utah

                                                             
i.     Some possible ideas:

1.      Fire,

2.      Great Salt Lake,

3.      Forest Service GIS group (GTAC)

4.     
Bears Ears (land rights, indigenous issues, resource extraction,
policy roll backs) (potential collaboration with the Traditional Ecological
Knowledge section, note their involvement in the plenary).

                                                           
ii.     Possible Contacts

1.      Rich knows the local lead, could ask her for suggestions

2.      Rich previously led a local science policy workshop, may be able to bring in some of the same
folks

3.      Talk to the Southwest Chapter for ideas

4.      Based on emails, did not find members of our chapter currently in Utah, but some might step
forward if requested in next email.

 

  1. News from ESA leadership
    1. Changes to governing documents are proposed that will be voted on by general
      membership and Council in coming months (see ESA Governance Renovation
      FAQ)
    2. New for 2020 Annual meeting

                                                             
i.     Change in schedule/structure

                                                           
ii.     $60 abstract fee for talk (with ability to opt-out), will fund recordings

    1. Secretary Info

                                                        
i.     Did more tweeting this year – went well & people responding to twitter feed
more. Scheduled tweets ahead of time.

                                                           
ii.     Switch over to mailchimp or another email platform

                                                         
iii.     More science policy fellowships  – ask our members for suggestions

                                                         
iv.    Newsletterformat – upcoming deadlines for fellowships and news for ESA that could be
relevant. Information outside the annual meeting.

                                                           
v.     Charlotte can migrate info over to mail chimp and we can do a test newsletter for the
wider leadership group and people on the call.

 

  1. Brainstorming
    for the Policy Section
    1. Potential to provide policy “horizon-scanning” for Public Affairs Committee during one
      of their in-person meetings

                                         
i.    Rich reminds that this was one of the original goals of the Policy Committee, and
that this could provide a lot of value added if we discuss further.

    1. Newsletter— we will do a limited first run of a newsletter this coming week, to see
      how effective it might be/how we might use it.