Institute for Environmental NegotiationFiscal Year 2017 Annual Report

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485 Contents

Our Vision

IEN At a Glance

A world with authentic leaders, healthy communities, and a resilient environment.

Empowering communities to create shared solutions.

STAFF AND INTERNS

IEN PROJECTS

BUILDING CAPACITY

BUILDING SOLUTIONS

BUILDING KNOWLEDGE

DONORS

DONORS

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Our Mission

IEN Staff

2016-2017 Interns

Kelly Altizer, VNRLI Program ManagerTanya Denckla Cobb, DirectorFranklin Dukes, Ph.D., Distinguished Institute FellowCarla Jo Breeden, Office ManagerTammy Switzer, Administrative AssistantJudie Talbot, Senior Associate

Allie Arnold (CLAS '18)

Ali Barta (MBA/MPP '18)

Dorothy Baker (MUEP '18)

J.D. Brown (MUEP '16)

Lea Brumfeld (MUEP ‘17)

Eiline Cai (CLAS '17)

Emma Dillon (CLAS '17)

Tori Kanellopoulous (MUEP '18)

Dylan Kolb (MPP, '18)

Peter Krebs (MUEP ‘17)

Rachel Moon (ARCH, '18)

Allison Owens (MPP, '18)

Alex Sentilles (MUEP ‘17)

Christian Storch (MUEP '18)

Devin Willis (CLAS, '20)

Julia Yu (MUEP ‘17)

450+alumni of the Virginia Natural Resources Leadership Institute

stakeholders engaged in

20+projects

600+

37 projects and

contracts awarded

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The 2016 - 2017 fiscal year was rich and varied, and brought numerous opportunities to IEN. The scope of IEN's work continues to affect communities in Virginia and beyond.

One project close to home, though far-reaching in its impacts, was our facilitation of the development of the Memorial for Enslaved Laborers at UVA, which

provides long overdue recognition of those who built the university and sustained its daily life.

Another project, the RVA H20 Water Plan, has helped set a new bar for how communities can manage their water through integrated water planning.

Outside Virginia, we facilitated the Pennsylvania summit where nearly 200 participants developed strategies to implement the state's Watershed Improvement Plan. By reducing pollutants in the Susquehanna River, Virginia’s cherished Chesapeake Bay will become cleaner.

And then there is a bit of uncanny prescience: in summer 2016, we saw a need to develop national guidance to help communities navigate the deep wounds and beliefs surrounding monuments and public spaces. We launched Transforming Community Spaces (TCS): Bending the Arc of Memory Toward Healing and Justice in March 2017 with the inaugural gathering of its national advisory committee. We could not have foreseen how, only five months later, the tragic events of August 12 would make this work more urgent.

Some IEN projects even change lives and communities – no small matter. The Virginia Natural Resources Leadership Institute completed its 17th year with over 450 alumni. And the Clinch River Valley Initiative, now in its seventh year, continues to assist Virginia's southwest five–county coalition to build a vibrant and resilient region. These are but a few examples of how IEN is facilitating collaborative change – helping people shape our world together. We hope this report is a teaser, giving you insight into IEN’s compass while creating a desire to learn more. We look forward to working with you!

Message from the Director IEN ProjectsTransportation• Campbell County Route 29 Corridor Planning Effort: Collaboration Framework (*)• Clarkton Bridge Stakeholder Engagement (*)• New Baltimore/Rt. 29 Community Stakeholder Engagement (*)

Negotiation & Facilitation Training• National Preservation Institute Trainings (Richmond)• National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Trainings• Virginia Department of Environmental Quality: Negotiation Training• Virginia Natural Resources Leadership Institute (VNRLI) (*)• Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI)

Resilient & Sustainable Food Systems• White House Kitchen Garden• U.Va. Sustainable Food Strategy Task Force (*)

Strategic Planning• Rivanna Conservation Alliance

Water Quality & Stormwater Management • Chesapeake Bay Landscape Professional Certificate: Facilitation• Chesapeake Bay TMDL Assessment (*)• Richmond (RVA) Clean Water Plan (*)

Community Resilience • Clinch River Valley Initiative (CRVI) (*)• Resilience and Adaptation Feasibility Tool (RAFT) (*)• Ringwood Mines Community Involvement Plan (*)• University and Community Action for Racial Equity (UCARE)

Community Engagement• Loudoun Water/Beaverdam Reservoir: Community Engagement• Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services: Managed Pollinator Protection Plan

(*) Project Descriptions Included in Report

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Clinch River Valley InitiativeThe Clinch River Valley Initiative (CRVI) is a pioneering effort to build local economies in the coalfields of Southwest Virginia, focusing on the Clinch River Valley. Working at a watershed scale with several local partners, this grassroots effort has developed significant support and momentum throughout the region.

Utilizing a consensus-based approach, project partners have developed goals for connecting downtown revitalization, outdoor recreation, creating a state park, enhancing water quality, entrepreneurship and environmental education along the Clinch River.

Below: CRVI Walking Tour of the Town of Dungannon

Working with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries Service Office of Habitat Conservation, IEN conducted a customized training for each of the Office’s three Divisions: Restoration Center, Habitat Protection, and the Chesapeake Bay Office.

The training sessions revolved around experiential opportunities to learn and practice new skills which are immediately transferable to professional settings and interactions. Each session focused on different themes tailored to respective staff responsibilities and authorities. The suite of activities refreshes and enhances skill development related to interest-based negotiation, conflict management styles and approaches, meeting facilitation, online meetings, and establishing tangible outcomes and deliverables.

National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Training

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Virginia Natural Resources Leadership Institute The Virginia Natural Resources Leadership Institute (VNRLI) equips environmental leaders to address contentious natural resource issues through conflict resolution and collaborative problem solving.

VNRLI is unique in Virginia in offering a multi-sector approach to professional growth and development. Emerging leaders across industry, nonprofit, and public sectors are able

to learn together and form a network of lasting relationships. The nine-month program is comprised of six sessions held across the state.

The 33 members of the 2016-2017 class delved into some of the Virginia's most pressing issues, including water quality in the Chesapeake Bay, extractive resources, and environmental justice.

Below: The VNRLI Class of 2017

The resilience of Virginia's coastal cities, towns, and villages is threated by sinking ground, increased rainfall intensity, storm surges and rising seas.

How will coastal communities address the challenges that rising water poses to established neighborhoods and businesses? How can residents be involved and engaged in decidig their own fate?

To address these questions, UVA architecture professor Alex Wall used a Resilience Research SEED grant to work with IEN's Director, Tanya Denckla Cobb, to convene a focus group of coastal locality stakeholders. With the support and partnership of Old Dominion University's Virginia Sea Grant, a focus group of eleven knowledgeable “thought leaders” from coastal localities, universities and nonprofits gathered in

August to tackle the difficult topic of relocation. The result of their work – Community Relocation in the Face of Recurring Inundation: A Preliminary Framework – is intended as a conversation starter, in hopes that others will build on this work to help coastal localities prepare for the challenges associated with possible community relocation.

Community Relocation in the Face of Recurring Inundation

Left: Participants explored how at-risk coastal communities might conceptualize, plan, and implement the undesired and unwanted relocation of a neighborhood or community.

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In June IEN facilitated the kickoff and listening session for Pennsylvania’s Phase III Watershed Implementation Plan (WIP).

The event, attended by over 200 local government representatives, members of the agricultural community, and other stakeholders, was an opportunity for participants to share ideas for how the state can best achieve federally mandated water pollution reductions in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

Since the launch of the Chesapeake Bay Restoration Strategy, Pennsylvania has made significant progress toward meeting EPA targets, but continues to lag behind in achieving the goals outlined for nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment levels. Listening session discussions were focused around

ideas for the Phase III WIP, which will specify the steps the state will take through 2025 to meet local water pollution reduction goals in the Bay watershed.

Pennsylvania's Phase III Watershed Implementation Plan (WIP)B

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RVA Clean Water PlanThe RVA H20 Clean Water Plan (an initiative of City of Richmond’s Department of Public Utilities) creates an integrated approach to wastewater, stormwater, and drinking water, bringing them together in one watershed management program, so that together, the City can achieve "cleaner water faster.”

To create the Clean Water Plan, the City of Richmond engaged key technical stakeholders who are knowledgeable about water quality issues over a two-year period.

As the facilitator for the process, IEN worked with the City Department of Public Utilities, West Cary Group, and Limnotech to design the multi-year stakeholder engagement process in which the technical stakeholders identified key watershed goals, objectives, and strategies, and then prioritized watershed strategies and projects for implementation.

With the Clean Water Plan completed, the City is now entering the implementation phase of the project.

Above: Stakeholders discuss Richmond project sites

UVA Sustainable Food Strategy Task Force

The IEN is working with the Sustainable Food Strategy Task Force to implement the University of Virginia's Sustainability Plan (2016-2020) goals relating to food.

Completing its first year of work, the task force is led by IEN and includes participants from UVA Sustainability, UVA Dining, Environmental Sciences, Public Health, Darden Dining, Hospital Dining, the School of Architecture, and student organizations concerned and interested in food and its impacts.

Meeting once a month, the task force has been developing strategies to facilitate implementation of the five Sustainability Plan food goals which are to:

1. Annually increase the percentage of sustainable foods and beverages available on grounds; 2. Reduce food waste and single-use servings sent to the landfill by 2030, in alignment with overall UVA waste goals;3.Reduce the water and energy impacts of dining operations;

Students at the UVA Farmer's Market event. Photo by Nina Morris.

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4. Increase students, staff and faculty awareness of sustainable food systems and seek to translate this heightened awareness into informed choices;5. Collaborate within UVA and with the region, bringing together faculty, staff, students, and dining operations to advance sustainable food systems in the broader community.

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IEN assisted the US Environmental Protection Agency in developing a Community Involvement Plan for the Ringwood Mines Site. The site, located in New Jersey, is the first (perhaps only) to be removed and then returned to the Superfund National Priorities List.

Community members and the EPA had been working productively on cleanup options, until disagreement arose over an alternative on-site disposal solution. IEN met with members of the community, the mayor and EPA representatives to hear their perspectives on the possibilities to re-establish lines of communication regarding cleanup activities. Drawing on stakeholder interviews, IEN ensured that the background contained in the Community Involvement Plan would represent all of the participants’ perspectives. Communication protocols were

established between EPA and the state-recognized tribe, whose members comprised the majority of the affected community.

The Community Involvement Plan was submitted in June 2017 and, since then, the Community Advisory Committee has reconvened to monitor and discuss future cleanup activities and options.

Above: The Ringwood Mines site. Photo courtesy of the EPA.

Ringwood Mines Superfund Community Involvement Plan

Transforming Community SpacesThroughout the nation, we are seeing insistent challenges to building names, monuments, memorials, and other sites identified with slavery, colonialism, and more recent contested histories. To help communities address these challenges, IEN has launched a new initiative, Transforming Community Spaces (TCS).

IEN convened a TCS national advisory committee in March, to inform the development of guidance for communities and institutions. This guidance will help institutions and communities benefit from past lessons learned in order to design and convene inclusive, transparent dialogues that have a greater likelihood of yielding desired outcomes.

TCS also features two pilot projects. The first, “Charlottesville Acts for Racial Equity (CARE)”, will link truth-telling with committed action in Charlottesville in the wake of the 2017 attacks by white supremacists. The second project will be at another location in the U.S., to be determined at a later date.

Although much of the recent national dialogue

around memorials has centered on iconography of the Confederacy, many other locations outside of the South also grapple with how to best remember troubled histories.

Above: Members of the TCS Advisory Committee reflect during a 2017 meeting.

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S IEN worked with the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), to facilitate a Section 106 stakeholder engagement process (funded by the Virginia Transportation Research Council), to determine the future of the historic Clarkton Bridge.

The bridge, which spans the Staunton River at the border between Halifax and Charlotte Counties in southern Virginia, is over 100 years old and is on the National Register of Historic Places. The condition of the bridge has deteriorated and it has been closed to vehicular and pedestrian traffic for several years. VDOT felt that the bridge posed a

hazard to public safety and should be removed, while some community members wanted to see the bridge preserved.

Following the stakeholder engagement process, group members reached agreement with VDOT that the bridge needed to be removed, and parts of the bridge preserved for historic interpretation. Stakeholders hope to raise private funds for construction of a pedestrian bridge at the same site, which VDOT would be willing to maintain. Below: The Clarkton Bridge, courtesy of the Clarkton Bridge Alliance.

Clarkton Bridge Stakeholder Engagement

IEN worked with VTRC and VDOT to design and facilitate a consensus-building process for a section of Route 29 near Culpeper that is considered unsafe due to a series of rises that lower visibility, but which also lies in a region of historic battlefield vistas. Changes to the road could change the representation of cultural history, and thus stakeholder engagement has been a critical issue for VDOT.

Over the course of 9 months, stakeholder team members identified goals and concerns, learned about the engineering options for the corridor and intersections concerned, and discussed their preferred solutions. The group also reached consensus over 10 principles that should guide selection of the transportation options that are being evaluated throughout the corridor.

New Baltimore/Rt. 29 Community Stakeholder Engagement

The Virginia Transportation Research Council (VTRC) partnered with Campbell County, the Lynchburg District Office of the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), the Central Virginia Metropolitan Planning Organization (CVMPO), and IEN on a collaborative planning effort.

The VTRC was awarded one of seven by national grants by the Federal Highway Administration (FHA). The grant enabled the VTRC to test the use of the FHA's collaborative planning "PlanWorks" framework with Campbell County and provide feedback on how PlanWorks can be improved.

The partners worked with the community and local interests to identify and submit a preferred package of improvements for the Route 29 corridor, just south of Lynchburg. The final recommendations support safety, local access and through-traffic flow.

Campbell County Rt. 29 Planning Effort

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E Memorial to Enslaved LaborersIn June the University of Virginia's Board of Visitors approved the “Freedom Ring” design and location of the Memorial to Enslaved Laborers, authorizing the design and development team to move forward with the project.

IEN was part of the design team, led by the Boston firm, Höweler+Yoon. IEN's role was to plan and facilitate the significant engagement of community members, faculty, and students, to help inform the memorial design.

The design of a new memorial marks a critical moment to address the complex history of the University and of the country, and affirms UVA’s role as a leader in the national conversation about race, history and institutions.

Photo: Renderings of the "Freedom Ring" design planned for the Memorial for Enslaved Laborers at the University of Virginia, courtesy of Höweler+Yoon.

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E Resilience and Adaptation Feasibility ToolIEN is partnering with the Virginia Coastal Policy Center at William & Mary and Old Dominion University - Virginia Sea Grant to develop a tool to help coastal localities increase their resilience to coastal flooding and storm hazards. The RAFT includes three components: scorecard assessment of locality resilience, a locality workshop for leaders to prioritize actions to insure resilience, and assistance with implementation of these actions.

With support from the National Fish & Wildlife Foundation (NFWF), the partnership piloted The

RAFT in 2017 to assess environmental, social, and economic resilience in three coastal communities: Gloucester County, the Town of Cape Charles, and the City of Portsmouth.

The advisory committee includes mutliple universities and disciplines, local government representatives, state agencies, and the nonprofit, Wetlands Watch.

Photos: Workshop participants from Cape Charles (right) and Gloucester (left) provide input on coastal resilience in their communities.

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ENutrient Management PlanningThrough a grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, IEN worked with Sustainable Chesapeake in convening a stakeholder Nutrient Management Leadership Team to develop recommendations for enhancing farmer participation in the Virginia Department of Conservation & Recreation’s Nutrient Management Program.

The approach centered on a survey to query farmers, nutrient management planners and industry representatives on the strengths and challenges associated with the current approach. Based on survey responses, IEN facilitated development by the Leadership Team of recommendations to strengthen the state program. Recommendations include establishment of an ongoing stakeholder advisory group, creating several paths for participation in the program, making plan outputs and revisions more user-friendly, and partnering on education and outreach.B

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White House Kitchen GardenThrough a collaborative agreement with UVA and the National Park Service, first lady Michelle Obama commissioned UVA landscape architecture professor Elizabeth Meyer to lead a team of faculty members, including IEN Director Tanya Denckla Cobb, and students in designing a communal table and gathering space for the White House Kitchen Garden. The Garden was created by the first lady in 2009 to encourage national conversations around health and wellness.

The team spent hundreds of hours designing improvements for the garden, building prototypes and conducting two site visits at the White House to test their designs.

The team developed a document depicting the evolution of the White House Garden, which can be found on the Park Service website

Photo: UVA faculty and students involved in the White House Kitchen Garden project. Courtesy of Mary McCall.

Businesses and Organizations:Charlottesville Area Community Foundation: Ballyshannon FundDept. of Urban & Environmental Planning, University of Virginia School of ArchitectureDominion ResourcesFriends of Southwest VirginiaUniversity of Virginia, Frank Batten School of Leadership & Public PolicyVirginia Department of Conservation & RecreationVirginia Department of Forestry - Urban and Community Forestry GrantVirginia Department of Game & Inland Fisheries Virginia Cooperative Extension at Virginia Tech

The Institute for Environmental Negotiation expresses its heartfelt appreciation to its Fiscal Year 2017 grantors and donors:

Frederick AbbeyHeather BarrarAnne BealsCharles W. BeckerWade BiddixAllen Brockenbrough, IIISusan & Louis CableWilliam ConkleGene CrabtreeAlycia CrallRick CroffordTanya & Cecil CobbJustin DoyleFrank & Linda DukesDiane DunawayBob Dunn

Mike & Sue EllerbrockElena GonzalezRebecca GwynnKhalil HassanCarol A. HeiserMelissa & Jeff HerlitzAnn JenningsDr. John L. JohnsonScott JohnsonDavid JoynerDaniel KestnerCathryn KloetzliRyan KlopfUrsula Lemanski Cathryn McCueLeslie Middleton

Emily NelsonCraig NicolJudy Okay Anthony PuglisiRobert RadspinnerBettina K. RingNicole SandbergLlyn SharpBrian SewellGinny SneadDavid SpearsJennifer WamplerA.J. WangnerBud WatsonSynthia WaymackCarey Whitehead

Kelly Wilder Kim Woodwell

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Gifts to the Virginia Natural Resources Leadership Institute & Paul Revell Fund

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2015 Ivy Road, Suite 422Charlottesville, VA 22903

Mailing Address:P.O. Box 400179Charlottesville, VA 22904

Report design by : Julia Yu & Peter Krebs

Report edited by:Kelly Altizer Unless otherwise noted, all photos are by IEN staff except:

P.4 courtesy of Dan Addison (UVA Communications), p. 10 courtesy of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and p. 19 courtesy of Höweler+Yoon,

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