A Survey of Collaborative Practices by Natural Resource Managers on Military Lands

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A Survey of Collaborative Practices by Natural
Resource Managers on Military Lands
Scott Thomas, Ph.D.Stetson Engineers,
Inc.Diamondhead, MS [phone]
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Outline

• Why is collaboration by the military important?
• Survey data how much collaboration does the
  military perform?
• What drives collaboration?
• Thoughts on agency culture
• Conclusions and recommendations

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What is Collaboration in Natural Resource
Management?

• Purpose
• Communicating intent, sharing information,
  coordinating actions, building trust,
  prioritizing objectives collectively, managing
  perceptions and expectations, sharing lessons
  learned, resolving conflict
• Outcomes
• Changed perceptions and increased quality of
  decisions

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Mandates for Collaboration

• 1994 DoD Directive on ecosystem management
• 1998 Sikes Act Improvement Act
• 2005 Executive Order on cooperative conservation

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Endangered Species and DoDs Share
Millions of
Number of
Acres of Land
Federally
Listed Species
Acres of Land
Number of Federally
Adapted from Natural Heritage Data Network -
Listed Species
The Nature Conservancy
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Urbanization inSouthern California
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Camp Pendletons Increasing Responsibility for
Regional Resources

• 18 TE Species
• Riparian
• Least Bells Vireo - 45
• Uplands
• Pacific Pocket Mouse - 100
• Riverside Fairy Shrimp - 66
• Estuarine/Beach
• CA Least Tern - 20
• Tidewater Goby - 100 of SOCAL

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Relevance to Management of Coastal Systems

• Extensive coastal resources
• Deep pockets
• Criticism for lack of collaboration
• Regulatory agencies and advocacy groups
• Consequences
• If military installations do not collaborate with
  regional stakeholders, then they
• Fail to capture input from external organizations
  and individuals
• Fail to leverage others strengths
• Fail to consider issues at the spatial scale
  necessary to address resource sustainability
• Reach lower quality resource management decisions
  
• How well bases collaborate is of interest to
• Military headquarters
• Other agencies
• State and local governments
• Concerned citizens
• Conservationists and researchers seeking
  partnering opportunities

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Hypothesis

• Military installations are not performing
  collaboration.

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Research Design

• Telephone Survey
• High response rate
• Control who responds
• Control question sequence
• Clarify misunderstood questions
• Stratified Random Sample
• Army 39
• Navy 15
• Air Force 31
• USMC 15

Population Natural resource management staff at major military installations
Sample unit Natural resource manager
Sample frame 197 major bases
Sample size n 74
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Operational Definition

• An installation is performing collaboration if
  it
• Conducts regular/frequent meetings to share
  information in region or watershed
• Regulators
• Land management agencies
• Private groups/citizens
• Collaborates with outside organizations to
  conduct research and conservation
• Solicits input for natural resource planning from
  outside organizations/individuals
• Shares results of surveys and studies with
  outside organizations/individuals
• Plans at the watershed or eco-regional level
• Natural resource staff indicates that
  collaboration is a management priority

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Success Criteria

• Must be doing at least 4 of the 8 elements during
  any 6-month period
• Rationale
• Elements can be performed independently, so
  performance of all is not absolutely required
• However, multiple elements (at least half) must
  be employed at a frequency that creates the
  momentum and synergy necessary for collaboration.

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Respondent Attributes
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Installation Attributes
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Implementation Rate
Least Collaboration
Most Collaboration
Implementation Rates Implementation Rates Implementation Rates Implementation Rates Implementation Rates Implementation Rates
of All Bases Marine Air Force Navy Army
Installations performing at least 4 of the 8 collaboration criteria 74 (10) 45 (29) 74 (18) 91 (17) 76 (16)
Installations performing at least 6 of the 8 collaboration criteria 52 (11) 36 (28) 61 (20) 55 (29) 52 (18)
All Bases Marine Corps Air Force Navy Army
Mean rate (out of 8 total success criteria) 5.01 (0.49) 4.45 (1.51) 5.22 (1.02) 5.36 (0.86) 4.93 (0.82)
95 confidence interval for proportion in
parenthesis 95 confidence interval for mean in
parenthesis
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Implementation Rate
Criteria All Bases Marine Bases Air Force Bases Navy Bases Army Bases
1. Conducts regular or frequent meetings to share information with regulatory agencies in its region or watershed 80 73 78 100 79
2. Conducts regular or frequent meetings to share information with other land management agencies in its region or watershed 66 55 74 56 67
3. Conducts regular or frequent meetings to share information with private groups and/or citizens in its region or watershed 48 27 48 45 55
4. Collaborates with outside organizations to conduct research and/or conservation actions 59 45 57 73 62
5. Solicits input for natural resource management planning from outside organizations and individuals 60 55 70 55 56
6. Shares results of surveys and studies with outside organizations and/or individuals 91 82 83 100 96
7. Is engaged in planning at the watershed or eco-regional level 38 64 30 45 35
8. Natural resource staff indicates that collaboration is a management priority 73 45 86 73 67
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Analysis of Variance
Condition Mean Score
1. Installations with significant ground-based training, versusNo significant ground-based training (F 4.57 p 0.036) 5.63 4.59
2. Installations possessing a written EM plan, versus No written EM plan (F 14.55 p lt0.001) 5.65 3.85
3. Installations with a natural resource staff 1, versus Staff 2, versus Staff 3 or more (F 3.64 p 0.031) 4.26 4.40 5.59
4. Installations with threatened and endangered species, versus Without TE species (F 8.11 p 0.006) 5.49 4.08
5. Installations where collaboration is a priority, versus collaboration is not a priority (F 40.11 plt0.0001) 5.88 3.05
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Independent Variables

• Demographic
• Education level of manager
• Profession of manager
• Experience level of manager
• Mangers number of years with DoD
• Environmental
• Number of listed TE species
• Size of base

• Institutional
• Size of natural resource staff
• Service
• Level of ground-based training
• Presence of written ecosystem management plan
• Whether staff perceives that collaboration is a
  command priority
• Level of adaptive management practice

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Correlation AnalysisBy Service
Independent Variable Dependent Variable Service Pearsons r Z-score
Staff size Collaboration comprehensiveness USMC Navy Army .68 .61 .40 2.34 2.00 2.16
Staff size Frequency of meetings with other land management agencies USMC Navy .65 .71 2.17 2.49
Frequency of meetings with regulators Collaboration comprehensiveness USMC Army .74 .57 2.71 3.32
Adaptive management comprehensiveness Collaboration comprehensiveness Navy Army .75 .65 2.78 3.94
0.05 level of significance met
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Correlation Analysis Ground-based Training
Independent Variable Dependent Variable Service Pearsons r Z-score
Staff size Frequency of meetings with regulators All Services .44 2.46
Frequency of meetings with regulators Collaboration comprehensiveness USMC .85 2.49
Respondents number of years in the natural resource field Collaboration comprehensiveness All Services .41 2.28
Respondents number of years in DoD Collaboration comprehensiveness USMC -0.80 -2.19
Number of threatened and endangered species on the installation Collaboration comprehensiveness Army .58 2.67
0.05 level of significance met
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Key Variables Predicting Success

• Size of staff
• Resource managers number of years in the field
• Resource managers number of years with DoD
  (negative)
• Prioritization of collaboration by management
• Presence of significant ground-based training
• Presence of threatened and endangered species
• Size of installation
• Frequency of meetings with regulators
• Presence of written ecosystem management plan

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Challenges for Collaboration

• Institutional boundaries are incongruent with
  natural ones
• Agency decision-makers often near-sighted - seek
  safety in the static and concrete
• Fuzzy definitions for key concepts -
  sustainability and ecosystem integrity
• Incompatible data sets

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Military Cultural Factors Influencing
Implementation

• Conservative culture of the immediate
• Hierarchical, authoritative leadership style
• Not a culture of inquiry and long-term planning
• Goal-oriented and proactive
• But defensive in dealing with outsiders
• Inexperienced and uncomfortable in eco-regional
  politics
• Driven to an architecture of simplicity by
  focus on control and mission accomplishment
• Variety and experimentation suppressed
• Partnering not embraced

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Anecdotal Experience with Collaboration in
Agencies

• Risk-averse hierarchies stifle innovation, if not
  explicitly, then through institutional inertia
• Conformity is generally valued more than
  innovation, inter-agency cooperation, or outreach
• Information represents power, and is controlled
• Public participation is uncontrollable, and
  therefore feared

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Recommendations for Military Resource Managers

• Prioritize collaboration initiatives
• Where resource managers perceive collaboration as
  a command priority, collaboration rates are
  higher
• Promote collaboration by focusing on those
  elements easiest to improve upon
• Meet with private groups and citizens to share
  information
• Collaborate with outside organizations for
  research
• Solicit outside organizations for planning input

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Suggestions for Collaborating with Military
Natural Resource Managers

• Understand the culture
• Develop buy-in among leaders and staff
• Dont assume study results alone will move the
  installation to take action
• Explicitly identify competing objectives
• Concentrate on collecting regional data, placing
  base in context
• Plan for frequent turnover of military personnel

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Future Research

• What are the practical consequences of not
  collaborating?
• Why do managers choose to perform some elements
  of collaboration, but not others?
• Are stakeholders in some regions more amenable
  to, or acceptable within, partnerships than
  stakeholders in other regions?
• If so, what attributes drive this condition?
• Are there different levels of aggressiveness,
  motivation, or activity of regulators or
  activists?

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Questions?
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(No Transcript)
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Program Attributes
With Written EM Plan With Written EM Plan With Written EM Plan With Written EM Plan With Written EM Plan
MC AF Navy Army
Yes, completed 64 65 55 55
Yes, being developed 18 4 9 0
No 18 30 36 45
Don't Know 0 0 0 0
Compliance Versus Stewardship (mean) Compliance Versus Stewardship (mean) Compliance Versus Stewardship (mean) Compliance Versus Stewardship (mean) Compliance Versus Stewardship (mean)
Resource management decisions driven by compliance versus concerns for stewardship 59 60 72 45
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Correlation Analysis
Independent Variable Dependent Variable Pearsons r Z-score
Staff size Collaboration comprehensiveness .28 2.40
Installation size Collaboration comprehensiveness .23 1.99
Staff size Frequency of meetings with regulators .29 2.52
Staff size Frequency of meetings with other land management agencies .24 2.10
Frequency of meetings with regulators Collaboration comprehensiveness .47 4.31
0.05 level of significance met