The Ecosystem Enhancement Program:
Designing and Implementing a National Model
The state of North Carolina is committed to balancing development and environmental protection. A state of vast natural resources and a growing economy, North Carolina's quality of life has spurred growth, bringing the need for appropriate transportation infrastructure and overall economic development to accommodate a burgeoning population.
During the mid-1990s, the N.C. Department of Transportation (NCDOT) began to experience increased project delays in its transportation-infrastructure program because of unavoidable environmental impacts in its development projects. At the time, the NCDOT attempted to satisfy most of its mitigation needs through internal staffing and outsourcing to the private sector.
Then, the state in 1997 founded the Wetlands Restoration Program, a wetlands-oriented mitigation program for development under the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources (NCDENR). The NCDOT and NCDENR mitigation programs functioned independently with different operating processes, a situation that failed to meet the satisfaction of either federal and state regulatory agencies, or environmental interest groups. (NOTE: The Wetlands Restoration Program has been incorporated into EEP.)
A time for change
To address this situation, a cooperative process-improvement initiative in North Carolina involving more than 10 state and federal natural-systems agencies convened in 2001. Obstacles identified in the initiative included inadequate communication, undefined roles and responsibilities, poor synchronization in executing existing mitigation and permitting processes, and a lack of clearly understood mitigation-success objectives.
This panel's conclusions led to recommendations that mitigation should be provided years in advance of project impact, and be designed to replace unavoidable functional losses to wetlands and riparian buffers. The panel also conceived and set into motion events leading to the creation of the Ecosystem Enhancement Program.
Over the subsequent two years, business and operational planning occurred that encompassed funding authorization, consensus-building with environmental- and mitigation-interest groups, legal support, regulatory-agency agreements, and transition plans for staffing and logistics. A Memorandum of Agreement between NCDOT, NCDENR and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers established the EEP's procedures on July 22, 2003. The MOA recommended a two-year transition period in which the EEP will complete operational and organizational development.
A national model
As a result, North Carolina has created a national model for wetlands mitigation through EEP, already earning recognition such as 2005 and 2007 designations as one of the top 50 new innovative government programs in the nation by Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, and a prestigious award for local watershed planning from the National Association of Environmental Professionals.
The EEP facilitates responsible economic growth while providing high-quality ecosystem enhancement to offset impacts from development, and many states can say the same. The difference is that the EEP's mitigation program addresses environmental impacts proactively, not reactively.
Funds are invested in environmental protection ahead of the date the impact will occur. This basic foundation of the EEP allows North Carolina to address the need for economic development while simultaneously protecting and enhancing the environment, an issue germane to every state in the nation.
Strength through partnerships
Acting on the philosophy that a programmatic, watershed-based planning process will focus all biological engineering resources toward the best possible environmental return, the EEP also embraces partnerships that work to create streamlined government for the state. The EEP's formation by definition helps to eliminate duplicative resources, and also embraces the expertise of all shareholders affected by its processes.
The EEP partners with the private sector on two fronts to offset unavoidable environmental impacts. The program's alliance with local and regional land trusts across the state, believed to be unprecedented in the nation on this scale, harnesses the expertise, innovation and local knowledge of 22 separate trusts to promote land acquisition and open-space protection. The partnership's aim is to provide fair economic return to landowners while achieving open-space protection for the state.
The EEP also partners with more than 20 private biological-engineering and mitigation-banking companies on wetlands restoration and enhancement programs across the state.
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