The Pacific Northwest Environmental Response Management Application (ERMA) team and NOAA Fisheries, West Coast Region Protected Resource Division have collaborated to make the final Rockfish Critical Habitat designation under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) available through Pacific Northwest ERMA concurrent with the publication of the final rule in the Federal Register.

The OR&R ERMA technical leads worked closely with the NOAA Fisheries Protected Resources Division personnel to load their spatial data and background information into Pacific Northwest ERMA, and create unique views which highlight the final areas and enable users to overlay spatial information including habitat types, land use, cultural and historical information, and topographical and bathymetric features. This innovative cross line-office collaboration improves NOAA’s communication of Critical Habitat designation in a consistent and user-friendly web mapping environment. Additional information regarding the Critical Habitat designation can be found at NOAA Fisheries’ Critical Habitat for Puget Sound/Georgia Basin Rockfish webpage. Users can click the Interactive Rockfish Critical Habitat Maps link which will take them directly to the spatial data in ERMA. For more information, contact Nicolas.Eckhardt@noaa.gov, Benjamin.Shorr@noaa, or Michele.Jacobi@noaa.gov. Go back to OR&R Weekly Report.