My thesis project is to create a conservation plan for the Reservoir Canyon Natural Reserve (RCNR) in San Luis Obispo, California. It is a professional project for the City of San Luis Obispo with the goal of eventual adoption by the City Council. The plan was motivated by City policy, which advises creating conservation plans for open spaces, and by a particular need to address management issues in RCNR that include plant and wildlife conservation, trail access, erosion, electrical utility easements, and other legal matters. The project consists of two main components: the conservation plan and a companion paper. The paper is an overview of the theory and best practices involved in conservation planning, and is meant to be complementary to the conservation plan. Therefore, discussions found in the paper are not present in the plan itself, but instead serve as background. The paper consists primarily of a literature review and my reflections on how the literature applies to the process of planning and managing RCNR. The Draft Reservoir Canyon Natural Reserve Conservation Plan, attached as an appendix, explains the conditions of the reserve, and describes the goals and management strategies the City will employ.

abstract: Conflict over management of natural resources may intensify as population growth, development, and climate change stress natural systems. In this dissertation, the role of policy networks implementing Habitat Conservation Plans (HCPs) is examined. As explored here, policy networks are groups that come together to develop and implement terms of HCPs. HCPs are necessary for private landowners to receive Incidental Take Permits (ITPs) from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) if approved development activities may result in take of threatened or endangered species. ITPs may last up to 100 years or more and be issued to individual or multiple landowners to accomplish development and habitat conservation goals within a region. Theoretical factors in the implementation and policy network literatures relevant to successful implementation of environmental agreements are reviewed and used to examine HCP implementation. Phase I uses the USFWS Environmental Conservation Online System (ECOS) database to identify characteristics of policy networks formed to implement HCPs within the State of California, and how those networks changed since the creation of HCPs in 1982 by amendment of the 1973 Endangered Species Act. Phase II presents a single, complex, multiple-party HCP case selected from Phase I to examine the policy network formed, the role of actors in this network, and network successes and implementation barriers. This research builds upon the implementation literature by demonstrating that implementation occurs in stages, not all of which are sequential, and that how implementation processes are structured and executed has a direct impact on perceptions of success. It builds upon the policy network literature by demonstrating ways that participation by non-agency actors can enhance implementation; complex problems may better achieve conflicting goals by creating organizational structures made up of local, state, federal and non-governmental entities to better manage changing political, financial, and social conditions; if participants believe the transaction costs of maintaining a network outweigh the benefits, ongoing support may decline; what one perceives as success largely depends upon their role (or lack of a role) within the policy network; and conflict management processes perceived as fair and equitable significantly contribute to perceptions of policy effectiveness. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Public Administration 2015

Submitted by Cássia Santos (cassia.bcufg@gmail.com) on 2016-09-16T13:35:24Z No. of bitstreams: 2 Tese - Priscila Lemes de Azevedo Silva - 2014.pdf: 8738399 bytes, checksum: ebb4f9ec58380c199dc16142d8009cac (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciana Ferreira (lucgeral@gmail.com) on 2016-09-16T15:35:18Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 Tese - Priscila Lemes de Azevedo Silva - 2014.pdf: 8738399 bytes, checksum: ebb4f9ec58380c199dc16142d8009cac (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-09-16T15:35:18Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Tese - Priscila Lemes de Azevedo Silva - 2014.pdf: 8738399 bytes, checksum: ebb4f9ec58380c199dc16142d8009cac (MD5) license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-03-18 / Global processes such as: habitat loss, overexploitation, invasive species and climate change are driving many species to extinction. In the face of these threats, the development of systematic planning which indicates the most important biodiversity conservation areas has become widely accepted. The establishment of protected areas is the main strategy for the protection of biodiversity and maintenance of ecosystem processes due to its feasibility and economic cost. However, species distribution can be altered by global climate change and, possibly, the current network of protected areas may not be sufficient for species representation in future scenarios. The impact of climate change on biodiversity can be anticipated by spatial prioritization for conservation through the development of dynamic conservation plans. However, it is clear that some species have a more important ecological role than others (due to their biological and life history characteristics) which includes the unique challenge of taking an integrated view of biodiversity in conservation planning into account. The Atlantic Forest is a lush biome which holds 7.7% of the world's known species of amphibians and high concentration of endemic species. However, the Atlantic Forest is also one of the most threatened tropical biomes of the world, mainly due to the loss and fragmentation of natural habitats. This thesis provides proposals for conservation efforts, considering the possible effects of climate change and also the wider aspects of biodiversity. For this, I used the available amphibian data from the Red List of Threatened Species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, available climate models, information on protected areas by the World Database on Protected Areas, and attributes of species and the phylogenetic tree consistent with specific literature. Chapter 1 highlights a discussion on the impact of climate change and priorities for biodiversity conservation and the importance of including the functional and phylogenetic diversity in conservation efforts. Chapter 2 brings a discussion about available data for conservation studies, as well as the advantages and disadvantages of using maps of extent of occurrence in systematic planning for conservation. Chapter 3 shows the effectiveness of protected areas in maintaining species richness under climate change from consensual projections of species distribution models for amphibians inhabiting of the Atlantic Forest. In this chapter, we identified that protected areas may gain or lose species due to climate change according to the location of the current network of protected areas. Chapter 4 presents an alternative approach to complement the existence of protected areas and incorporates possible changes in species distribution. The prioritization is based mainly on the distribution of species in both present and future scenarios. This chapter outlines a conservation plan that minimizes the effects of climate change on species dispersion. Besides these effects on species dispersion, this solution also minimizes the uncertainty associated with distribution models and prioritizing areas of low uncertainty. Chapter 5 explains the spatial prioritization of conservation, including different aspects of biodiversity, such as: phylogenetic & functional diversity measures and their influence on evolutionary history and underlying ecological processes. The main objective is to identify and compare the places that contain the most information on the taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional diversity, while also indicating the conservation priorities for each biogeographical region of the Atlantic Forest. In conclusion, we present our new and original ideas for conservation and discuss the future prospects and predictions in this area. / Processos globais como a perda de habitat, a superexploração, a invasão de espécies exóticas e as mudanças climáticas estão conduzindo muitas espécies à extinção. Nesse contexto, o desenvolvimento de um planejamento sistemático que indique as áreas mais importantes para a conservação da biodiversidade tem sido amplamente aceito. O estabelecimento de áreas protegidas é a principal estratégia para proteção da biodiversidade e a manutenção dos processos ecossistêmicos devido à viabilidade e ao custo econômico. Todavia, a distribuição das espécies pode ser alterada pelas mudanças climáticas global e, possivelmente, a atual rede de áreas protegidas pode não ser suficiente para representar as espécies no futuro. A priorização espacial para a conservação pode antecipar os impactos das mudanças climáticas sobre a biodiversidade, além de mitigar tais impactos por meio do desenvolvimento de planos dinâmicos de conservação. No entanto, é evidente que algumas espécies têm um papel ecológico mais importante que outras devido às suas características biológicas e à história de vida, portanto, um novo desafio é adotar uma visão integrada da biodiversidade no planejamento da conservação. A Mata Atlântica é um exuberante bioma que detém 7,7% das espécies de anfíbios conhecidas do mundo e grande concentração de espécies endêmicas. Contudo, a Mata Atlântica é também um dos biomas tropicais mais ameaçados do mundo, sobretudo devido à perda e fragmentação dos hábitats naturais. Esta tese fornece propostas para os esforços de conservação, considerando os possíveis efeitos das mudanças climáticas e também os amplos aspectos da biodiversidade. Para tanto, utilizei os dados de anfíbios disponíveis na Lista Vermelha de Espécies Ameaçadas da União Internacional para a Conservação da Natureza para toda a Mata Atlântica,modelos climáticos disponíveis e informações sobre áreas protegidas oferecidas pelo World Database on Protected Areas. Os atributos das espécies e a árvore filogenética estão de acordo coma literatura específica. O capítulo 1 apresenta uma discussão sobre os impactos das mudanças climáticas e as prioridades para a conservação da biodiversidade. Ainda, é discutida a importância de incluir a diversidade funcional e filogenética nos esforços de conservação. O capítulo 2 apresenta os tipos de dados disponíveis para estudos de conservação, além das vantagens e das desvantagens do uso de mapas de extensão de ocorrência no planejamento sistemático para a conservação. O capítulo 3 apresenta a avaliação da eficiência das áreas protegidas em manter a riqueza de espécies no contexto de mudanças climáticas a partir de projeções consensuais dos modelos de distribuição das espécies para anfíbios da Mata Atlântica. Essa avaliação identifica se uma área protegida poderá ganhar ou perder espécies devido às mudanças climáticas considerando a localização da rede atual das áreas protegidas. O capítulo 4 apresenta uma abordagem alternativa para complementar a atual rede de áreas protegidas e incorpora as possíveis mudanças na distribuição das espécies. A priorização baseia-se, principalmente, na distribuição das espécies tanto no presente quanto no futuro e busca minimizar os efeitos dessa mudança na distribuição das espécies a partir de uma medida de dispersão no contexto de mudanças climáticas. Além da medida de dispersão, a solução também minimiza a incerteza associada aos modelos de distribuição, priorizando locais de baixa incerteza. O capítulo 5 apresenta a priorização espacial da conservação, incluindo diferentes aspectos da biodiversidade tal como a diversidade filogenética e funcional cujas medidas inferem tanto a história evolutiva quanto os processos ecológicos subjacentes. O principal objetivo é identificar e comparar os locais que conservam a maior informação sobre a diversidade taxonômica, filogenética e funcional quanto possível. Além disso, são indicadas as prioridades para a conservação para cada região biogeográfica da Mata Atlântica. Finalmente, em sua conclusão, são apresentadas as principais novidades da tese e discutidos os rumos para futuros trabalhos.