Archives - Definitions of Current Criteria for the MMA Inventory (2000/2002)

This section presents the current criteria used for including sites in the Marine Managed Area (MMA) Inventory. It also includes the criteria originally proposed during the initial development of the Inventory (then called the MPA Inventory), and a table comparing the two criteria.

Introduction

Executive Order (E.O.) 13158 defines a “marine protected area” as “any area of the marine environment that has been reserved by Federal, State, territorial, tribal, or local laws or regulations to provide lasting protection for part or all of the natural and cultural resources therein.” The E.O. defines “marine environment" to mean "those areas of coastal and ocean waters, the Great Lakes and their connecting waters, and submerged lands thereunder, over which the United States exercises jurisdiction, consistent with international law."

In the fall of 2000, criteria were developed for six key terms in the E.O. definition: Area, Reserved, Duration (Lasting), Protections, Marine, and Cultural. These ‘working criteria’ were established to guide government agencies in identifying sites to be included in a national inventory of marine protected areas.

These criteria were used through the summer of 2002. At that time, two of the criteria were revised to make them less restrictive. The purpose of the revision was to create a more comprehensive information base of marine managed areas to support the eventual development of the list of MPAs called for in the E.O. and to support the analyses identified in section 4(a) of the executive order. The name of the inventory was also changed from the Marine Protected Area (MPA) Inventory to the National Marine Managed Areas (MMA) Inventory to reflect the broader perspective. The specific revisions were based on comments received at a series of public meetings followed by internal discussions. A Federal Register Notice is being prepared to seek additional public comment on the revised MMA criteria.

The two criteria that changed were for Duration (Lasting) and Protections. The revised criteria for Duration (Lasting) states that protections must be enacted for a minimum of two years with a three-month minimum of continuous protection. This contrasts to the original criteria that required protection to be year round for a minimum of four years. The revision to Protections states that sites with single species protections can be included. The original criteria excluded any sites that were established with the single purpose of providing protection for a single species.

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Current Criteria and Definitions of the MMA Inventory

The following criteria have been used since summer 2002. NOAA and DOI jointly propose the following definitions for: “area,” “marine,” “reserved,” “lasting,” and “protection.” These definitions provide guidance to government agencies identifying sites for the MMA Inventory.

Area

To be included in the MMA Inventory, the site:

Must have defined geographical boundaries and underlying submerged or intertidal lands, and may be of any size, except that the site must be a subset of the U.S. Federal, state, territorial, local or tribal marine environment in which it is located.

Application of this criterion would exclude, for example:

Generic, broad-based resource management authorities without specific locations.

Areas in which the boundaries change over time based on species presence.

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Marine

To be included in the MMA Inventory, the site:

Must be: (a) an area of ocean or coastal waters (note: coastal waters may include intertidal areas, bays or estuaries); or (b) an area of the Great Lakes or their connecting waters. The term “intertidal” is understood to mean the shore zone between the mean low water and mean high water marks. An MMA may be associated with a land-based (terrestrial) protected area; the terrestrial portion, however, is not considered an MMA. For mapping purposes, an MMA may show an associated terrestrial protected area.

NOAA and DOI have agreed to use the following definition for the term “estuaries” or “estuarine” or “estuary”: “Part of a river or stream or other body of water having unimpaired connection with the open sea, where the sea water is measurably diluted with fresh water derived from land drainage, and extending upstream to where ocean-derived salts measure less than 0.5 parts per thousand during the period of average annual low flow.” The first part “Part of a river . . . from land drainage,” is found in the Coastal Zone Management Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Estuaries and Clean Waters Act of 2000. The second part “extending upstream to where . . . average annual low flow.” is from the national standard definition, as agreed upon by the Federal Geographic Data Committee, which also includes the first part in its definition. The reference is “Cowardin, L.M. et al. 1979. Classification of Wetlands and Deepwater Habitats of the United States. FWS/OBS-79/31. December 1979. Reprinted 1992.”

Application of this criterion would exclude, for example:

Strictly freshwater areas outside the Great Lakes that contain marine species at certain seasons or life history stages.

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Reserved

To be included in the MMA Inventory, the site:

Must be established by and currently subject to some form of Federal, state, territorial, local or tribal law or regulation.

Application of this criterion would exclude, for example:

Privately created or maintained marine sites.

Duration (Lasting)

To be included in the MMA Inventory, the site

Must provide year-after-year protection for at least 3 months of each year.

Must be established with an expectation of, or at least the potential for, permanence. Areas with a sunset clause must provide a minimum of two years of continuous protection and must have a specific mechanism to consider renewal of protection at the expiration of the sunset period.

Application of this criterion would exclude, for example:

Areas subject only to temporary protections, such as areas protected only by emergency fishery regulations under the Magnuson-Stevens Act that expire after 180 days, and areas that are protected by annual management specifications.

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Protection

To be included in the MMA Inventory, the site:

Must have existing laws or regulations that are designed and applied to afford the site with increased protection for part or all of the natural and submerged cultural resources therein for the purpose of maintaining or enhancing the long-term conservation of these resources, beyond any general protections which apply outside the site.

Application of this criterion would exclude, for example

Areas closed to avoid fishing gear conflicts; and

Area-based regulations established solely to limit fisheries by quota management or to facilitate enforcement.

Taken together, these definitions and criteria provide the basis for populating the MMA Inventory.

In addition, the Executive Order uses the term cultural resources.

NOAA and DOI interpret this to mean any submerged historical or cultural feature, including archaeological sites, historic structures, shipwrecks, and artifacts.

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Original Criteria and Definitions of the MPA Inventory

The following criteria definitions were established in the fall of 2000 to provide guidance to government agencies for identifying sites for a national inventory of marine protected areas. The criteria for Duration (Lasting) and Protection were revised during the summer of 2002 to be less restrictive.

Area