Introduction to the May '04 WMPALA Virtual Workshop

The May '04 WMPALA Workshop took place at Northern Arizona University.

The ForestERA May '04 Western Mogollon Plateau Adaptive Landscape Assessment (WMPALA) Virtual Workshop (VW2) is the online followup to the May '04 WMPALA Workshop that was held May 11-13, 2004 on the Northern Arizona University campus in Flagstaff, Arizona. (Workshop Handbook). VW2 will begin in early August and run for about two weeks. To participate, please register on the VW2 Bulletin Board.

Background

May '04 WMPALA Workshop participants were first divided into four groups based on expertise in fire, wildlife, watersheds and communities. These "topic groups" provided management guidelines for the subsequent mixed groups (green, red, yellow and blue). By working in mixed groups with members from the topic groups interspersed, participants were given the flexibility to use datasets and treatment modeling tools as they felt appropriate to develop GIS-based management action scenarios.

Workshop participants:

• discussed various management actions related to landscape-scale restoration and fire hazard reduction planning,
• explored GIS datasets describing the location of important landscape elements (including, for example, human communities, important wildlife habitat areas, and areas of high fire hazard: see Data Atlas), and
• began the process of using these data layers to make recommendations as to the type and location of management actions for improving forest health throughout the landscape.

In preparation for VW2, ForestERA staff continues to refine the four preliminary scenarios, adding additional requested information when possible, and conducting additional analyses when appropriate with input from participants responsible for creating the scenarios.

See The Virtual Workshop Process