Nature & Nurture | Annual Fund News

Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation Inc. Funds Coastal Projects

The Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation Inc. has awarded grants totaling $100,000 to the Nicholas School to benefit the FerryMon Project and The Duke Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines (PSDS).

"The Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation is delighted to be able to support the Nicholas School and the work of the FerryMon Project and the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines. Both projects have great potential to assist efforts to protect and improve North Carolina's unique and fragile environment," said Tom Ross, executive director of the foundation.

If you thought ferries were only used to transport vehicles across large bodies of water, think again. Scientists also are using ferries to monitor water quality. The Albemarle-Pamlico Estuarine System (APES) is North America's second largest estuary and provides critical habitat for the southeastern U.S. fishery. Presently, several, interrelated factors impact water quality in the APES including land use change in the upland and coastal watershed, legislatively mandated basinwide nutrient management plans, intense storms (hurricanes and nor'easters), and global and local changes in sea level.

Despite its importance as essential fish habitat, the APES has not been monitored as intensively or extensively for habitat impacts associated with decreased water quality as other estuaries, such as Chesapeake Bay. To support the sustainable use of these estuaries, the Nicholas School joined with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the NC Department of Transportation Ferry Division, the NC Department of Environment and Natural Resources, and the AllTel Corp. to develop an automated water quality monitoring system aboard ferries that traverse the APES. The FerryMon program provides a unique, long-term and cost-effective monitoring system to evaluate status and trends in APES water quality.

"Thanks to the generosity of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, the M/Vs Floyd Lupton, Carteret, and Governor Hyde will continue to provide important information on water quality in APES. We are extremely grateful for the foundation's support," said Joe Ramus, professor of biological oceanography, former director of the Duke University Marine Laboratory, and co-director of the FerryMon project.

Dr. Orrin Pilkey, James B. Duke Professor Emeritus of Earth Sciences and director of the Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines (PSDS), agrees with Ramus. "The Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation not only supports the important work of PSDS, but has also provided us with an opportunity to expand and fulfill an exciting and important new role, that of scientific advocate."

PSDS is dedicated to conserving, preserving and protecting the quality and long-term sustainability of North Carolina's beaches and has established a scientific coastal advocacy initiative to ensure that state and local management decisions and actions that affect the health, viability and long-term sustainability of the state's beaches are made in the context of "good" science and are in the best interest of all North Carolinians.

PSDS provides objective technical and scientific data to organizations around the country working to preserve our nation's beaches. According to Pilkey, "Scientific advocacy is very rare, and we are fortunate that the folks at Z. Smith Reynolds had the foresight to see the benefits in what we are doing."

PSDS was established in 1985 to examine the physical and scientific basis for managing developed shorelines in a time of rising sea level. Since its inception, PSDS has been an outspoken advocate for the responsible management of America's shorelines and has made significant contributions in the fields of coastal geology, policy and hazard mitigation.