EVERY YEAR, as countless endangered sea turtles migrate south along the Massachusetts shore to escape the cold, they become trapped in Cape Cod Bay’s freezing waters. Dedicated staff and volunteers with Mass Audubon carefully walk along the Cape’s beaches to rescue the stranded turtles and deliver them to the New England Aquarium to receive treatment, where they join the more than 5,000 sea turtles that have been rehabilitated and released since 1997.

These conservation heroes are on the frontlines of the effort to save our turtles, a challenge that has deepened in recent years as ocean temperatures rise and alter the historical migration patterns of sea turtles. When turtles chart a new migratory path through colder waters, it throws off their internal body temperatures, causing more turtles – most often the endangered Kemp’s ridley sea turtle – to wash ashore in fragile states of health. In 2000, 49 trapped sea turtles were rescued on the Cape. In 2022, that number ballooned to 866. This more than 10-fold increase is a warning sign: we have to throw a lifeline to sea turtles before it’s too late.

More than $67 million in federal funds and grants have been directed toward the marine mammal stranding network for whales and dolphins over the last 20 years, but sea turtle rescue teams have been left out in the cold. The New England Aquarium and others like National Aquarium in Baltimore and South Carolina Aquarium in Charleston are among eight sea turtle stranding and response institutions nationwide that voluntarily and collectively spend $5 million each year to save our turtles.

This mission is as costly as it is critical. When turtles are rescued and transported to the Aquarium’s Sea Turtle Hospital in Quincy for treatment, they often receive fluids, antibiotics, X-rays, and monitoring as they are slowly warmed 10 degrees every 24 hours in the hospital’s tanks for days or weeks. Some turtles require months of rehabilitation. Right now, the federal government does not have a dedicated grant program to support this effort, but the problem is only getting worse.

That is why Congress must pass the Sea Turtle Rescue Assistance Act. This legislation would provide $30 million to support institutions in Massachusetts and across the country working to save endangered sea turtles. From coast to coast, these federal dollars would be a boon to recovery, rescue, and rehabilitation efforts for years to come.

The Sea Turtle Rescue Assistance Act will ensure that sea turtle champions like those at the New England Aquarium aren’t merely treading water. It’s time for lawmakers to come together and pass this critical legislation.

Vikki Spruill is president and CEO of the New England Aquarium and Edward J. Markey is a senator and Bill Keating is a US representative from Massachusetts.

The post As strandings of sea turtles rise, voluntary rescue efforts won’t cut it appeared first on CommonWealth Beacon.

GOV. MAURA HEALEY’S recent appointment of the Commonwealth’s first cabinet level climate chief –Melissa Hoffer, joining from the Environmental Protection Agency – reflects the new administration’s belief that resiliency is a priority issue that spans public health, equity, the economy, and environmental sustainability.

With key federal, state, and local players committed to rapidly advancing our efforts to address climate change, Massachusetts has both the scientific prowess and innovative spirit to be a global leader in addressing this critical issue.  We also have an influx of new federal dollars, including funds from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act  and the Inflation Reduction Act, available to municipalities, states, and community-based organizations to fund resiliency efforts.

As an advocate for a vital and vibrant ocean, the New England Aquarium sees waterfront resilience as ground zero for addressing the consequences of our climate crisis. The problem is overwhelming and growing every day. but it is not unmanageable. In fact, thoughtful strategies can both protect our coastline and provide additional public benefits. Natural infrastructure options such as living sea walls and shorelines, managed wetlands, rain gardens, tree trenches, and strategically planned and managed open spaces can protect us from storm damage and flooding, provide new active recreation land, store carbon, remove marine debris, restore habitats, and create jobs.

Chief Hoffer and the Healey administration are poised to drive an intentional and strategic action plan for addressing urgent climate change issues. The newly-created chief role also best positions Massachusetts to gain maximum advantage from the myriad federal programs (the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s building resilient infrastructure and communities, Department of Transportation’s protect program, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s  climate ready coasts program) that can protect our coastlines and other infrastructure necessary for a functioning Commonwealth.

To be successful, the administration should require an updated and forward-looking regulatory environment and the necessary staff infrastructure to facilitate this work; this model would include several interlocking concepts:

• Science, data, and innovation should drive our planning. Thinking around resiliency has evolved from pursuing barriers that prevent flooding to identifying nature-based solutions. This model recognizes that flooding is inevitable and tries to mitigate its risks. These strategies should be monitored, studied, and updated so that future planning is informed by real-time data.
• Tracking should incorporate metrics that consider not just successful resiliency, but also issues of equity and public health.
• Nature-based solutions also tend to lend themselves to resiliency strategies that are multi-purpose and create public benefit. With careful planning, these spaces can be designed to improve public open space in under-resourced neighborhoods and bring people to the water’s edge, so that they can engage with waterways and the Atlantic Ocean, and so that they can see the beauty of our blue planet and the benefits of protecting it.
• Our laws need to be updated. a state-level coastal protection effort that smooths the regulatory pathway, mandates district-wide planning (to avoid parcel-by-parcel approaches); facilitates the inter-agency, public-private partnerships needed to develop resiliency projects; and is consistent with federal requirements for funds available for the projects.
• To maximize the federal dollars available today, we also need to prioritize state investment in these initiatives. State dollars should be allocated with an eye toward both the most pressing resiliency needs and assuring that environmental justice communities without financial resources to make the necessary upgrades (on both public and private land) are not left behind.

Many of the Commonwealth’s most impacted cities and towns have already begun to plan—and in some cases implement—multi-purpose, nature-based solutions. Given the urgency of climate change’s impacts on our coastal resources, we need to move from piecemeal local efforts to a full partnership among state, regional, and municipal stakeholders, and to create comprehensive plans and the best possible environment for federally compliant, shovel-ready projects.

Approaching coastal resiliency in this way would harness federal, state, and local resources to make our coastlines more resilient, more equitable, and welcoming, and more attractive for all our residents. That would truly be transforming one of the defining challenges of our generation to greater opportunities for all.

Vikki Spruill is president and ceo of the New England Aquarium.

The post Waterfront resilience is ground zero in climate fight appeared first on CommonWealth Beacon.

THE LANDSCAPE of the upcoming Boston mayoral race makes it abundantly clear that the city’s biggest priorities—housing, education, economic opportunity—will be considered through a new lens, one more reflective of its diverse residents. Creating a waterfront for everyone through planning and a leading-edge approach to climate change must also land on that list of priorities.

Despite the astounding nearly $15 billion in taxpayer money spent to clean Boston Harbor, depress the Central Artery, and reconnect the city to its waterfront, efforts to maximize this resource, prioritize climate resilience, and prioritize inclusivity at the water’s edge have been fragmented and reactive. That must change.

The mayoral candidates should be guided by the following five principles and be held accountable to develop working plans in each area to assure that each priority is effectively addressed.

Boston Harbor and its benefits should extend beyond Downtown and the Seaport: Reflecting the longstanding power structures of this city, the Seaport and the Downtown waterfront have consistently received the lion’s share of the public attention. Yet from Charlestown to Dorchester and East Boston to the Boston Harbor Islands, there are countless opportunities to think creatively about the waterfront as a resource for recreation for all Bostonians, a hedge against sea level rise, and an engine for economic development to help improve the quality of life and economy of our whole city and region.

Planning should be expansive, in terms of scope and public engagement: To date, the design and implementation of waterfront infrastructure is reactive, parcel-by-parcel, and not in service to our entire city. The City’s Resilient Boston Harbor Vision and the climate action plans for individual neighborhoods require a neighborhood-wide approach to address access and resiliency that includes ensuring that voices from non-water-adjacent neighborhoods— Mattapan, Roxbury, Hyde Park, Roslindale, Allston/Brighton—are also included in the process.

Future investment should deploy private dollars differently and rethink funding overall: One of our predecessor organizations was an ardent advocate for private dollar investments in the Harborwalk; at the time (now more than three decades ago), this was a cutting edge strategy that resulted in 43 of the 47 miles of our waterfront being accessible to the public. But in today’s context, this approach is woefully inadequate, leading to a mix of disconnected experiences that can be hard to find and feel closed off to those not privileged to live or work on the waterfront. As we plan for a more resilient and welcoming waterfront, a different model is required.

We recommend three initial steps to improve the funding model:

1. Create baseline standards for new waterfront neighborhood development that prioritize infrastructure improvements that lead with the sustainable public benefits for the entire neighborhood or district and add value that the general public has requested.
2. Launch a city-wide waterfront investment fund with developer dollars (much like the current jobs and housing linkage funds) that can be applied to programming and marketing as well as the built environment.
3. Pursue new government resilience funding sources for neighborhood-based climate change protections. Public sector resiliency funding is needed to match an increase in private sector investment.

We also should assure that resilience funding does triple duty consistent with the principles of resiliency, inclusivity, and accessibility. This means protecting vulnerable neighborhoods and creating protections that offer new parks, open spaces, and waterfront access for all.

Boston can be an incubator for change: Boston’s innovation economy is the perfect laboratory for startups with solutions that have the potential for significant impact on jobs and education, ocean sustainability, and global resilience. Areas of particular opportunity for entrepreneurs include offshore renewable energy, sustainable seafood, maritime decarbonization, marine pollution, blue tech, and resilient waterfronts.

Located right at the water’s edge, UMass Boston has already begun to make a name for itself promoting sustainablesolutions. The Stone Living Lab is hard at work using the Boston Harbor Islands to develop nature-based solutions to the impacts of sea level rise and storm surge. The Aquarium’s BlueSwell Incubator program, launched last summer in partnership with SeaAhead, bolsters startups focused on new ocean-related technologies and business solutions that enhance ocean health, sustainable ocean industry, and global resilience. By creating public private partnerships and offering incentives for collaborations between business, non-profits/ advocacy groups, and higher education, Boston can become a test lab for solutions that can change the world’s response to climate change.

Our waterfront should be for all: Access to the ocean, the Harbor Islands, waterfront open spaces, and opportunities for individual and community health (as recently demonstrated in the response to Covid 19) should be open to everyone.   This includes identifying parts of the waterfront that are adjacent to diverse neighborhoods (like Moakley Park) and increasing our investments in those communities, furthering the transportation infrastructure that brings people from non-adjacent neighborhoods to the waterfront, and fostering more inclusive programming, recreational opportunities, and passive engagement. To open up currently unwelcoming stretches of waterfront in the Seaport and Downtown, we must ensure that there are affordable amenities, from food and cultural attractions to restrooms and places to sit.

Equitable cities go beyond the basics and think boldly about how the riches of the waterfront—from the rivers to the Harbor—can benefit everyone. We have much work to do to get there.

Kathy Abbott is president and CEO of Boston Harbor Now and Vikki N. Spruill is president and CEO of the New England Aquarium. 

The post Five priorities for Boston’s waterfront appeared first on CommonWealth Beacon.

THIS YEAR’S rapid-fire turn of events is stunning. Minute to minute, day by day, we face a new reality. It’s no different leading one of Boston’s most popular and beloved cultural institutions in the year when we planned to celebrate our 50th anniversary. Then, it all turned upside down. 

To give you a sense of the impact on local institutions, I want to share how the entire New England Aquarium has been affected by the pandemic. To do that, I want to talk about how the Aquarium is more than the beloved institution people visit on Central Wharf in Boston, and why. I’ll start with the why. 

The ocean is particularly vulnerable right now because of climate change and how we, as humans, use it. 

Through our research and our rescue arms—the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life and Animal Care Facility and the Animal Care Center and Sea Turtle Hospital in Quincy—we are working for a vital and vibrant ocean for generations to come. Through animal care and research, education, and advocacy, we safeguard endangered and threatened species and their habitats, inspire people to take action to protect the blue planet and work to affect state and federal policies that do the same. The Aquarium itself is one piece of a larger conservation organization; it just happens to be the most well-known one. 

On Friday, March 13, we closed the doors of the Aquarium to the public. Although closed for 18 weeks, we had about 35 staff members caring daily for our 20,000 animals and the infrastructure that supports them. In many ways, during those months, it was business as usual for the animals—just much quieter. 

When the pandemic hit, our scientists were just getting back on the water after a winter hiatus and preparing for their summer field seasons. Summer plans and any ongoing fieldwork stopped suddenly, although our scientists continued their research and to publish. 

Eventually, by August, our right whale research team—which has spent every summer for the past 40 years conducting research in the Gulf of Maine—quarantined as a family unit and headed north. One of our shark researchers drove from Maine to Key West towing a camper in order to stay socially distanced from others. And, our aerial survey team got back up in the air donning full flight suits and face masks. In our Sea Turtle Hospital, rehabilitation work continued for the handful of sea turtles rescued from the shores of Cape Cod in late fall and early winter still healing from bouts of hypothermia and related illnesses. (We had already successfully rehabilitated and released nearly 200 turtles.) By July, we quietly released the remaining turtles on uncrowded beaches at sunrise into the warm waters off the Cape. In years past, such releases were accompanied by great fanfare with cheering crowds. 

When we closed, we pivoted quickly to using social media to tell the stories about the ongoing care in the Aquarium, as well as our research and rescue work. Every weekday at 11 a.m., we broadcast “Virtual Visits.” Aquarists and scientists—formerly used to advancing their work quietly behind the scenes—suddenly became the stars of our Facebook page. We had our share of technical difficulties, but we continued educating and inspiring people with the wonders of the ocean online. Viewership skyrocketed. Countless families, teachers, and librarians told us how they were relying on our virtual visits to supplement at home learning. 

As time passed, we got the go-ahead to reopen on July 16, and did so at only 15 percent of building capacity. That makes for a wonderful Aquarium experience but not a sustainable business model. 

Still, we created one-way paths, implemented timed ticketing, and trained our staff on how to enforce mask wearing and social distancing guidelines among guests. We are delighted that people are comfortable and eager to come visit, and yet, like our peers, we missed late summer and early fall tourism. We see fewer guests during the week now that school is in session but are fortunate for sustained interest on weekends. We are losing money every month, even with our doors open. 

Most acutely, the pandemic has affected us financially. Like our counterparts at many zoos and aquariums, we rely on ticket sales and earned income, such as events, for most of our revenue—80 percent in our case. During our five-month closure, we lost $16 million in revenue. We had to make painful reductions and let go of valued, longtime staff members. We have had to become more innovative and agile, doing more with less. We started the Mission Forward Fund to raise critical dollars. About $3.8 million has been raised to date. 

Like the Children’s Museum and the Museum of Science, the Museum of Fine Arts and the Institute of Contemporary Art, we are part of the cultural fabric of this city. Along with the Greenway, the Harbor Walk, Christopher Columbus Park, and the North End, we help make the downtown waterfront welcoming and inclusive and vibrant. 

Our doors are open, our research continues, we’re preparing for another sea turtle rescue season, and we’re developing more and different virtual programming to serve the needs of individuals and families, as well as of teachers and schools. We are determined to make it to the other side of this pandemic because our blue planet, our city, and our region needs us. 

Vikki Spruill is president and CEO of the New England Aquarium. She shared these remarks as part of the October 5 webinar “A Better City Conversations: Cultural Institutions” alongside leaders of the Boston Children’s Museum and the Museum of Science. 

The post How we’re staying afloat at the New England Aquarium appeared first on CommonWealth Beacon.

THIS IS A TIME of reckoning for our nation.  We are seeing the disastrous results of discounting public health experts, scientists, and the facts when we should have listened.  The fight against the coronavirus is giving us the chance to reconsider the value of science in our public policy and in how we live our lives.  It is encouraging us to embrace science and the power it gives us to overcome the challenges we face.

It is an unfortunate irony that in the midst of this science reckoning, we as science institutions were some of the first public institutions to close our doors. This has been a painful period for our visitors, staffs, and boards. Yet, we are taking this time to learn how to become even stronger at serving our community, and how together we are ushering in a needed science renaissance that will continue once we open again.

STEM education is often positioned as a pipeline into jobs, but this crisis is demonstrating that fluency around basic science goes far beyond vocation. Access to STEM creates the ability to think critically, separate fact from fiction, and ultimately feel more assured about the day-to-day decisions you make in a fast-paced world – what you might call “STEM confidence.”

For many people in our community, love of science, passion for the natural world, and confidence about problem solving is nurtured in our aquariums, zoos, children’s museums and science centers.  It is there that they come to understand that our world is both fantastic and knowable.  It is there they realize their own power to solve problems in innovative ways.

Our missions have always included building STEM confidence in our community.  We are the conduit that connects science to people’s everyday lives.  This mission manifests in ways that spark action. When you leave the New England Aquarium, you think differently about climate change and how it impacts our ocean and the world around us. A Museum of Science visit empowers you to ask uestions and test ideas to create a better world.  A trip to Boston Children’s Museum may be the first time a young child is encouraged to explore basic science phenomena such as gravity, air, and light, and a visit to Zoo New England’s Franklin Park Zoo and Stone Zoo inspires you to learn more about the importance of biodiversity and global stewardship.

This is STEM confidence. STEM confidence is like a muscle that needs to be flexed to grow stronger over time so that we as a society are steadfast enough to believe the science even when it’s tough, and not succumb to false soundbites on social media because they’re easy.

Though we were forced to close our physical doors to the public as a result of COVID-19, we are finding new ways to fulfill our missions. We have responded to this crisis by creating new, free digital versions of our programs and exhibits. We are doing all we can to serve people in their homes, in ways they value and that are accessible to all.

We are using this time to create our new normal that will emerge from this crisis: the ability to both connect with people anywhere they are and welcome them to the place-based institutions they count on us to be.  We have done this because now, more than ever, building STEM confidence and equitable access to the world-class institutions in our community is needed.

Collectively our institutions were visited by more than 4 million people last year through tourism, personal visits, field trips, and more. There will never be a substitute for in-person visits.  But this crisis is demonstrating how we can become trusted places people of all ages and backgrounds know they can count on when they want to learn, interact, and engage in issues impacting their day-to-day lives. We are partners with the immense scientific expertise that is within our own community already.  We are identifying and breaking down barriers to accessing all that we have to offer to help people succeed in a world driven by science and technology.

As we enter each phase of the COVID-19 crisis, we believe deeply that the appetite for this knowledge and environment will continue to grow and become greater than ever before. In the long run, we hope our efforts mean doing our part to build the knowledge, curiosity, and, most important, the diverse community we need to learn from today’s crisis. Together, we can be confident in confronting the exponentially more complex challenges we continue to tackle, and those that we’ll face in the years ahead.

Tim Ritchie is president of the Boston Museum of Science, Vikki N. Spruill is president and chief executive officer of the New England Aquarium, Carole Charnow is president and chief executive officer of the Boston Children’s Museum, and John Linehan is president and chief executive officer of Zoo New England.

The post During crisis, importance of science grows appeared first on CommonWealth Beacon.

NOW MAY BE our last chance to save the North Atlantic right whale from extinction.

The North Atlantic right whale population once dominated the Atlantic Ocean with numbers likely in the tens of thousands, but today, only about 400 remain. In the 1700s, whalers prized these marine mammals for their fatty blubber, making them the “right whale” to harvest for oil and baleen. By the time whaling was outlawed in 1935, the species was decimated.

More than 80 years later, the North Atlantic right whale is still struggling to recover. Yesterday’s threat of whaling has transitioned to today’s new dangers in the form of ship collisions and fishing line entanglements, which are responsible for more than half of documented right whale deaths. As fishing communities, scientists, and the government team up to combat the dangers the right whale faces today, additional risks in the form of seismic airgun blasting, used to find offshore oil and gas reserves, could further threaten right whale recovery in the immediate future.

Some may wonder why it’s important to save a species from extinction. The more scientists learn about ecosystems, the more they understand how complex, sometimes subtle, interconnections between species contribute to the Earth’s habitability. The North Atlantic right whale is no exception. By virtue of their feeding habits and their range from Florida to Canada, right whales fertilize the entire marine food chain and support the marine productivity upon which robust and economically valuable fisheries depend. This species is also an important “canary in the coal mine,” providing scientists, managers, and policymakers early warning cues on how to more effectively manage and protect other species, ecosystems, and habitats impacted by warming and acidification of today’s changing oceans.

We are at a crossroads, and in our hands lies the fate of the last of the North Atlantic right whales. Bringing a species back from the brink of extinction is a complex problem, but we are committed to finding a solution. Evidence shows this species is capable of recovery, but we must act swiftly.

We may seem an unlikely trio: a Marine, a sheriff, and the CEO of one of the nation’s leading research and conservation aquariums. The two of us who serve in Congress are from different parties, and we live about as far apart on the East Coast as possible.

But we are united by a desire to protect our communities, our country, and our Earth. From Florida to Massachusetts, the livelihoods of millions of people and millions more animals depend on clean water and healthy ecosystems.

That’s why we joined together to introduce and advocate for the SAVE Right Whales Act, a bill that would invest $5 million annually in efforts to restore the North Atlantic right whale population. We are proud to be joined by diverse partners, including the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen’s Alliance, SeaWorld, the Humane Society, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Defenders of Wildlife, who support the SAVE Right Whales Act and other efforts to protect the North Atlantic right whale. It is our hope that this bipartisan bill will empower coastal communities to develop and implement creative solutions that help the North Atlantic right whale fully recover.

It’s also why we are leading the push to prevent seismic testing from coming to the Atlantic.

In this mission to save the North Atlantic right whale, we find good reason to be hopeful. This year, seven calves were spotted in the North Atlantic right whale’s calving grounds off northeast Florida’s coast.

On Sunday, thousands of people gathered at the New England Aquarium for the New England Right Whale Festival. They were celebrating this good news and the whales’ arrival to the region from Florida.

Last Wednesday, we gained another reason to celebrate: Republicans and Democrats on the House of Representative’s Committee on Natural Resources worked together and passed the SAVE Right Whales Act out of committee on Wednesday. Next stop is the House floor for a full vote. We urge Congress to pass The Save Right Whales Act and send it to the President’s desk as fast as possible.

The future of these young calves and the 400 other right whales in the Atlantic as well as fishing economies up and down the East Coast are counting on collective action. Let’s unite and bring this iconic animal back from the brink.

Seth Moulton represents Massachusetts 6^th congressional district and John Rutherford Florida’s 4^th congressional district in the US House of Representatives. Vikki Spruill is the president and CEO of the New England Aquarium.

The post We can still save the North Atlantic right whale appeared first on CommonWealth Beacon.