Ecological Society of America

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ESA Governing Board
November 22-23, 2002
Washington, D.C.

The November 22-23 meeting of the ESA Governing Board was attended by Pamela Matson (Past-President), Bill Schlesinger (President-Elect), Jill Baron (Secretary), Allison Power (Vice President for Public Affairs), Norm Christensen (Vice President for Finance), Carol Brewer (Vice President for Education and Human Resources), Ed Johnson (Member-at-Large), Oswaldo Sala (Member-at-Large), Sharon Collinge (Member-at-Large), and Executive Director Katherine McCarter. Managing Editor David Baldwin, Director for Public Affairs Nadine Lymn, Director of Education Jason Taylor, Director of Finances Elizabeth Biggs, and Frontiers Editor-in-Chief Sue Silver were also present. Michael Freedman, an auditor with Gelman, Rosenberg, and Freedman, joined the Board Friday evening. Margaret Palmer, Chairwoman of the Ecological Visions Committee, joined the Board Saturday afternoon. The meeting was called to order by President-Elect Schlesinger at 7:00 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 22, 2002, and adjourned at 5:00 p.m., Nov. 23.

I. Roll Call

1. The GB unanimously adopted the agenda.

II. Ratification of votes taken via email since last meeting

1. A. Approved the nomination of Jeremy James, University of California, Davis and Kiona Ogle, Duke University for the Shreve Award honoring desert research.
   
2. Approved the nomination of Antonio Magione, National University of San Luis, Argentina and Michael J. Lowes, University of Natal, South Africa for the Whittaker Travel Fellowship for outstanding international ecologists.
   
3. Recommended that the ESA Council establish three new Sections. They are Biogeosciences, Traditional Ecological Knowledge, and Urban Ecology. Requested staff initiate a vote on these new groups.
   
4. Recommended that the ESA Council approve a by-laws change to establish a new Mexico Chapter.
   
5. Recommended that the ESA Council discontinue the Quebec Chapter.

III. Reports

1. Report of the President. Although President Bartuska was not able to attend, she passed on the message that her goals this year are to make the Ecological Society of America a more visible resource for policy, and keep the Board open to opportunities to increase visibility by issuing statements and, sponsoring meetings.
   
2. Meeting with Michael Freedman, auditor. Mr. Freedman presented the independent auditors’ report of ESA finances to the Board. The cover letter to the Board states that the financial statements of ESA present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of the Ecological Society of America, Inc. As of June 30, 2002, and its change in net assets and its cash flows for the year then ended in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America. The report is on file in ESA HQ. Mr. Freedman commended ESA for raising dues last year (the first time in 7 years) and noted that some boards have policies to raise dues depending on rates of inflation every few years, or by cumulative cost of inflation. If ESA wishes to do that, we would need to propose a Bylaws change.
   
   The Board extends special thanks to Executive Director McCarter and Finance Director Biggs for a perfect audit and no management letters from the auditors for the past two years.
   
3. Report of the Executive Director and Staff. Executive Director McCarter presented a set of written reports to the Governing Board summarizing the activities of ESA staff. Highlights of staff reports include the following:
   
   
   1. Science Director Position. Lori Hidinger is serving as Interim Director for Science until a new Director joins the staff. Candidates were interviewed for this position in September, and an offer was made to the top candidate, who, regretfully, opted not to come. The search was reopened and candidates are being interviewed.
      
   2. Frontiers in Ecology and Environment is nearing it’s opening publication date. Andrew Dobson has joined the International Advisory Board. Chris Emery and Jacqueline Byrd have joined the Frontiers staff, as Editorial Assistant and Advertising and Marketing Manager, respectively.
      
   3. Finances and Membership Report. Finances were discussed above, under Reports. ESA membership increased by one from 2001 (7833) to 2002 (7844). Individual subscriptions to the journal declined, as anticipated, presumably due to members gaining on-line access to journals through their institutions. Institutional and on-line subscriptions increased, and in 2002 about 25% of members receive on-line journals. Section and chapter membership declined for the third year in a row, with the exception of the Rocky Mountain chapter, and the Rangeland Ecology and Agroecology Sections.
      
      Moe Zaw-Aung has joined ESA staff as Webmaster.
      
   4. Science Program Office. Margaret Palmer has agreed to chair the new ESA 18-month-long assessment and strategic planning effort. A number of agencies have committed funding for the Assessment.
      
      The Symposium on Effects of Fishing Activities on Benthic Habitats: linking geology, biology, socioeconomics, and management, co-sponsored by ESA, USGS, NOAA, and AFS, was held November 11-15, 2002 and was a big success.
      
      Followup to the International Nitrogen Conference held in 2001 included a workshop at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg. Other Science Program activities include management of the National Parks Ecological Fellowship Program, participating in Sustainable Resources Roundtables, working with UCS on regional climate change effects reports (the Great Lakes report is out for review), and coordinating historical range of variation assessments for the Forest Service. Working with NSF, ESA supported development of a CD to promote the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON).
      
   5. Public Affairs Office. Nadine Lymn and Adrienne Froelich (AIBS) launched the Biological and Ecological Sciences Coalition (BESC) to address federal agency funding for non-medical life science.
      
      An announcement of ESA 2003-2004 Congressional Science Fellowship has been distributed to the ecological community.
      
   6. Education. A proposal has been submitted to NSF to sponsor students from under-represented groups to ESA annual meetings. SEEDS and BEN projects are proceeding, with BEN (the BioScience Education Network receiving funding through 2004 from NSF. SEEDS and ESA were presented at career conferences in Boston, Sacramento, Bimark, Tulsa, and elsewhere.
      
   7. Publications Office. Plans for conversion to electronic processing of manuscripts are moving along. Plans for moving the Ithaca office to new quarters are also moving along. The Bulletin had its last hard-copy issue and will henceforth be published online.
      
   8. Meetings. The 2002 Annual meeting in Tucson had 3,756 registrants, making it the largest ESA meeting ever. Planning for the 2003 meeting in Savannah, GA, is well under way. An Invasive Weeds conference will be held in Ft. Lauderdale Nov 3-7 2003, sponsored by ESA and several other organizations.
      
      
4. Report of the Vice-President for Finance. The status of ESA fund accounts and the first quarter financials were presented by Finance Director Biggs and Executive Director McCarter. Vice-President Christensen presented some initial thoughts on allocation of ESA endowment income. Christensen will seek advice from the Finance Committee on ESA’s investment strategy, how best to position ourselves for recovery, how to best manage and spend out of the endowment. The Board discussed the idea of adding a section to the ESA website that describes why ESA members should give to ESA.
   
5. Frontiers. There will be a launch celebration at the AAAS meeting in Denver February 13-17, 2003, and a similar fête in Washington D.C. on February 6.

III. Discussion Items.

1. Meeting of the Ecological Societies of America Proposal. Member-at-Large Sala proposed that ESA host a meeting of the Presidents of South and Central American countries (Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico) on the Friday preceding the start of the Annual meeting in Savannah. The purpose of the meeting is to explore possibilities for collaboration. The GB approved the proposal and agreed to fund travel and one night’s lodging for five international presidents and one night’s lodging for the ESA president. A suggested agenda was strengths, weaknesses, and purposes of the various societies discussed in the morning, develop a document on future collaborative activities in the afternoon. Publicity for this event should include posters of the Society Presidents (similar to last year’s Ecologists posters), announcement in the flyer for the Millenium Funds, and post on the ESA web site.
   
2. Issues in Ecology - Report of the Ad Hoc Committee. The subcommittee submitted four recommendations to the Governing Board regarding future development, review, and funding for the Issues in Ecology series. GB approved the three that were related to editorial board composition and responsibilities, and professional venues for manuscripts in addition to Issues. The Board added substitute wording related to funding for specific Issues out of operating funds if there are not funding strategies in place, but not to allocate funds a priori for Issues. Other GB recommendations: a) An education-oriented person should be a member of the editorial board; b) Translation of Issues into Spanish must be considered in funding strategies; c) ESA Education Staff should consider making good curriculum outlines for Issues (similar to the Climate Reports), and link these to learning web sites, such as NSF’s TIEE.
   
3. Position Papers - Review of Process. A 16-step process for guiding ESA Position Papers from conception to publication was presented to the GB. The Board approved this behemoth with the following exceptions:
   

   Step 3: following approval of a proposal for a position paper, the lead author and committee have two months in which to submit a detailed outline back to the Board.
   
   Step 6: The committee is expected to write a draft of the position paper within eight months once the outline is approved.
   
   Steps 8 and 9 were combined into 8a and 8b; 8b is now changed to read: the Monitor provides the draft to ESA HQ for posting on the ESA website in the Members Only page for the purpose of obtaining comments. There will be a call for interested ESA members to review the document.
   
   Steps 7, 8a, 8b, and 9 should all occur at the same time.
   
   Steps 9-16 need to be renumbered.
   

   GB discussed potential problems of stalled position papers. As some of them could become obsolete, but the importance of others will not diminish with time, each case should be determined individually. Very timely statements should be submitted as Resolutions. Comments on drafts from ESA members are invited but need to be thoughtfully documented; the monitor will distill them. Monitors that rotate off the board will take their monitoring responsibilities with them. This topic should be revisited frequently.
   

4. Position Paper Updates. Biodiversity and GMO position papers are in draft stage. A proposal for a Fire Ecology Position paper was discussed with some comments that will be relayed by Vice President for Public Affiars Power to John Keeley, originator of the proposal.
   
5. A proposal was submitted to GB to combine the Future Meetings and Program Committees. The Board approved, noting this new committee will report to the Vice President for Science. The new committee will meet during the annual meeting. Should an additional mid-year meeting be necessary, the committee will need to request GB approval. This first year is an exception: the committee is authorized to meet before the Savannah meeting in order to organize. The Board approved use of revenues from the Tucson meeting for this purpose. Establishing the new committee will require a change in the bylaws, and this process will be initiated as soon as possible.
   
6. The Board appointed Paul Ringold to serve as Program Chair for the 2005 annual meeting in Montreal.
   
7. The Board appointed Paul Ringold and Allan Solomon as local hosts for the 2004 annual meeting in Portland, OR.
   
8. Diversity in Ecology Luncheon. The GB agreed that future diversity luncheons should be a ticketed event (to keep track of participants), but costs will be minimized to maximize student participation. Brown bag or box lunch options will replace the catered lunch of previous years.
   
9. Symposia Policy. The Board received and approved a policy statement regarding symposia at the annual meetings. It proposes numbers of symposia be limited to no more than 24/yr. Proposals will be selected competitively based on quality and relevance to meeting theme; criteria for symposia will no longer include endorsement from a section or chapter. Sections and chapters, officers and other entities are not entitled to symposia. (Note: this requires removing endorsement language from the ESA web site pertaining to symposia).
   
10. Ecological Visions Committee. Margaret Palmer reported the list of committee members and updated GB on support received from agencies. The first meeting of the committee is scheduled for Jan. 6-8 in Washington, D.C.
    
11. Covers for Ecology, Ecological Monographs, and Ecological Applications. Managing Editor Baldwin indicated that the Editors-in Chief of ESA journals feel the time has come to change the covers for these journals. Baldwin and the EiCs proposed they utilize the cover design that was NOT selected for Frontiers. The Board approved this plan, but strongly advised holding off making the change until at least 6 months after the debut of Frontiers.
    
12. Historical Records Committee. Secretary Baron reported that Buck Sanford, University of Denver, has agreed to chair this committee. Patty Sprott and Steven Brown have agreed to be committee members.

Respectfully Submitted,
Jill S. Baron, Secretary