Reference Documents for Revitalization Institute's Technical Council

[Resource last added on May 5, 2006. Resources listed in the order in which they were added; most recent at the bottom.]

1. Tetra Tech's Community Certification Guidelines.  This was used successfully during Tetra Tech's 7-year Philippine coastal revitalization project for USAID. [Kitty Courtney]

2. NOAA's National Estuary Restoration Inventory project. [Steve Emmett-Mattox]

   • Overview

   • Comment Request

   • Database Fields

3. Article about ASTM's "sustainable brownfields" standards. [Storm]

4. Society for Ecological Restoration's Primer on Ecological Restoration. [Storm]

5. www.sustainablemeasures.com [Bill Reed]

6. www.sustainabilityindicators.org (see the "resources" section) [Bill Reed]

7. LEED development structure (Word document) [Bill Reed]

8. EPA Watershed Grant Criteria (Word document) [Kitty Courtney]

9. Value-focused Watershed Restoration spreadsheet (Excel) [Storm] Take a look at this: It's great! It's from Prof. Jason R.W. Merrick in the Dept. of Statistical Sciences and Operations Research at Virginia Commonwealth University. He just published a wonderful article in the Summer 2004 issue of the Journal of the American Planning Association, titled "Using Value-Focused Thinking to Improve Watersheds"

10. Institute of Environmental Management & Assessment practitioner registration (web site) [Storm]

11. Registration process for the National Register of Historic Places www.cr.nps.gov/nr/  [Tracey]
    The nomination process and criteria is detailed at: www.cr.nps.gov/nr/publications/bulletins/nrb15/
    The listings can also be searched at: www.nationalregisterofhistoricplaces.com  The Secretary of Interior's Standards for Treatment of Historic Properties (for preservation, rehabilitation, restoration, and reconstruction) and accompanying guidelines are at  http://www2.cr.nps.gov/tps/standguide/index.htm  The registration process trickles up from local to state to federal: Nominations to the national register must come from through state historic preservation office (SHPO) in which the property is located. (Or from the appropriate federal historic preservation office or tribal historic preservation office if the property is located on federal or tribal lands.) A nomination is prepared, often by individuals at the grass-roots level, using the National Register’s criteria and sent to the SHPO for review. Anyone can nominate a place. If a review board at the SHPO approves it, the property may be listed on the State Register of Historic Places. A second review board at the SHPO decides if the cultural property has enough national merit to forward the nomination to the National Register of Historic Places. If so, a third review takes place at the National Register of Historic Places, maintained at the National Park Service.  Despite the status given to listed properties, designation as a National Register listing does not bring any federal restrictions on the use of the property. Property owners are free to maintain, dispose or even neglect their property as they see fit. What designation does bring is acknowledgment of the historical significance of the property in a manner that has been documented and evaluated according to uniform standards.

12. Fishery Certification Program (Tetra Tech project in Philippines) plus Lessons Learned in Fishery Certification Both are PDF documents. [Kitty Courtney]

13. Protecting Water Resources with Smart Growth (PDF).  A brand (July 2004) new report from EPA that list 75 growth management policies that protect water.  If you look at the Table of Contents, you'll see them listed.  Many of them are restorative, so this might provide a number of the general principles we're looking for, since water is both the critical resource, and often the critical indicator. [Storm]

14. Agriculture & Water Metrics (Word document) by Bill Reed. [Bill Reed]

15. EPA's Targeted Watersheds program. How's this for an integrated approach (from EPA website)? "The Targeted Watersheds Grant Program is a relatively new EPA program designed to encourage successful community-based approaches and management techniques to protect and restore the nation's waters. The watershed organizations receiving grants this year exhibited strong partnerships with a wide variety of support; creative, socio-economic approaches to water restoration and protection; and explicit monitoring and environmentally-based performance measures." [Storm]

16. LEED-ND Background Paper (1 page). [Storm]  The U.S. Green Building Council's latest project is LEED for Neighborhood Developments, which will be a blend of New Urbanism, green building practices, and smart growth principles.  While not a restorative development tool per se, there will likely be many overlaps, given that all three of those components have restorative aspects.  As with New Urbanism and green building in general (not so much with Smart Growth), LEED-ND will be applicable to new development as well as restorative development, so LEED-certified sprawl neighborhoods will likely result, just as LEED-certified sprawl buildings result from the current program, but the Smart Growth aspects should help minimize that, especially since one of the goals of LEED-ND is to revitalize existing neighborhoods. This background paper doesn't have much in the way of detail, but LEED-ND will likely be the closest thing to a standard for restorative development outside of our efforts, so it's well worth staying on top of its progress.  Once it's up-and-running, LEED-ND will be one of the more useful external standards that our Integrated Revitalization Guide can reference as another source of points. The more such standards emerge, the better, as they allow us to stay focused on integrating the twelve sectors, which is where our primary value lies.

17. The New Economy of Water (executive summary). [Storm] This 2002 report by the Pacific Institute analyzes trends in water management--especially private approaches--and lays many many useful guidelines and general principles.  Their August 2004 report Freshwater Resources: Managing the Risks Facing the Private Sector updates these insights, and offers ten "recommended practices & benchmarks".

18. Solutions for America. Website offers a number of principles to follow for revitalizing downtowns, summarized here:

    • Aim for a multi-functional downtown.

    • Develop a broad strategy for revitalizing downtown areas. 

    • Create partnerships.

    • Pay particular attention to attracting commercial business. 

    • Focus on developing the unique qualities of downtowns.

    • Maintain and develop genuine public spaces. 

    • Make strategies locally based and flexible.

    • Secure multiple sources of funding.

    • Get local governments involved in several areas.

19. Version 1.0 of the Canadian LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) green building rating system contains two aspects of interest to restorative developers.  They have a "durability rating" (pages 56 & 57 of the linked document) which is similar to the "restorability" factor (building in such a way as to leave restorable assets, rather than piles of junk). The document also addresses "major renovations", rather than just new buildings.  See the document at http://www.cagbc.ca/database/img_415b07cfd4684.pdf [Storm]

20. Smart Growth scorecards.  Links to Smart Growth scoring systems independently developed by states and communities  from around the U.S., compiled by the EPA. Includes municipal-level, project-specific, component, and more. [Storm]