Invasive Steering Committee Meeting Notes

November 16, 2008

Members in Attendance:

Lois Stack, Dale Pierson, Mark Faunce, Nancy Sferra, Don Cameron, Ellen Blanchard, Ann Gibbs

Guests:

Rep. Pat Flood

Meeting Notes:

Minutes from the October 16, 2007 meeting were approved and will be posted on the Department website.

Intent of the Resolve:

Rep. Flood was able to attend the meeting for a while to explain his intent in writing this Resolve. He indicated that he wanted it to be general and not too prescriptive, such as lists of plants, or the effort would fail. He thought it was most important to develop a process and criteria for listing plants that was endorsed by the group. A preliminary list of plants could be developed to show how the criteria might work. He also thought it would be helpful to include in the report some suggested next steps for this process. The Department should have an opportunity to present its findings to the Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry Committee and the report presented should not be lengthy, possibly 5 to 6 pages. A question was asked regarding covering the cost of all the time involved in running plants through the criteria. Rep. Flood indicated there was no state funding available for this process.

Review of Draft Criteria:

Don and Ann had made edits and these were presented to the group. The group worked through the changes and made suggestions that will be incorporated into the next draft. There was some discussion that many more of the terms should be defined. These will be added to the list. Lois asked how these different categories of plants, as listed in the criteria, would be regulated? Is there another option besides regulation? There was a question regarding the interpretation of terrestrial plants and whether this would include plants in wetland areas. The group felt it should. It was also mentioned when putting plants through the criteria the importance of using empirical data. Ann distributed worksheets developed for species proposed for the Massachusetts invasive plant list. She will investigate getting copies of these documents.

Next meeting is scheduled for 12/19/07 at 2pm. Topics to cover include: changes to the criteria, a list of groups to support this effort, sample plants for criteria, and references to support criteria.

Respectfully submitted by,

Ann Gibbs

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