Assessments

Two types of assessments help determine if leasing and ownership are viable strategies for ocean and coastal conservation: Legal Assessments, and Spatial Data Assessments.

The Country Summaries, U.S. State Summaries, and Maps and Data pages provide a first level assessment of the legal framework and data availability for several areas. The interactive map below provides summary findings as well as links to more detailed assessment reports when available. All information provided on the map is related to lands and resources lying below the high tide line.

Legal assessments identify and evaluate the legal and policy frameworks for management and conservation of lands and resources lying within ocean and coastal waters for specific countries and states. Under ideal circumstances, legal assessments help determine how private acquisition of fee-title or less-than fee-title rights can supplement existing ocean and coastal conservation mechanisms. Legal assessments can take various forms (formal publications, informal research papers, internal memorandums) and can be undertaken by different interested parties (universities, NGOs, government agencies).

Spatial data (depicting the ownership and use of lands and resources lying below the high tide line) are assessed to identify and evaluate what types of spatial data is available, where it is located, how available it is, and what it illustrates. Before a leasing and ownership project can move forward, the owners and users of the lands or resources targeted for acquisition must be known. In some cases, the owners and users will be obvious. In other cases, the owners and users will not be obvious and spatial data will have to be used to make the determination. In this latter scenario, spatial data assessments may be necessary.