This RFA is seeking insightful, expert, and cost-effective applications from eligible applicants to provide technical analysis and programmatic evaluation support of non-federal agencies and organizations that are members of the Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) partnership.

While the CBP partnership

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is comprised of federal and nonfederal agencies and organizations, the activities funded under this RFA shall only support the non-federal partners.

The recipient of the cooperative agreement awarded under this RFA may work directly with federal agencies, but the nature of that work will result only in benefits to the non-federal agencies, organizations, partners, and the general public.

The non-federal CBP partners will provide programmatic direction to the cooperative agreement recipient through the CBP partnership’s Water Quality Goal Implementaiton Team (GIT) and its workgroups, the CBP partnership’s Habitat GIT and its workgroups, the CBP partnership’s Fisheries GIT and its workgroups, the CBP partnership’s Scientific, Technical, Assessment and Reporting (STAR) Team and its workgroups, other CBP partnership’s GITs, and the CBP partnership’s Management Board.

The selected organization will support the CBP mission of expanding and accelerating the implementation of nutrient and sediment load reduction practices and technologies throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed through collection and evaluation of tidal and watershed water quality and living resources monitoring data.

This mission also includes:Managing the CBP partnership’s jurisdiction-based tidal and watershed water quality and living resources monitoring data network, working directly with federal, state, regional, and local governmental and non-governmental data providers; Enhancing multiple-partner, consensus-based environmental decision-making throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed via the analysis of water quality and living resource data trends and supporting the integration of monitoring data with the CBP partnership’s airshed, watershed and estuarine models and other decision support tools; Better understanding the past, present, and future responses of the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem and its watershed to management actions through management, analysis, and interpretation of long-term monitoring network data; and Expanding the acquisition, maintenance, analysis, interpretation, and dissemination of water quality and living resources monitoring data and information important to the CBP partners.

Applications should be oriented towards further promotion and enhancement of the capacity of environmental professionals working within the partnership-oriented, implementation-focused structure of the Chesapeake Bay Program.