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Meet Clea Rome – North Olympic Peninsula RC&D Coordinator

It is just a short distance from my old desk down the hall at the Clallam Conservation District, but so much has happened since I started my new job as the North Olympic Peninsula (NOP) RC&D Coordinator.  I feel like my position at the conservation district is already in the distant past.  It has been a whirlwind of exciting and sometimes overwhelming floods of information about the agency and the RC&D program. 

Clea Rome, new Resource Conservation and Development Coordinator in Port Angeles, WA. My background and training is in Landscape Architecture, a profession that sits squarely at the intersection of natural and cultural landscapes.  I jumped at the opportunity to work for the NRCS RC&D program.  I see not only the RC&D program, but the work of NRCS as a whole as sitting at this same intersection, with a strong history of conservation and enhancement of our country’s agricultural and natural resources.  From my experience working at a conservation district, in partnership with the NRCS field office, I have seen that NRCS programs in our area are positively influencing the way resources are perceived, utilized and conserved at a very local level, farmer by farmer, pasture by pasture.  At the same time, with its wide breadth of members and partners across both Clallam and Jefferson Counties, the NOP RC&D Council can effect change from the sea to the mountains, from the coast to the Sound. 

I believe strongly in the unique model that the RC&D program is built on, a model in which the federal government provides targeted assistance to address locally determined resource needs.  Through the RC&D Council, local governments, organizations and citizens come together to make their communities better places to live.  The past and current projects of the NOP RC&D demonstrate this very clearly.  Below is a sampling of what the NOP RC&D has achieved or is currently working on. 

  • Connecting local resource managers in the Dungeness and Elwha watersheds with NASA tools and technology to aid in effective natural resource management.
  • Partnering with the Columbia Pacific RC&D to help rural coastal communities explore opportunities for wood biomass utilization for renewable energy projects.
  • Supporting local jurisdictions in pursuing a comprehensive baseline inventory of local energy uses that contribute to greenhouse gas emissions in order to develop estimates of current emissions and forecasts of future emissions if current practices do not change.

  • Assisting a 50-acre working farm to create a local hands-on learning center for agricultural and environmental education.

All of these projects supported by the RC&D have positively changed the landscape, culture and resources of the North Olympic Peninsula.  As the new RC&D coordinator for this area, I look forward to the opportunity to be a part of that change.
 

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