Collaborative Conservation Planning for the Gaviota Region (Final Report Only), The Bren School, University of California Santa Barbara, 2022-2023

The Gaviota Region of Southern California encompasses a myriad of diverse cultures and organizations, including the Chumash Indigenous people, a strong ranching and agricultural community, residential communities, and an array of private, governmental, and non-profit institutions. Within this region lies the Jack and Laura Dangermond Preserve (JLDP). It is owned and managed by The Nature Conservancy (TNC), one of the largest non-profit environmental organizations in the world. As one of the most effective and efficient environmental protection organizations globally, the JLDP can potentially anchor conservation protection and management actions spanning the entire Gaviota Region. This project aims to create a decision-making framework to assist JLDP, local agencies, stakeholders, and rightsholders in setting collaborative priorities and developing a region-wide conservation management plan. Our primary deliverable is an interactive tool that combines information gathered from stakeholder and rightsholder interviews and data regarding the ecological characteristics of the Gaviota Region. We conducted 23 interviews with regional stakeholders and rightsholders to assess their conservation priorities. In addition, we combined numerous spatial data sets to represent the conservation values of the region — namely, biodiversity, water, climate resilience, and soil health. We analyzed a matrix of priority scores for given conservation values and combined these with spatial analyses for this region. These analyses formed the basis for our spatial planning tool and allowed us to determine the spatial priorities based on the reported priorities of the Gaviota Regions’ stakeholders and rightsholders.

美国南加州加维奥塔（Gaviota）区域承载着多元文化群落与各类组织，包括丘马什（Chumash）原住民群体、颇具规模的农牧社区、住宅社区，以及众多私营、政府与非营利机构。该区域内坐落着杰克与劳拉·丹杰蒙德保护区（Jack and Laura Dangermond Preserve, JLDP），其由全球最大的非营利环保组织之一的自然保护协会（The Nature Conservancy, TNC）所有并运营。作为全球最具成效与效率的环保组织，自然保护协会旗下的JLDP有望成为覆盖整个加维奥塔区域的保护行动与管理工作的核心锚点。本项目旨在构建一套决策框架，以协助JLDP、地方机构、利益相关方与权利持有人制定协作优先级，并编制全域性的保护管理计划。我们的核心交付成果是一款交互式工具，该工具整合了从利益相关方与权利持有人访谈中获取的信息，以及加维奥塔区域的生态特征数据。我们针对区域内的利益相关方与权利持有人开展了23次访谈，以评估其保护优先级。此外，我们整合了多套空间数据集，用以表征该区域的保护价值——具体包括生物多样性、水资源、气候韧性与土壤健康。我们针对各类保护价值构建了优先级评分矩阵，并将其与本区域的空间分析相结合。这些分析构成了我们空间规划工具的基础，并使我们能够基于加维奥塔区域利益相关方与权利持有人上报的优先级，确定空间保护优先级。