The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced a $241,250 grant to Trout Unlimited as part of a multi-project cooperative partnership to restore coastal and river fisheries habitats throughout the coastal United States. NOAA is an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The funding supports the creation of a three-year partnership between Trout Unlimited and the NOAA Restoration Center for habitat restoration projects that benefit commercial fisheries resources and recreational sportfish. The partnership will involve citizens working on local habitat restoration projects that benefit cold-water fisheries. Examples of projects include placing wood in spawning areas to allow resting habitat for spawning fish and removing out-dated dams to allow fish passage in freshwater spawning and rearing habitats.

"This partnership between NOAA and Trout Unlimited is a great example of a federal to local initiative that is critical to restoring important fisheries along our nation's coasts," said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. "NOAA and the Bush Administration are working to improve the understanding of our environment and to strengthen local and regional initiatives in habitat restoration, protection and fishery development."

This new partnership continues efforts that started in 2001. NOAA and Trout Unlimited have worked together to implement restoration projects on both a watershed scale and through Trout Unlimited's Embrace-A-Stream program which funds Trout Unlimited chapters to implement restoration projects locally. Embrace-A-Stream projects have been funded in nine states, while watershed scale efforts have been implemented directly by
Trout Unlimited in Maine and California.

"Trout Unlimited is extremely pleased in renewing our partnership with NOAA. In our previous collaborations, we've shown that we can make significant habitat improvements on a watershed-scale. We're looking forward to expanding our efforts with NOAA in restoring Atlantic and Pacific salmon and the fisheries that they support," said Joe McGurrin, Trout Unlimited director of Resources.

The NOAA Restoration Center uses a community-based restoration program to work with organizations and governments to support locally driven habitat restoration projects in marine, estuarine and riparian areas. NOAA funds on-the-ground habitat restoration projects that offer educational and social benefits for citizens and their communities and provide long-term ecological benefits for fishery resources. Since 1986, over 800 projects in 26 states have been implemented using NOAA funding and leveraged funding from national and regional habitat restoration partners. For more information on the Community Restoration Program, please visit:
http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/habitat/restoration.

Each year, NOAA awards approximately $900 million in grants to members of the academic, scientific and business communities to assist the agency in fulfilling its mission to study the Earth's natural systems in order to predict environmental change, manage ocean resources, protect life and property, and provide decision makers with reliable scientific information. NOAA's goals and programs reflect a commitment to these basic responsibilities of science and service to the nation for the past 34 years.

NOAA is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of our nation's coastal and marine resources. To learn more about NOAA, please visit http://www.noaa.gov.

Trout Unlimited is North America's leading coldwater fisheries conservation organization, dedicated to the conservation, protection and restoration of trout and salmon fisheries and their watersheds. The organization has more than 130,000 members in 450 chapters in North America.

National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration

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