ADDUNDUM TO THE FALL 2002 AVP REPORT

Cave and Karst Acquisition Committee Chairman
Candidate: Phillip Moss

What is your vision/stance for the NSS's acquisition of cave and karst properties?
Philip: I think that the recent movement from NSS acquisition to the NSS helping conservancies to acquire cave and karst properties is a good one. We can assist in the purchase of many more caves than if we hold title ourselves and we avoid national management of local caves.

What are your thoughts on the current criteria for acquisition?
Philip: I am content with the current criterion that for the NSS to own caves that they must have national significance. I think that we can use a lower standard if we are helping others to buy caves. I think that they still need to be of local significance.

Do you have any ideas on how to increase the dollars in the Cave Acquisition Restricted Fund?
Philip: It currently has $15,000. I think that this properly falls into the domain of the Fundraising Committee. However, I think that there is little knowledge of this fund among the membership or knowledge of how many cave entrances have been purchased with assistance from this fund. The NSS Auction might have some money earmarked to go into the fund. Also, there is USFWS mitigation money for projects involving endangered species.

Should the NSS change its position from acquisition to one of Conservation Easements and support the conservancies in acquiring caves and just hold the in perpetuity conservation easement?
Philip: I think that we should make some effort to ensure that properties that the NSS helps to purchase are not sold to inappropriate owners. However, I suspect (but don't know) that Conservation Easements may give the NSS BOG excessive authority that it might choose to exercise in conflict with local conservancies. Since many conservancies are purchasing cave entrances for access, if the NSS were to have an aggressively conservation-minded Board, we might try to insist on restricting access. I think that we should avoid that situation. I do believe that a contract giving us first refusal to buy at an independently established fair market price in the event of a sale would secure our interests. Alternatively, perhaps we could have an option that would give us a conservation easement only in the case of a sale to a third party. I think that a lawyer needs to advise us on the possibilities.
What are your thoughts on the closed/restricted caves database and the value of this committee as it relates to acquisition?
Philip: The committee has not produced any data; the first Chair wanted the committee to be a closed cave list clearinghouse (which was specifically not part of the plan for the committee). Western cavers (and others) are very mistrustful and uncooperative. It would not hurt my feelings to see this committee go away before it becomes the committee we tried to avoid setting up; one that tries to disseminate specific closed cave information.

Do you agree with the way the NSS cave preserves are managed? What is your vision for the current cave preserves?
Philip: As indicated in my recent motion on the BOG agenda, I think that the only thing lacking is a formal feedback mechanism in the form of site-specific monitoring. We need to know if our management plans are effective. To the best of my knowledge, we have dedicated cave managers who truly are trying to protect NSS-owned caves while making them available to caver visitation.

Have you written a Cave Management Plan
Philip: Yes Paulter Cave, copy attached.

Land Owners Relations Committee
Michael Cicherski

I am interested in working with the private landowners. I am fully aware of the fact that from state to state, region to region, and all over the USA we find that for every landowner contact and relation that has been established, there are just as many approaches and ideas as to how to handle the relations. In other words, no set guidelines or directions have been established and published to the NSS members.

For starters, I suggest that we put together a "Best Practices" manual on how to work with private landowners. I would like to have the members of the NSS write, email or fax me with the ideas that have been most useful or productive for them. I would get this information through a request on caver list servers and a NSS News request. From the ideas it is possible that we can create a small manual, write up, or article that will be a guide to follow when establishing the initial contact and so forth and so on.

Next, we can create an NSS document, (if not already done), which cavers can give to landowners that handle objections to liabilities and other issues. We can create a draft agreement that holds the landowner harmless for personal injury. Yes, we have this here in Texas, but I do not know if other grottos have this document.

Background on me:
I have been caving since the mid-1980s. My mentor is Bill Steele...maybe you know him, maybe not. I have caved extensively with Mark Minton, Don Broussard, and numerous other well-respected Texas cavers. I have caved in Montana, Texas, Mexico and New Mexico. I was part of the Huautla project that has been written about by Bill Stone. I am currently the project director of a cave that has the potential of becoming the longest cave in Texas. The landowner relations with the property owners have been truly a complicated spider web, and from that has come the interest in this position.

Safety and Techniques Committee
Dano McConnell (37357 RE/FE)

Plans:
The first task I have set for myself is to create a Safety and Techniques (S&T) web page. The S&T web page would be connected to the Safety and Techniques Link that is presently shown on the NSS web page. There is currently no page attached to the NSS S&T link. Without a doubt, the S&T page will have a link to the Vertical Section. Other sections linked will be NCRC, Cave Diving, and Cartography. This is of course not a complete list of the proposed linked pages, but I think they will be a good starting point. The page would contain links to other pages in the NSS system as well as to outside sources that contain valuable and pertinent information for the society as relates to S&T. There would be a discussion page for S&T issues, and independent evaluations of equipment and practices. Also included would be an editorial page or letter section. I will be canvassing the Sections for articles and information to put into a clearinghouse page to be linked to the S&T page. I envision this page to be an archive of sorts of S&T related information. I have two web masters that have expressed a willingness to assist in the creation of this web page. I think that having the page up by the spring Board Meting is a workable goal.

This is, I think, the most important thing that the S&T committee could produce at this time and would occupy 100% of my time as S&T chair for the near future.

Future projects would include S&T pamphlets for distribution to the grottoes and articles to the News.