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This version of NSU News has been archived as of February 28, 2019. To search through archived articles, visit nova.edu/search. To access the new version of NSU News, visit news.nova.edu.
This version of SharkBytes has been archived as of February 28, 2019. To search through archived articles, visit nova.edu/search. To access the new version of SharkBytes, visit sharkbytes.nova.edu.
NSU Alumni Spotlight: Joanna Walczak, M.S. (’08)
Joanna Walczak, M.S. (’08)
Joanna Walczak, M.S. (’08), is the Southeast regional administrator for the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s Florida Coastal Office. Her responsibilities include oversight of Biscayne Bay Aquatic Preserves, Coral Reef Conservation Program, Coupon Bight Aquatic Preserve, Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary (FKNMS), and Lignumvitae Aquatic Preserve. She works with 28 full-time staff members across 5 counties, directly supervising 5 program managers, and coordinating policy advisers from 14 federal agencies, as well as governor appointees from Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.
Walczak is Florida’s point of contact for the U.S. Coral Reef Task Force (USCRTF) and the U.S. All Islands Coral Reef Committee. She is the state’s trustee for FKNMS with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, and the state’s natural resource trustee for nonpermitted coral reef injuries (e.g., vessel groundings, anchor drags).
Walczak is the coauthor of the Florida Coral Reef Protection Act (2009), and serves on the USCRTF Steering Committee and Coral Injury and Mitigation Working Group, which is developing a handbook for coral reef mitigation in the United States—a milestone in the development of national ocean policy.