American Statistical Association (ASA) Section on Statistics and the Environment (ENVR) Last Modified: 99-Mar-07

1999 promises to be another event-filled year for the ENVR Section. Thereare several topics about which I would like to inform the ENVR membership.First, I'd like to thank outgoing chair Noel Cressie for all his effortsas ENVR Chair on behalf of the Section. Noel formalized the post ofLiaison Officer, got ENVR going on a strategic plan, and proposedorganizational modifications for more effective communication among theelected and appointed officers. EVNR is continuing to benefit from hisefforts as Past Chair. And our best wishes follow him to Ohio StateUniversity, where Noel took up a new distinguished professorship lastmonth. I would also like to extend a warm welcome to the following ENVRofficers-elect: Barry Nussbaum, US Environmental Protection Agency,Chair-Elect; Katherine Ensor, Rice University, Program Chair-Elect; andKatherine Campbell, Los Alamos National Laboratories, Treasurer-Elect.

For those ENVR members who do not yet know me personally, I am astatistical scientist in academia working in renewable resource management(fisheries/forestry/wildlife) at the University of Washington (UW) inSeattle. Like many applied statisticians, my professorial appointment isoutside the department of statistics--in my case, in the UW's School ofFisheries. I also direct the UW's Teaching Academy, which honorsdistinguished teaching and engages in certain projects aimed atinstructional excellence. As an environmental statistician, I collaboratewith other scientists in cross-disciplinary situations, and thus aminterested in ensuring that statistical perspectives are legitimatelyrecognized on a variety of environmental issues.

David Marker is the appointed ENVR Liaison Officer for1998-99. As such, he will be attending the 1999 meetings of TheInternational Statistical Institute (and a satellite conference in Riga),where he hopes to firm up relationships with other environmentalstatisticians. He also may attend the meetings of the EnvironmetricsSociety (TIES) in Athens, Greece. ENVR is establishing electronic linkswith other related societies (see the ENVR webpage atwww.pnl.gov/statenvi/); we are also posting announcements for upcomingrelated conferences.

Each year, ENVR gives these awardsto one or more statisticians, "to highlight and emphasize thecross-disciplinary work of statistics and the environment." (Furtherdetails are available on the ENVR webpage.) Nominees must have a recordof distinguished contributions to the field of environmental statistics,have been a member for three years prior to June 1, 1999, and not havealready received this award. Required documentation includes a letter ofnomination, up to three supporting letters, and a CV or resume up to fivepages. The 1999 award chair is Cliff Spiegelman at Texas A&M University. The exact deadline (likely April or May) will be announced in the nextAmstat news.

This competition honors a student's paperon a topic within the realm of environmental statistics. Chair-ElectBarry Nussbaum is the contact person for the 1999 competition; entries aredue May 1, 1999. Some important changes in the competition rules haveoccurred. The student need no longer be the sole author; co-authorship(e.g., with one's major adviser) is now permitted. The prize for the bestpaper is $100 and a certificate, plus a $100 contribution towards travelexpenses if the winner attends the 1999 Joint Statistical Meetings inBaltimore.

ENVR continues to co-sponsor workshops and conferences. There will be aworkshop, "Hierarchical Modeling in Environmental Statistics", at OhioState University sometime in 2000. The organizing committee consists ofChair Noel Cressie, Tim Gregoire (ENVR representative) and Mark Berliner(statistics professor, Ohio State). Our thanks again to Noel, whoprovided the initial impetus to get this conference going.

With respect to finances, ENVR ended up with a small surplus (about $200) for 1998. Thus, our finances are stable, but the budget remains tight. Of course, one way to increase revenue is through recruitment of moremembers, and there is no better way to do that than through our currentmembers! For all of us who consider ourselves environmentalstatisticians, it is important to have good invited and contributedsessions, roundtable luncheons, continuing education courses, andconnections with other societies. The best way to accomplish this is byhaving a strong membership base ourselves.

Finally, Christine Ribic has kindly provided the following summary of aconference from Fall 1998. ENVR members are strongly encouraged to sendin these conference summaries (particularly when electronic or printsummaries of the papers are available) to either me or to Philip Dixon, theENVR publications editor. Activities like these fulfill the liaison partof ENVR's mission that encourages relationships with other working groups.

A symposium entitled, "Evaluating the Role of Hypothesis Testing/PowerAnalysis in Wildlife Science" was held at the 5th Annual Conference of theWildlife Society, Buffalo, NY, on 26 September 1998. The symposium wassponsored by the Biometrics Working Group of the Wildlife Society and wasco-chaired by Dr. William Thompson (USDA Forest Service) and Dr. ChristineRibic (USGS-BRD and ENVR member). Over 100 people attended the session tohear some of the leading authorities address some fundamental issuesregarding the use (and misuse) of null hypothesis testing in wildliferesearch. Besides experts in wildlife science, experts from the fields ofstatistics and social sciences were invited to bring theircross-disciplinary perspectives to this issue. Extended abstracts of allpresentations can be found at the website of the Wildlife SocietyBiometrics Working Group (http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/bwg/).