Assistance in Developing an Outreach Strategy for the CBP

The Assistance in Developing an Outreach Strategy for the Chesapeake Bay Program works to restore and protect the Chesapeake Bay and the thousands of streams, creeks and rivers in the watershed through collaborative policy making, scientific assessment and public communication.

Donor Name: Chesapeake Bay Program

State: Selected States

County: All Counties

Type of Grant: Program

Deadline: 11/17/2024

Size of the Grant: $10,000 to $100,000

Grant Duration: Grant Duration Not Mentioned

Details:

The Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) is a partnership guided by the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement, which sets goals and outcomes for restoring the Bay and provides a framework to hold them accountable for the work.

CBP are conveners, bringing together experts in all areas of Bay restoration to collaborate, educate and guide, while making available the most up-to-date policy, science, data and resources.

Partners include the states of Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia; the District of Columbia; the Chesapeake Bay Commission; the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on behalf of the federal government; and advisory groups of stakeholders, scientists and local government officials.

Objectives

The Alliance is seeking assistance in drafting an outreach strategy for the CBP, in addition to providing guidance and feedback on information gathering activities. The CBP Outreach Specialist will conduct meetings with relevant GITs, workgroups and advisory committees to gather their outreach needs. The contractor will use this information to synthesize the partnership’s outreach needs, advise on short-term and long-term recommendations and draft an outreach strategy.

Convene a kick-off meeting with the CBP Communications Office to determine project schedule and confirm deliverables. The selected contractor is expected to maintain regular contact with project leads and schedule progress meetings as needed.
The contractor will provide guidance to the Outreach Specialist in the development of an agenda and questions to guide the meetings with GITs, advisory committees and workgroups. Please note that the contractor is not expected to attend these individual meetings unless time and resources allow for it. Feedback gathered from these interviews may include, but is not limited to:
- Current activities related to outreach efforts.
- Future vision for CBP outreach efforts.
- Challenges or barriers to the effectiveness of CBP outreach efforts.
- Priority audiences to be engaged through CBP outreach efforts.
- Existing organizations, individuals or efforts working on these issues.
The Outreach Specialist will make meeting notes, recordings and a database of collected outreach needs available to the contractor to guide development of the outreach strategy. The outreach strategy should be a companion document to the recently refreshed CBP Communications Office strategic plan and therefore take into consideration the internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as external opportunities of the CBP Communications Office when developing short– and long-term outreach recommendations (e.g., currently there is only one Outreach Specialist for the partnership). The outreach strategy should include the following elements:
- Prioritized list of outreach needs and audiences determined from the meetings with GITs, advisory committees and workgroups.
- Short– and long–term recommendations for engaging organizations, partners or stakeholders that consider current efforts in place to reach target audiences.
- Framework for engaging with key organizations and their networks that includes current best practices for building networks, relationship-building techniques and outreach methodologies.
Provide guidance to the Outreach Specialist throughout this process as needed and required.