Public meeting on ocean management plan

The state Coastal Resources Management Council will hold a public meeting about the Ocean Special Area Management Plan at 5 p.m. Wednesday at the URI Bay Campus, Coastal Institute, Hazard A & B Rooms.

The focus of this meeting is to discuss two of the Ocean SAMP draft chapters. To reserve, call Amber Neville at (401) 874-6106 or amber@crc.uri.edu. Directions are available at www.gso.uri.edu/about-gso/directions. For more information on the project, go to www.seagrant.gso.uri.edu/oceansamp/index.html.

Lecture series on watershed begins Sunday

The Wood-Pawcatuck Watershed Association is sponsoring a lecture series, “Getting To Know The Watershed.” The first lecture, from 4 to 6 p.m. Sunday, will feature Greg Bonynge and Elise Torello. Bonynge is the Rhode Island geospatial extension specialist at URI and Torello is a water quality information management specialist for the WPWA. They will introduce new Web technologies that allow users to view and map environmental information in the watershed.

The second presentation will be from 4 to 6 p.m. Jan. 24 and will feature Chris Fox and James Turek. Fox is the executive director of the WPWA and Turek is in charge of environmental restoration programs for NOAA. They will describe dam removal and river restoration projects in the watershed to enhance the suitability of the area rivers to support migratory fish populations.

The third presentation will be held at the annual meeting of the WPWA in May and will feature famous fly fisherman Ed Lombardo, who will speak on the history of sport fishing in the watershed and what makes the Wood and Pawcatuck Rivers special for recreational anglers. The time and date of the annual meeting will be announced in the spring.

To reserve, call (401) 539-9017 or register online at www.tinyurl.com/wpwa-lectures. A schedule for the lectures, directions to the venue, and membership information can be found on the WPWA Web site at www.wpwa.org.

Workshops set on green building

The Rhode Island chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council will offer two green building workshops that have been approved as eligible training programs under the federal Workforce Investment Act.

The first workshop in the series, a nontechnical course called “LEED Core Concepts & Strategies,” will be held at the New England Institute of Technology in Warwick on Monday, Nov. 23. This eight-hour workshop is intended for students, property owners, facilities managers, emerging or experienced green designers, engineers, builders and product manufacturers and service providers including Realtors, appraisers, trades people, attorneys and government officials.

The second, more advanced workshop, “Building, Design and Construction, the LEED Implementation Process,” will be held early next year.

While many of the workshop participants will pay regular tuition, those who are unemployed or underemployed may qualify for free tuition through the Workforce Investment Act. Participants must first be determined eligible and suitable for WIA training before they enroll in order to have tuition paid through WIA funds. Those interested should sign up for a WIA training orientation, held weekly at one of four netWORKri One-Stop Career Centers across the state.

For more information on the specifics of the workshops, visit the www.usgbcri.org.