Call for Nominations: The American Shore and Beach Preservation Association’s 2021 Best Restored Beaches Awards Due April 30

ASBPA is seeking nominations for the Best Restored Beaches Award to recognize beach renourishment projects.  This award honors the Best Restored Beaches in America annually to help build awareness of the value of America’s restored beaches.  The award-winning projects on America’s open shoreline and on the Great Lakes’ shorelines could include:

• Beach and shoreline renourishment project on open coastlines
• Dune restoration and dune building projects
• Coastal resiliency projects with a sandy beach or dune component
• Inlet management and regional sediment management (RSM) projects including beach placement
• Beach and shoreline projects on open coastlines with structures that enhance the performance of beach renourishment projects

The intensity of the storms that have been hammering our coasts have been increasing.  It has been proven that high dunes and wide beaches are the best defenses to minimize the impacts of erosion and flooding from severe storms.  “Many seasonal or new residents of beach communities do not realize that their beach was built and has been maintained over the years.  It is important that everyone realize the time and effort that is required to maintain this critical resource” says Tony Pratt, President of ASBPA.

Continued public support for restoration is crucial and often difficult to maintain when restoration projects become successful and routine. ASBPA encourages nominations from established, as well as new, projects for the 2021 Best Restored Beaches Award.

The Committee will evaluate the nomination based on your responses to these questions.  Please feel free to expand on or the describe in more depth what efforts were required.

To meet submission deadlines, all nominations must be sent electronically to Bestrestoredbeach@asbpa.org by April 30, 2021.  Go to https://asbpa.org/about-us/awards-program/ for more information. A nomination checklist (PDF ~ 104kb) is available.  We encourage all applicants to use the checklist to make sure their application is complete.

Nomination packages must contain the following:

1. Nominator’s contact information (name, address, phone, fax, email).

2. The name and contact information for the nominee’s public affairs specialist who will be coordinating with the media for press releases,

3. Project location

4. The name of the project manager and the construction contractor. If consulting firms were  used in the design and/or permitting, provide the consulting firm’s principal scientist, biologist, ecologist or and/or engineer as appropriate.

5. Project narrative, including the following:
   1. Effectiveness and Purpose. Describe the primary objective(s) of the project and any secondary objectives.  Discuss the ow effectiveness of the project in meeting both primary and any secondary goals?
   2. Design features including constraints and challenges. The nominee should provide a comprehensive description of the design. Identify the issues influenced design.
   3. Construction Methods. The nominee should provide a description of, construction methods.  Projects with innovative design and construction methods that were effective and able to meet project’s purposes will be favored.
   4. Describe the funding sources and how any obstacles or hurdles were overcome. Projects with public / private partnerships and monitoring to document project performance success will be favored.

6. Several professional-quality color photographs of the restored beach with release (tourist development councils and local resorts are good sources for photos of this quality). Include before and after restoration photographs.

7. A statement about why you consider this project is Best Restored Beach in the United States. (It is important to let the Committee know that you are passionate about your project and that the restoration project was a benefit to the shoreline habitat).

8. Quantified outcomes (benefits resulting from the successfully executed project) are especially helpful.

9. Please include beach nourishment data for your current project, and historic beach nourishments, to include volume (cubic yards), cost, and length of shoreline restored. Your project will be added to our online geodatabase:  https://gim2.aptim.com/ASBPANationwideRenourishment/

Winners will be notified in advance. ASBPA will prepare press releases to notify the media of the winner. Winners must agree to provide press releases to their local media and arrange for a representative to be present at the 2022 ASBPA Coastal Summit in Washington D.C. or participate in the virtual Coastal Summit if an in person meeting is not conducted in order to accept the award.

All materials submitted will become property of the American Shore and Beach Preservation Association and will not be returned. Upon written request, a nomination from 2020 that was not chosen can be carried over to 2021.