NOAA Announces Nominations to the National System of Marine Protected Areas

NOAA is accepting comments on “the list of nominations received from state and territorial marine protected area programs to join the National System of Marine Protected Areas and notice of updates to the List of National System Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).”

The NOAA Federal Register notice  “(1) announces the addition of four MPAs managed by the National Marine Fisheries Service in consultation with the Mid Atlantic Fishery Management Council to the National System of MPAs (national system), thereby updating the List of National System MPAs; and (2) corrects a Federal Register notice published on December 27, 2010 announcing the nomination of 38 existing marine protected areas to the national system.

When NOAA announced the nomination of the 38 MPAs, some of the areas where left out of the Federal Register notice.  The corrected list is contained in NOAA’s new Federal Register notice, attached below.  Comments are due in 30 days.