National Park Service Grant for Wildlife Health Technical Assistance and Database Modernization

This Funding Announcement is not a request for applications. This announcement is to provide public notice of the National Park Service’s intention to fund the following project activities without full and open competition.

OVERVIEW

The mission of the National Park Service’s Biological Resource Management Division (NPS BRMD) is to work in cooperation with parks, regions, other divisions of the Natural Resource Stewardship and Science Directorate, and other partners to preserve, protect, and manage biological resources and related ecosystem processes in units of the NPS. One of the responsibilities of the BRMD is to provide expert scientific, planning, and evaluation assistance on management actions and biological resource management issues. The Division is also responsible for policy formulation, planning, training, coordination, and implementation of biological resource management activities and programs of broad Service-wide importance.

Within the Division is the Wildlife Health Branch (WHB). Wildlife health issues are an important aspect of these biological resource and ecosystem management programs. Chronic wasting disease (CWD) of deer and elk and zoonotic diseases such as plague have become national wildlife health concerns. Because of the potential biological, political, and economic impacts of these diseases, parks require technical assistance to address planning, surveillance, prevention, diagnostics, management, field studies, and communications.

In using the Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Units (CESU), federal agencies and nonfederal partners (e.g. tribes, universities, state agencies, and other organizations) collaborate through technical assistance, education, and training to address natural and cultural resource management issues. Under the Rocky Mountain CESU, the National Park Service and Colorado State University (CSU) will continue to collaborate on assistance to the Wildlife Health Program to help safeguard wildlife health, which in turn can influence health of human visitors and employees, in units of the National Park System and subsequently on adjacent lands. In addition, through the collaboration, students at CSU will be provided training and learning opportunities as it relates to conservation, conservation medicine, and natural resource management.

Through this task agreement, one of the goals for the WHB is to redesign the NPS WHB diagnostics database. The purpose of the database is to facilitate timely and accurate diagnostic services to the National Park units in accordance with the NPS and WHB mission while enhancing data-driven wildlife and public health surveillance, response, and science.

RECIPIENT INVOLVEMENT

CSU agrees to:
+ Develop a database population system that allows for parks to submit data to the diagnostic service in real time and with immediate notification to the wildlife veterinarian in charge of the case.
+ Re-design the current wildlife disease diagnostic database while analyzing, preserving, and migrating the 10 plus years of data from the current system into the new and partially automated system that links with the online diagnostic submission platform.
+ Support Chronic Wildlife Disease (CWD) research conducted on elk at Rocky Mountain National Park through field support for wildlife capture, sampling, treatment, and monitoring (survival, movements, etc.).
+ Assist and train the NPS staff on recognition of wildlife diseases, animal capture, field anesthesia, sampling of live animals, radio-telemetry, postmortem examination, and collection and handling of postmortem samples.
+ Collect post-mortem samples from diagnostic case submissions from the national parks and prepare diagnostic samples for histopathologic evaluation.
+ Map disease distribution using Geographic Information System (GIS) and other appropriate systems.
+ Provide administrative, data, and records management support for the NPS Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee.
+ Maintain NPS wildlife pharmaceutical database in compliance with applicable federal laws.
+ Develop and implement disease surveillance and adaptive management programs as required by parks.
+ Assist NPS wildlife health team on preparedness for, and potentially response to, zoonotic and emerging diseases.
+ Provide recordkeeping and archiving of frozen and fixed biological samples collected from national parks.
+ Assist NPS wildlife health team on other wildlife health and welfare projects and issues.

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE INVOLVEMENT

Substantial involvement on the part the National Park Service is anticipated for the successful completion of the objectives to be funded by this award. In particular, the National Park Service will be responsible for the following:
+ Providing the opportunity to diversify the educational experience of students in the Professional Veterinary Medicine (PVM) program and related undergraduate fields of studying by providing:
– Exposure to a variety of non-domestic wildlife species
– Teaching of wildlife diseases, wildlife disease investigation, and NPS policy and wildlife management philosophy by the NPS veterinarians and other NPS BRMD staff
– Short-term employment opportunities to students in an area related to field of study (wildlife, veterinary medicine, biology)
+ Providing assistance by the NPS wildlife veterinarians on necropsies and sample collection and consultation on cases.
+ Identifying potential field-based research projects for graduate students/special studies students in the College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
+ Collaborating in field management study.

SINGLE-SOURCE JUSTIFICATION

The National Park Service did not solicit full and open competition for this award based the following criteria:

(2) CONTINUATION, AND
(4) UNIQUE QUALIFICATIONS

Single Source Justification Description:

THIS IS A NOTICE OF INTENT TO AWARD

This is a Task Agreement, P13AC01129, under the Rocky Mountain Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU) Cooperative Agreement H2370094000, in the amount of $218,000.00 with a period of performance from date of award through December 31, 2014.

STATUTORY AUTHORITY

16 U.S.C. §1a-2(j) Cooperative research and training programs
Secretary of the Interior¿s authorization of activities – Enter into cooperative agreements with public or private educational institutions, States, and their political subdivisions, for the purpose of developing adequate, coordinated, cooperative
research and training programs concerning the resources of the National Park System, and, pursuant to any such agreements, to accept from and make available to the cooperator such technical and support staff, financial assistance for mutually agreed upon research projects, supplies and equipment, facilities, and administrative services relating to cooperative research units as the Secretary deems appropriate; except that this paragraph shall not waive any requirements for research projects that are subject to the Federal procurement regulations.

16 U.S.C. §5933 Cooperative agreements
(a) Cooperative study units – The Secretary is authorized and directed to enter into cooperative agreements with colleges and universities, including but not limited to land grant schools, in partnership with other Federal and State agencies, to establish cooperative study units to conduct multi-disciplinary research and develop integrated information products on the resources of the National Park System, or the larger region of which parks are a part.
(b) Report – Within one year of November 13, 1998, the Secretary shall report to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources of the United States Senate and the Committee on Resources of the House of Representatives on progress in the establishment of a comprehensive network of such college and university based cooperative study units as will provide full geographic and topical coverage for research on the resources contained in units of the National Park System and their larger regions.