Albertan’s are trusted to responsibly enjoy the province’s Protected Areas. Verification, through site inspection reports, ensures Albertans this responsibility is being carried out.

‘Trust but Verify‘ is a maximum used both in cyber-security and was often repeated by President Ronald Reagan during nuclear-arms reduction negotiations [1]. It can just as easily be applied to Alberta’s Protected Areas. We trust Albertans to use Protected Areas responsibly; a Steward verifies this is in fact the case.

SAPAA’s Take on the Online Inspection Report

An online inspection report is available from the Alberta Government (GoA). A recent survey through SAPAA’s Facebook Page indicated that few members use the form. Ideally, upon submitting the form, a courtesy-copy should be sent to the submitter (although the author’s experience indicates this is not always so).

How many individuals and how many submissions have been made over the past few years and for which areas is unknown to SAPAA. The GoA does not share even aggregated information due to privacy considerations.

SAPAA Sponsored Site Inspection Form

Given these challenges, SAPAA is considering creating its own inspection form. Information collected will be reported to SAPAA members and made available to the public. Periodically, SAPAA will transmit to the government submitted results. The form will be available to current government designated Stewards, all SAPAA members and ‘Citizen-Stewards’. In designing this form, the following principles will be used:

1. Secure and Meeting Data Privacy Considerations. Protected information (name, email address, phone number, etc.) will meet or exceed GoA security requirements.
2. Low Cost, Evolving, and Best Available Technology. SAPAA will use readily available technology (e.g. WordPress Forms) so that the form can be created, used, and improved quickly, efficiently, and effectively.
3. Simple User Experience. Feedback will be solicited from users to improve the user experience (UX) and ‘reduce the cost of reporting’. These efforts will be balanced against point number 2 above, low cost and best available technology.
4. Valid Data Collection. Information collected will be useful, relevant, and comparable between sites and over time. In addition to online reporting, the data will be made available to bona fide researches noting point 1 above, privacy.
5. Born Digital, Geo/Media Friendly. The starting point for the inspection report is the smart phone. While a paper copy print out may be possible, it is also the last resort. In addition, the tool mush support the upload of media files (photos, short videos, audio clips) and geo-position information.
6. One or Many Site Relevant. Some Stewards restrict their visits to their designated sites. Most will wander further afield and visit a handful of sites every year. A small cadre (the author included) strives to visit as many sites as possible. The tool will support all types of submitters.
7. Enduring Record for SAPAA, Submitter, and the GoA. The submitter can revisit previously submitted reports. This will allow for corrections, provision of additional details, and comparison across points of time.
8. Expandable and Integration. Initially the application will focus on the protected areas of interest to SAPAA and their status. Additional sites and data points will be added as SAPAA’s experience, tools, and resources permit.

Form and Function – A Roadmap

• Step 1, Just Enough. By September 2023, create an online tool to collect rudimentary information on Protected Areas. The focus will be on disturbances and the Steward’s overall impression of the site.
• Step 2a, Environmental and Data Scan. By December 2023, conduct a scan of existing site inspection tools. The SAPAA Board to will decide whether to continue development, adopt external tool, or another course of action.
• Step 2b, Data Submission to GoA. Submit to the GoA of site visits collected in 2023.
• Step 3, What Happens Next. Based on the above experiences, start developing/ buying/ using an online tool that best aligns with the design principles.

Step 1, Just Enough

So let’s get started! SAPAA’s online tool will use the data model introduced in the above graphic. A data dictionary is available. A working proof of concept (PoC) will be created and feedback solicited from SAPAA members, the general public, and interested GoA staff members.

Data Entry, Less is More

There is an inverse relationship between survey length and drop off rate (surprisingly, it is not linear [2]). For the PoC, the following completion objectives are planned:

1. Completed in 2-3 minutes excluding loading media files, etc.
2. Loading 10 media files in less than 5 minutes.
3. Fewer than 15 questions of which 8-12 are drop down boxes with free-text questions limited as much as possible.

WordPress Forms to the Rescue – Sort of

WordPress forms are a low-code platform to quickly develop and launch a site inspection report. While there are (LOTS) of other competing tools, for a quick-launch and low-cost PoC, WordPress is ‘good-enough’ for SAPAA to get started.

What Data to Collect

There is a near infinite number of things that can be asked about a site. For 2023, the mantra is ‘trust but verify’ by asking three groups of questions:

1. Who are you and which Site did you visit?
   • General Information: Name and contact details of the submitter.
   • Drop down list: which site was visited.
   • How Healthy is the Site, scale of 1-5?
2. What is in the Site (that should be there)?
   • What notable plants, animals, geological, or other natural phenomenon was observed?
   • Fences, signage, etc. for the site?
3. What are the human disturbances affecting the Site?
   • Agricultural activities (grazing, seeded crops, etc.)
   • Resource extraction (gravel mining, oil and gas, tree harvesting).
   • Motorized disturbances (ATV or vehicle activity).
   • Animal or self propelled activities (walking/hiking trails, skiers, snowshoeing, mountain biking, horses, other animals, canoeing)
   • Fires, camping, buildings (homeless camp, ‘bush party’ sites, recent fires or burns).
   • Infrastructure encroachment (recent or otherwise: power lines, roads, cut lines, pipelines, diversion of water courses through culverts).
4. What do you Recommend to be Done to Help the Site?
   • No Action required
   • Fence, post-signs and, educate visitors disturbing the site
   • Enforcement, in particular for illegal activities

Next Steps and Be an Early Adopter?

Technology can help SAPAA verify that Alberta’s protected areas are being enjoyed responsibly. What information would you like to see collected and what data point is not worth the effort to collect? Looking ahead, what sites and integrations would like to see in this tool. Finally, are you interested in being an early adopter for the tool and help with its early design?

Leave a comment below or reach out to webmaster AT sapaastewards.com to provide your feed back and comments.

References and Further Reading

1. Trust, but verify – Wikipedia.
2. Does adding one more question impact survey completion rate? | SurveyMonkey