ECOS State Measures Project

ECOS recently released plans for the ECOS State Measures Project.  The Project’s purpose is to develop a set of common measures and metrics that states can use to help communicate public health and environmental progress, as well as the economic impact of environmental achievements.  By using existing routinely collected and reported metrics, the project team will identify common measures, and ideas for conveying them in a way that is understandable to the public.  In addition to the common measures that all states can track, individual states may elect to include additional measures relevant to that state. One initial goal of the Project is to offer states tested and effective measures that they can use to raise public awareness about environmental and public health matters.  A second goal is to develop an annual ECOS report to provide a national perspective on state contributions to our country’s health and environment. The Project workgroup presently includes representatives from seven states and the state environmental media associations.  All states will have an opportunity to provide input during the course of this effort.