The San Francisco Bay Area Conservation Commons is envisioned first and foremost as a data-sharing community that possesses the tools and motivation to create a regionally relevant body of environmental information made openly available in support of decision-making, research, and education. This information will be shared and updated through a distributed digital library network by the contributing organizations as part of their in-house information management effort using tools, techniques, and services provided by the SF Commons and the California Conservation Commons. Access to information resources on the SF Commons as well as support for communication about them will be offered through an interface that adapts to the region’s uses and needs, and present a dynamic reflection of current knowledge. For more, please see our Short Concept Paper: HTML or Downloadable File.

The San Francisco Bay Area Conservation Commons is a regional multi-organizational partnership working toward making environmental data openly accessible for support of environmental management in the San Francisco Bay region of California. It works toward this goal by promoting the Principles of the Conservation Commons through the SFBACC Charter, offering training in data management and sharing, and by collaboratively developing the technology and content of the Conservation Commons. Participation in the SFBACC is open to everyone.

The San Francisco Bay Area Conservation Commons is dedicated to coordinating and cooperating with other groups promoting standards and practices for open data networking, such as the California Resources Agency’s CERES Program and Natural Resource Projects Inventory, the USGS National Spatial Data Infrastructure, the Federal Geographic Data Committee, and the National Biological Information Infrastructure.

Services that support the information network with core functionality including spatial data display and archiving, metadata harvesting and aggregation, searching, and communication among community members.

Standards and Protocols that allow for interoperability with other groups' information, such as standard methods for describing data, people, projects, and other information resources.

Tools and Guidelines for library development and administration that are free of license fees and independent of a particular software environment or contractor.

Knowledge Organization Systems that capture the concepts, issues, and topics of the state, regional, local, and thematic information communities, including thesauri for themes, place-names, species and registries of organizations and people's names.

Training and Outreach will be a necessary component of the building of the Commons and critical for its success.

Open Access to all catalogs, archives, and services for anyone to use in their libraries, aggregation sites, and information applications.

Membership and Participation

Active participants to date have been representatives from the following organizations: