Guideline 15: Linkage to Management Action 



Ultimately, an indicator is useful only if it can provide information to support a management decision or to 

 quantify the success of past decisions. Policy makers and resource managers must be able to recognize 

 the implications of indicator results for stewardship, regulation, or research. An indicator with practical 

 application should display one or more of the following characteristics: responsiveness to a specific 

 stressor, linkage to policy indicators, utility in cost-benefit assessments, limitations and boundaries of 

 application, and public understanding and acceptance. Detailed consideration of an indicator's 

 management utility may lead to a re-examination of its conceptual relevance and to a refinement of the 

 original assessment question. 



Degraded 



Unknown 



Reference 



v> 



Figure 3-9. Distribution of benthic index values for the test sites where ♦ = degraded sites and 

 o = undegraded sites determined by a pr/or/ criteria for dissolved oxygen, sediment 

 chemistry, and sediment toxicity. The cutoff value for degraded sites determined by the 

 benthic index is 3.0 and 5.0 is the cutoff value for undegraded sites determined by the 

 benthic index. 



The value of an index lies in its applicability across large geographical areas and its ability to provide regional 

 assessments of ecological condition. The information derived from an index of environmental condition such 

 as the benthic index is useful to environmental managers and policy and decision makers who want to identify 

 areas of potential degradation and track the status of environmental condition over time. A benthic index can 

 be used to answer questions about the health of benthic communities in the estuaries of a large geographical 

 region, the spatial or temporal variation of degraded areas of benthic communities, and the status of benthic 

 ecological conditions between the estuaries of different regions. 



3-24 



