I want to extend a special thanks to everyone who participated in the South Florida Restoration Forum on May 17-19, 1999, at the Embassy Suites in Boca Raton, Florida. The event made it possible to set up this forum web site. In addition, I want to highlight the aspects of the event:

• It was a massive, collaborative, first time effort by hundreds of scientific investigators to display their work in a format that was meaningful to both scientists and non-scientists. Both the event and the online forum have been developed mostly through electronic means with few meetings and minimal effort by all but a few of the individuals involved.

• The effort that was put into developing the information and displays for the forum is continuing to provide further benefits through its ongoing display on this web site which is another rare accomplishment for an event anywhere. This is being done mostly through an extraordinary effort by webmaster Heather Henkel.

• More than 500 scientists, resource managers, executives, and others participated in the forum by either displaying, exhibiting, presenting, discussing, and/or hosting displays in the front half of their guest suites for others who lived nearby. This provided a tremendous cost savings and provided recognition of the great team spirit. This is all part of the restoration effort.

The forum was greatly enhanced through last minute assistance from the Florida Center for Environmental Studies and its student workers from Florida Atlantic University, and by the onsite assistance of volunteers from the Loxahatchee Natural History Association as arranged by the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. This demonstrated the outstanding abilities of individuals in those organizations.

I want to give special recognition to: volunteers Dolores Tennant, Jay Litt, Jay Goldman, Bill Loery, Bert Zimmerman, Ruth Cogswell, Jerry Weiss, Bill Harms, Walter Goldstein and Serena Rinker for their invaluable services; student workers Anne Simons, Jenny Christopher, Dara Cole, Matthew Crane, Sophia Kokoros, Jordan Muss, Scott Park, Josh Patterson, Patricia Rieter, Ada Santamaria, Mandy Selix, Eric Tamila, and Louisa Kerwin for their truly amazing efforts; and Doreen DiCarlo of the Florida Center for Environmental Studies who did an outstanding job, especially with the informal evening reception.

Many thanks to all!

Bob Mooney
Forum developer / coordinator