The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative Accelerates Great Lakes Protection and Restoration in Five Focus Areas
GLRI Action Plan IV is responsive to Clean Water Act Section 118 amendments in 2015 and 2016 that codified the GLRI. This codification includes a mandate to review and revise the Action Plan every five years and to address five priority areas. These Focus Areas are not silos; GLRI agencies will continue to coordinate and encourage collaboration across Focus Areas in recognition of the interrelated nature of many Great Lakes issues and the multiple benefits that can accrue from larger projects across several Focus Areas.
Under GLRI Action Plan IV
GLRI Action Plan IV continues to specify objectives with related commitments and measures of progress for each Focus Area that will be used to evaluate the actions implemented under this Action Plan. Recognizing that it will take many years to document ecological and human health benefits for an ecosystem as large and complex as the Great Lakes, the measures of progress focus on outputs and/or outcomes that can be measured over the five-year period covered by this Action Plan. They track progress toward achieving the GLRI’s long-term goals.
Agencies will report annually on 23 measures of progress, identified on Objective pages within the Focus Area Summary, with the full list of measures available on the FY2025-2029 Action Plan Summary, including 17 measures that have numeric targets.
GLRI Action Plan IV includes many ideas shared with the federal agencies during the public engagement sessions in 2023. Please see the GLRI Home page for a summary of this input along with how it factored into the development of GLRI Action Plan IV. The Great Lakes Advisory Board also provided valuable recommendations. The federal agencies are grateful for these recommendations and will continue to actively seek additional input from their many partners to protect and restore the Great Lakes. These combined efforts will hasten the day when we can achieve and maintain our long-term goals.
Long-Term Goals for the Great Lakes Ecosystem
- All Areas of Concern (AOCs) delisted
- Equitable access to restored areas
- Community and economic revitalization through restoration and protection actions
- Fish safe to eat
- Water safe for recreation
- Safe source of drinking water
- No new self-sustaining invasive species
- High-impact invasive species controlled
- Harmful/nuisance algal blooms eliminated
- Habitat protected and restored to sustain healthy ecosystem function and native species
- Disadvantaged communities receive 40% of overall benefits of GLRI IIJA investments (Justice40 Initiative goal)
- A more resilient ecosystem to a changing climate and other stressors
Continue reading about the Action Plan IV: