§8550 — Title 15 Commerce and Trade | U.S. Code

Summary

The Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, through the National Weather Service, must improve the Cooperative Observer Program. The NWS must help state programs and places with few observers, work with state weather offices to add stations and boost participation, try to keep stations that have reported for more than 50 years staffed by volunteers, and make recruiting new volunteers a priority. The NWS must provide automated reporting and simple ways to submit non-automated observations like drought, snow, and hazardous weather. Every 180 days the NWS must check station status with state and regional offices and work with the Forest Service, Department of Agriculture, and USGS to grow and better use the network, stations, and staff.

Title 15, §8550

Commerce and Trade — Source: USLM XML via OLRC

(a)The Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, acting through the National Weather Service, shall improve the Cooperative Observer Program by—

(1)providing support to—

(A)State-coordinated programs relating to the Program; and

(B)States and regions where observations provided through the Program are scarce;

(2)working with State weather service headquarters to increase participation in the Program and to add stations in States and regions described in paragraph (1)(B);

(3)where feasible, ensuring that data streams from stations that have been contributing data to the Program for more than 50 years are maintained and continually staffed by volunteers;

(4)prioritizing the recruitment of new volunteers for the Program;

(5)ensuring that opportunities exist for automated reporting to lessen the burden on volunteers to collect and report data by hand; and

(6)ensuring that integrated reporting is available for qualitative observations that cannot be automated, such as drought conditions, snow observations, and hazardous weather events, to ensure that volunteers in the Program can report and upload observations quickly and easily.

(b)Not less frequently than every 180 days, the National Weather Service shall coordinate with State and regional offices with respect to the status of Cooperative Observer Program stations.

(c)The National Weather Service shall coordinate with other Federal agencies, including the Forest Service, the Department of Agriculture, and the United States Geological Survey, to leverage opportunities to grow the Cooperative Observer Program network and to more effectively use existing infrastructure, weather stations, and staff of the Program.

Editorial Notes

Codification This section was enacted as part of the National Integrated Drought Information System Reauthorization Act of 2018, and not as part of the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2017 which comprises this chapter.

§8550 Improvements to Cooperative Observer Program of National Weather Service

Summary

Title 15, §8550

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Editorial Notes

Citations & Metadata