Office of Law Enforcement | Special Agent Office - Charlestown, RI
This single agent duty station is collocated with the Division of Refuges and Coastal Program at the Service’s Kettle Pond Visitors’ Center in the southwestern corner of Rhode Island. The Center is located in the town of Charlestown, RI approximately thirty five miles south of Providence and eighty eight miles south of Boston. The Special Agent assigned to this office is primarily responsible for the State of Rhode Island, including Block Island, Southeastern Massachusetts, Buzzards Bay, Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket and the Elizabeth Islands. The Special Agent also partners with other law enforcement agencies including the Rhode Island Environmental Police, Massachusetts Environmental Police and NOAA – Office of Law Enforcement. Several high-profile federal endangered, threatened and trust species, whose survivability is greatly dependant upon the ability to co-exist in close proximity to a heavily populated areas utilize this region for breeding habitat. These species include piping plovers (pdf - 226KB), roseate terns, bald eagles, ospreys and a large variety of colonial nesting shore birds. Approximately half of the entire Atlantic Coast’s piping plover population utilizes many of Massachusetts’ and Rhode Island’s flat sandy beaches as nesting habitat. These same beach areas are also very popular with the thousands of local residents and tourists who flock to these shorelines for their summer recreation. Unfortunately many of these popular leisure pursuits, including the use of off-road vehicles, cause direct threats to the eggs and unfledged chicks of piping plover and other colonial nesting shorebirds. When such human activities result in the take of federal protected species, the RI based agent investigates the facts and circumstances of such matters to determine if a violation of the Endangered Species Act has occurred. The Agent also provides assistance to Service and state endangered species biologists in their efforts to educate private and municipal beach management authorities on their responsibilities under the Endangered Species Act. Links
You can also contact the Resident Agent in Charge located in Chelsea, Massachusetts, which oversees this office. |
