the risk of an introduction, it should be stopped or never attempted. Prevention, rather than risk assessment, is advocated as a guiding principle. Additionally, though federal, guidelines and regulations to mitigate invasive species should be tailored to fit the specific needs of a geographical location, since each is unique in a number of ways. One solution in one part of the country may not be applicable to another part, and the original wording of NISA neglected to make geographical distinctions in terms of policy recommendations. Recommendations for the reauthorization of NISA 1996 based on the Great Lakes Panel on ANS are as follows. 1.) Institutional framework: Because NISA is primarily upheld by the ANS Task Force, and is a solely federal agency, there is a high request to incorporate the unbiased, local expertise of the Great Lakes area to address and advance new and reoccurring ANS prevention and control. Incorporating new perspectives from a local standpoint creates innovative and practical solutions that can bolster local economies and environments. Local institutional expertise can also provide more rapid assessment and response to ANS introduction events than the traditional process of local committees having to apply for funding through the ANS Task Force. 2.) Research and monitoring: Billions of dollars are spent each year holding back populations of zebra mussel, and clearly represent the extreme measures needing to be taken just to maintain an ANS population. Increasing research and monitoring with required vessel reporting can help improve prevention efforts, and reduce further needed budgets to maintain new invasive species potentials altogether. With further research, scenarios such as ballast sediment deposition and other loopholes of ANS can standardize cargo ship maintenance, as well as other potential ANS introduction vectors. 3.) Ballast water standards: Providing numerical standards that are inclusive to vessel industries and local institutional experts can only intend to provide more robust and incentivized standards for adopting practices necessary to meet standards. An addition implementation of an incentive program can help promote standards as well. 4) Non-ballast non-indigenous species control: Create a protocol and response agency incorporated with similar frameworks to the re-evaluations of NISA for potential terrestrial and non-ballast aquatic non-indigenous nuisance species invasions. Limitations Major limitations of NISA addresses today surround the language and structure of the act itself. Both the original NANPCA and NISA were authorized in direct response to the outbreak of zebra and quagga mussels in the Great