Wildlife Habitat Council- Corporate Lands for Learning

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CLL Spotlight

Lessons Learned

This series of articles will focus on good ideas from some of our very best CLL sites all over the world. If you are an established CLL, or just considering involvement, we believe you’ll find useful information to apply to your own program as you visit these sites along with us. For more customized support in establishing or enhancing your own CLL, contact the Education and Outreach Department.

This month, we are proud to highlight efforts by many different stakeholders in the western regions of the US, instead of a single program.

Western Summit Yields a Vision for Moving Ahead in the Intermountain States

On March 17, 2010, the Wildlife Habitat Council (the Council) hosted the first-ever Western Summit, held at the Headquarters of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (RMEF). Underwriting of the event was provided by BP Corporation with generous support from the staff of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation who lent their exceptional meeting facilities and media support to the event. The group of nearly 40 participants was warmly welcomed to the headquarters of the RMEF by David Allen, President and CEO of RMEF.

This Summit was organized in part to recognize the outstanding job corporate sites in the western US have done to enhance habitat for wildlife and promote conservation education in their communities. This gathering of Council members with interests in the intermountain west included participants from Lafarge, BP, ExxonMobil, Monsanto Corporation, Unimin Corporation, Oldcastle Materials, Kinder Morgan, Ensign US Drilling, and Matador Cattle Company (a subsidiary of Koch Industries). Conservation and community partners included members of the staff of the RMEF as well as representatives from the US Forest Service, the Montana National Resource Conservation Service (NRCS), Montana Economic Revitalization & Development Institute, Golder Associates, BLM, Western Governor’s Association, the Intermountain West Joint Venture, Partners for Fish and Wildlife, Pioneer Technical, and the Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States (IPAMS). For a complete accounting of the day’s presentations, please download the PDF.

western summit open discussion

Kristin Salamack, Council Biologist, leads open discussion at the Summit

Following the morning and afternoon presentations, Kristin Salamack, the Council’s biologist for the intermountain west region, presented a ‘snapshot’ of Council activities in the western states that included a brief history of the Council in the west and outlined prominent conservation and land use issues encountered by Council members and partners.

After listing the benefits of involvement with the Council, Ms. Salamack detailed opportunities and challenges unique to the intermountain region. All participants of the Summit then engaged in a discussion, led by Ms. Salamack and aided by a cadre of conservation partners including Robert Veldman of Golder Associates, John Blaine of the Montana NRCS, Sandy Kraville of the US Forest Service, Howard Lemm of the BLM, and Betsy Hands of the Western Governors’ Association. Topics explored included the potential to develop a regional initiative to coordinate and standardize wildlife data, the opportunity for the Council to become a liaison between industries and land agencies, to motivate people at the grassroots level, and to find a productive way to use available federal funds and the importance of this group having a “basis for action” in the coming months (for more detail, please refer to complete proceedings on PDF).

The group decided that critical next steps to power the intermountain region forward as a working group would include:

· Continue to develop methods and opportunities to share what Council members are accomplishing in the region; allow them to share challenges as well as successes.

· Pass on information to members regarding costs of Wildlife at Work/CLL projects; dollars spent, dollars matched, etc, so members may “shorten the learning curve” when planning their own path.

· Continue to develop the Council’s presence as a FACILITATOR between industry, government agencies, and conservation organizations:

· The Council should continue to develop an intermountain west Advisory Committee and add other participants as necessary:

· The Council through its advisory committee and other partnerships should seek to “educate the next generation” and “reach out to youth” through Council programs:

· The Council must evaluate current Awards and Recognition to see if they adequately reflect the needs of western states, and the opportunities of the large-scale partnerships in the region. - when corporations do conservation work on public lands

The Council should explore one “Pilot Project” that would tie many of these elements together and work to implement this in the coming year.