Help us fight for North Cascades grizzlies

The Trump Administration has put a halt to recovery for now, but we won’t give up until North Cascades grizzlies thrive again!

By Matthew Brouwer, Development Director

Last week we shared news that the Trump Administration’s Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt issued an order “terminating” the North Cascades Grizzly Bear Restoration Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), officially closing the door on grizzly bear recovery in the North Cascades for the immediate future.  

At the forefront of grizzly bear advocacy in Washington state for more than 30 years, Conservation Northwest is deeply disappointed by this decision from the Trump Administration, which flies in the face of the law, science and public sentiment.   

But we’re not giving up hope. And we need your support to continue this fight.   

 

You can also help remind Congress that Washingtonians support  grizzly restoration by SENDING A MESSAGE WITH ONE CLICK.

Our International Programs Director, Joe Scott, has been leading our grizzly bear programs since the mid 1990’s. Just across the Canadian border, attitudes towards the Great Bear are much more favorable. Joe’s work with the British Columbia government, First Nations, landowners and recreationists has helped build the political will and community buy-in needed to make significant progress on recovery efforts for threatened grizzlies in Southwestern British Columbia.

Experts like Joe make us a leader in this fight and mean we have the capacity, know-how and tenacity to win it. 

Rest assured, we will continue to fight until grizzlies once again thrive in the North Cascades, their native home for some 20,000 years. Your gift makes our work for grizzly bears and a wild, healthy North Cascades Ecosystem possible. 

Spanning nearly 10,000 square miles, the North Cascades provide some of the best habitat in the continental United States for grizzly bears. We know that restoration here is possible.  

Grizzly bear recovery in the North Cascades is mandated by the Endangered Species Act and federal grizzly bear recovery plans, and restoring a small number of bears to the backcountry in and around North Cascades National Park is the only feasible way to jumpstart recovery.

With less than ten bears remaining, the North Cascades population is considered the most at-risk group of grizzlies in the United States, making translocation of bears from areas of similar habitat, such as Glacier National Park in northwest Montana, essential for ensuring a stable, healthy population. 

Learn more about how restoration can work, guided by science and community input, in this video we produced with our colleague Chris Morgan.

Since the North Cascades Grizzly Bear Restoration EIS began in 2014, we have solicited more than 100,000 supportive public comments, and polling has shown that more than 80 percent of respondents support grizzly restoration, including residents around the North Cascades.

We know that there is broad support for grizzlies in communities on both sides of the Cascades. Local tribes, conservation partners and thousands of individuals have expressed their desire to see the bears recover.  

An important part of our local ecology, a powerful symbol of the wild, and a vital component of both native Salish culture and our region’s natural heritage, the North Cascades grizzly bear needs to be restored.    

You can count on us to continue to advocate, educate, lobby, and organize until that day happens.   

Please join us so that we can sustain this fight and bring back North Cascades grizzlies before it’s too late. 

Sincerely, 

 

 

 

Matthew Brouwer, Development Director 

Please help remind Congress that Washingtonians support careful grizzly restoration in the north cascades by SENDING A MESSAGE WITH ONE CLICK.