Our Legacy
CNW was started in 1989 to bring clearer strategy and greater organization to the region’s environmental movement. CNW has protected hundreds of thousands of acres of wildlands, supported the recovery of threatened species from wolves to fishers, and touched thousands of lives throughout the greater Northwest. Our successful campaigns and groundbreaking collaborations help define our effective approach to conservation. Elected leaders, government agencies, and conservationists know us for being science-based and tenacious, yet pragmatic.
Our achievements
Loomis Forest Wildlands
In perhaps our most celebrated win, Conservation Northwest saved 25,000 acres of wild forest habitat to be protected from logging in 1999.
A court settlement allowed us, then a small org, just 15 months to raise over $16.5 million to keep this critical lynx habitat intact.
We succeeded in dramatic fashion, as the forest and its lynx remain healthy today.
Our achievements
Cascades Conservation Partnership
CNW led a successful five-year campaign to reconnect the North and South Cascades across the I-90 landscape east of Snoqualmie Pass. Our efforts, raising over $18 million in private funds and over $65 million from Congress, caused over 45,000 acres of corporate timberland to shift to Forest Service protection. This provided a foundation for the next step of winning wildlife crossings over and under I90.
Our Cascades Partnership transitioned into the I90 Wildlife Bridges Coalition, which successfully advocated for the many wildlife crossings east of Snoqualmie Pass.
Our achievements
Blanchard Mountain
Conservation NW led a campaign to protect the much-loved heart of Blanchard Mountain in western Skagit County from being logged by the DNR.
This breakthrough victory came in 2007, when Mitch helped reach agreement among diverse stakeholders to protect 1,600 acres.
Our achievements
Fisher Reintroduction
Conservation Northwest catalyzed and saw through an 18-year effort with state and federal partners that successfully restored Pacific fisher populations to the Olympics and North and South Cascades.
We accomplished this by working with trappers in Canada to capture healthy fishers and releasing them to their new home in Washington.
Our achievements
Figlenski Ranch
Conservation Northwest funded the Colville Tribes to purchase and steward this historic ranch of almost 10,000 acres.
This is not only the lynchpin to conserving a wildlife corridor linking the Cascades to the Kettle Range (and on to the Rockies) but was at the time the largest privately funded “land back” action in the history of the American West.
Our achievements
Supreme Court Victory for State Trust Lands
Conservation Northwest won a landmark legal case before the WA Supreme Court in 2022. Known as CNW v Commissioner of Public Lands, this ruling changed how the state and the courts are to view the state’s trust obligations with respect to most state lands.
Whereas the previous interpretation was that the state, as trustee, had an obligation of “undivided loyalty” and should maximize revenue (mostly from logging) to trustee, now the state can balance that trust obligation with the public’s interest in clean water, wildlife, and other values.
Our achievements
Mountain Caribou Recovery Plan
Conservation Northwest was a core partner in the Mountain Caribou Project, which campaigned for and in 2007 won protection from logging and road building for 5.2 million acres of habitat and from motorized recreation in BC’s globally unique Inland Temperate Rainforest. Those habitats remain in protected status along with several hundred thousand more areas that are were placed off limits to motorized recreation as part of the recovery plan.
CNW’s Joe Scott has continued to be involved in the evolving efforts to limit recreation impacts, protect caribou calves from predation, and otherwise help the critically endangered mountain caribou herds of southern B.C. in coordination with Okanagan Nation Alliance and Secwepemc Nations.
Our achievements
Lake Whatcom Park
In 2012, the WA Department of Natural Resources reconveyed 8,700 forested acres to Whatcom County for park purposes.
CNW was at the heart of this effort, the largest reconveyance of state land in Washington history. It not only resolved concerns about logging threats to the quality of Bellingham’s drinking water but provides a haven for recreation and wildlife.
Our achievements
Wolf Recovery
Conservation Northwest has been fully involved in every step of wolf recovery since even before the first pack appeared in 2008.
Our focus has been on modelling and funding range riders and other means of minimizing conflict with livestock. The result is that Washington has the most successful wolf recovery of any state, with a far lower rate of human-caused wolf mortality than any other state.
