Rio Grande Valley Broadband • Entered by Susan Ostlie on June 29, 2021
Izembek: World-Class Wilderness or Highway?
June 16, 2021
Participants and Hours
| Pre Planning hours | |
| Post Admin hours | 3 |
| Activity Hours | 1 |
| Participants | 1 |
| Total Hours | 4 |
Key Issue: Wilderness & Monument Designation/Protection
Activity Type: Trainings (WALTS, CAREs/GLOWs, research, conferences, workshops, etc.)
Key Partners: Wilderness Watch chapter leader, WW staff attorney, retired wildlife biologist for the US Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska,
Landscape/area: Izembek National Wildlife Refuge (315000 acres)
Short Description of Activity
Description: For nearly three decades, the State of Alaska and its congressional representatives have been trying to build a road through the irreplaceable Izembek Wilderness.
Panelists Fran Mauer (retired wildlife biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Alaska and WW Alaska Chapter leader) and Dana Johnson (Wilderness Watch staff attorney) will discuss the decades-long fight to protect the Izembek Wilderness, one of the most wildlife-rich, but largely unknown, places on the planet. Learn more about this incredible place and its wildlife, the history around efforts to save it, and why we can’t let our guard down with a new administration in office.
Reflection/Evaluation
This webinar really broke my heart – I plan to email Deb Haaland, who will be in King’s Cove, and request that she consider the other side of the issue. The road they are requesting permits to do scoping on is unnecessary b represents the camel’s nose under the tent – putting a road right through the middle of a wilderness area sets a terrible precedent. Also, the Izembek Lagoon definitely needs protection for the eel grass that is the source of food for migrating birds who use it to fatten up before migrating non-stop to the Baja and also to New Zealand. It is appalling and evidence of political dirty tricks used to get Murkowski’s confirmation vote for Haaland.