Western Landowners Alliance Releases Guide to Endangered Species Act
As Congress considers changes to the Endangered Species Act, the advocacy group Western Landowners Alliance has released a guide to the E S A with the aim of improving the level of public dialogue.Leslie Allison is the Executive Director of the Alliance:
"We hear over and over again that the polarization, the eroding trust, the misunderstanding between urban and rural people is making life harder it's making it more difficult to do business in many ways. When you get these widening political pendulum swings, you get radical changes in policy and those policies undermine investor confidence, they undermine landowner confidence. It's kind of a destabilizing thing that's not benefitting anybody. We'd like to bring people towards the center and see if we can find that common ground."
Allison says the guide includes the direct voice of the landowners who must be part of the conversation.
"When we talk to people all over the west, sit at kitchen tables, there's a lot of common sense and a lot of concern out there. I'm maybe less confident in political processes that we're seeing today and I'm hoping that having a greater voice from the land, we can influence that positively."
The Western Landowners Alliance has a stated mission to advance policies and practices that sustain working lands, and native species.
The Guide can be found at: www.westernlandownersalliance.org.