For more than 30 years, the Defenders of Wildlife Northwest team has been working on the state and national levels to protect wildlife and the habitat they depend on.

Success Story: Mapping Tool Brings Industry and Conservation Groups Together to Help the Environment [1]

In New Jersey, the Wildlife Habitat Council uses the Conservation Registry to find successful osprey habitat enhancement projects to help a corporate partner maximize their conservation investments.

Other achievements:

• Initiated and passed SB 513 in Oregon, a bill that encourages and enables state agencies to use markets for ecosystem services to help achieve state conservation goals
• Provided guidance for all fish and wildlife agencies in the U.S. to help them address climate change in revised wildlife action plans
• Launched a nationwide effort in 2006 to expand local land trusts involvement in biodiversity conservation efforts
• Created the Conservation Registry [2], a database and website that tracks conservation projects across the country
• Helped establish the Willamette Ecosystem Marketplace [3], a new, market-based approach to land, water and wildlife conservation in Oregon
• Initiated and supported legislation that improved the effectiveness of Oregon state programs for voluntary conservation
• Initiated and supported legislation in Washington State that established a biodiversity policy for the state and led to the creation of a Biodiversity Council [4]
• Secured protection for almost 23,000 acres of endangered shrub steppe habitat in the Columbia Basin through negotiated settlement with the State of Oregon, agribusiness interests and environmental litigants
• Helped establish a dedicated source of conservation funding (through the lottery, Measure 66) in Oregon that has generated more than $300 million for state investments in habitat conservation and watershed improvements
• Spearheaded the Oregon Biodiversity Project, a collaborative biodiversity assessment that produced one of the nation’s first statewide conservation strategies and provided a model for the state wildlife action plans completed nationwide in 2005
• Helped launch the “Watchable Wildlife” Program that led to the publication of wildlife viewing guides in most states and the designation of over 1000 wildlife viewing sites
• Halted the use of strychnine for above ground uses
• Successfully challenged President Reagan’s proposal to re-register Compound 1080, an extremely toxic wildlife poison