National Wildlife Refuge Association Friends Workshop

Hafa Adai and Tiirow from Saipan!

January was a busy month for Friends of the Mariana Monument Chairman Ignacio V. Cabrera and Secretary Laurie Peterka who were invited to attend the National Wildlife Refuge Association Friends workshop in Kaui’I. The invitation was in conjunction with having been awarded a Mentoring Grant from the same organization.

The Friends worked together with the National Wildlife Refuge manager in Guam to make the application for the grant in mid-December 2017.  The purpose of the mentoring grant is to help the Friends become more familiar with the way the National Wildlife Refuge and Friends relationships work and get both prepared for a future memorandum of understanding. The MOU will solidify the relationship and allow goals to be set for community outreach and special projects.

Visiting the closed area of the refuge up above Kilauea Point where the lighthouse is located. This is a very diverse group of folks who volunteer at refuges in Alaska, Hawaii and the CNMI. Some are also NWR employees. All are passionate about wildlife and connecting people with their refuge. — with Ilana Nimz, Ann Bell, Nicole Galase, Desiree Sorenson-Groves, Jennifer Waipa, Lamar Gore, Helen Fields, Joanna Webb, Crystal Leonetti, Heather Tonneson, Caroline Garrett Brouwer, Ignacio Cabrera and Chelsea McKinney and others at Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge.

The purpose of the workshop was to bring all the Friends groups in the Pacific together to work on a mutual agenda established at the 2016 meeting. This is only the second time the group has met. The workshop lasted five full days and included Friends board members giving presentations about their respective locations, hearing from the National Wildlife Refuge staff, facilitator-led working sessions to help Friends groups re-center, and field trips to three different Kaua’I Refuge complexes.

“We learned from the other Friends groups that we have similar issues,” said Cabrera. He added, “I was grateful for the Hawaiian chants they used as part of the process and the connection that the Hawaiian people have with their history and culture of protecting the ocean and the resources for our future generations. I would like to see more of this in the CNMI.”

“The days were 12-hours long and intense,” commented Peterka. “There were several ‘Ah ha!” moments for us on the third day when we did this half day exercise that helps drill down to finding the core reasons why our Friends group is so important for the world,” she added.

The Friends of the Mariana Trench now carry on for the rest of 2018 meeting with mentors appointed by the NWRA board to re-align itself and come up with plans that will help the community be more aware of everything about the Mariana Trench Marine National Monument.

Marianas Trench Monument Advisory Council Meeting Sept. 12 at Hyatt Regency Saipan

The Marianas Trench Monument Advisory Council (MTMAC) is holding a meeting to provide advice and recommendations on the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument (Monument).

The meeting will be held on September 12, from 8:30am to 4pm at the Hyatt Regency Saipan, Chamolinian Conference Room.

The public is invited to attend the meeting and will have an opportunity to comment from 4pm to 5pm.

Members of the MTMAC and agency representatives from NOAA Fisheries and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will be available to answer questions and provide additional information on the planning process for the Monument.

House renews wildlife refuge volunteers program

Phil Taylor, E&E reporter
Published: Wednesday, July 31, 2013

The House by voice vote last night passed a bill to extend volunteer and community partnership programs at the nation's wildlife refuges through 2017.

H.R. 1300, by Rep. Jon Runyan (R-N.J.), would allow the National Wildlife Refuge System to expand its volunteer programs and encourage environmental education efforts, the Interior Department said.

Current authorization for the programs was set to expire in 2014

The bill, which is co-sponsored by Northern Mariana Islands Del. Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan (D), passed under suspension of the rules.

Jim Kurth, chief of the National Wildlife Refuge System, backed the bill at a hearing in April before the House Natural Resources Committee.

In 2012, volunteer work at refuges "skyrocketed" to more than 56,000 individuals who donated more than 2 million hours of time, the equivalent of more than 1,000 full-time employees, he said. The work was worth nearly $47 million, he added.

"They help implement conservation measures, provide environmental education and recreational opportunities to the American people, organize and carry out special events, and perform many other valuable services for fish and wildlife conservation and for the refuge system and its visitors," Kurth told the Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans and Insular Affairs. "These volunteers donate millions of hours of their time each year, and those volunteer hours continue to increase."

The program, which is authorized at $2 million annually, allows the Fish and Wildlife Service to recruit and train volunteers and provide them with food, housing, transportation and uniforms.

It also allows the agency to enter into cooperative agreements with partner organizations, academic institutions or state or local governments to support operations, maintenance and educational projects and develop refuge education programs.

Refuge System Sets Goals for Next Decade

Friends of the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument
to Join 1,200 at One of Nation’s
Largest Gatherings of Conservationists

Representing Friends of the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument (FOMTM) Ignacio V. “Ike” Cabrera, Chairman and Laurie Peterka, Secretary, will be among 1,200 professionals and citizen conservationists who will hear from Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, retired U.S. Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, who headed the federal response to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and historian/author Douglas Brinkley at the National Wildlife Refuge System Conserving the Future conference in Madison, WI. The conference will be held July 11-14, when a new vision will be ratified to guide the Refuge System for the next decade.

The conference – one of the nation’s largest gatherings of conservationists — is the culmination of a months-long, highly transparent process to create a reinvigorated vision for the Refuge System. Over the past six months, Americans submitted more than 10,000 comments to the draft vision, posted online at http://americaswildlife.org, where more information about the vision and the conference is available.

Speakers will also include noted oceanographer Dr. Sylvia Earle; award-winning nature photographer Dewitt Jones who traveled the globe for National Geographic; MacArthur-winning environmental activist Majora Carter of the Bronx, New York; and Juan Martinez of Los Angeles, with the nonprofit Children & Nature Network and named by National Geographic as one of its Emerging Explorers.

FOMTM was among more than 100 nonprofit Refuge System Friends organizations at the conference. FOMTM formed in the Spring of 2008 to express the voice of the local community and consists of a cross-section of indigenous and resident people of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands who are dedicated to the conservation, preservation and protection of flora, fauna and geological features of the oceans; and the proper management of the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument. The organization was a recipient of a 2009 EPA Environmental Award for their community outreach work supporting marine protected areas. Currently, FOMTM follows and reports on progress of the steps outlined in the 2008 declaration.

The Refuge System, managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, is the nation’s largest network of federal lands and waters dedicated to the protection of wildlife and the habitat on which it depends. The Refuge System is composed of 553 national wildlife refuges spanning about 150 million acres. More than 44 million people visit wildlife refuges each year.

The new vision will help the Refuge System implement the best wildlife conservation practices guided by the latest science. The Refuge System’s new vision recognizes the rapid social and environmental changes that have taken place over the last decade or so.

One idea slated for discussion: to establish an interagency team to improve habitat conservation and the conservation literacy of America, especially among the young.

FOMTM is attending the NWR conference to network with like-minded professionals and volunteers in order to bring whatever resources it can back to the local community. Any particular programs that may be launched as a consequence of participation will be announced at http://marianamonument.blogspot.com/, where you can also follow all other activities that FOMTM is involved on behalf of the community.

The Conserving the Future conference will also showcase a modern face of the federal government: Many conference proceedings will be live-streamed. Texting, mobile communications and social networking will all play essential communications roles.

The Refuge System will offset carbon emissions tied to conference travel with contributions to The Conservation Fund’s Go Zero program.