08/30/05 C.C.C. - back to the future

As the White House Conference on Cooperative Conservation continues through tomorrow in St. Louis, one gets the sense that the theme of this inaugural event is "everything old is new again". KNIGHT: It's very much what is old is new again. You hear people talk about cooperative conservation and it looks a lot what we did seventy years ago, when the Soil Conservation Service was born as a result of the Dust Bowl. A recognition that awareness, education, going belly to belly with our customer, farmer, or rancher, and talking to them about what are your conservation goals and how we can help you. That's cooperative conservation and so we're really back to this agency's roots that we got in the Dust Bowl. And it is not just Natural Resources Conservation Service Executive Director Bruce Knight that feels that way. The White House itself in announcing this conference highlighted that this was the first such gathering of federal, state, tribal, landowner, industry, and conservation entities on the issue of conservation since President Theodore Roosevelt called a similar meeting together a century ago. And many people agree that several of the efforts that are in play now by local stakeholders in their respective areas are based on models conducted throughout the country, with some of these models several decades old. But Knight says one area that many groups wish not to repeat history in, is the confusion of which federal or state agency has the right to do what in the realm of conservation & a confusion that put private landowners and businesses in a gridlock in implementing conservation efforts out of fear of a federal hammer of fines and penalties being placed on them. KNIGHT: At times, all too often, you look at the history of conservation and you've seen one agency or a department in a turf battle with another. And the whole theme of cooperative conservation is that we have to be working together closely. I was just sitting down with my counterpart at the Fish and Wildlife Service talking about how we can improve consultation on Endangered Species Act so we can respond more quickly on emergency watershed work so that we can avoid flooding. That's an example of cooperative conservation. Knight adds that about thirty different individual efforts from across the country will be highlighted as a demonstration of cooperative conservation. The goal with the conference, and with the concept of cooperative conservation, is to spur a greater effort among stakeholders.