This project was initially envisioned as an approach to identify priority areas for the National Wildlife Refuge System (NWRS) in the Columbia Plateau ecoregion. It quickly became clear that working in a partnership-based setting would lead to a more holistic conservation design in the region, and NWRS priorities would follow from that design. Therefore, we aligned this project with an existing conservation partnership in the region, the Arid Lands Initiative (ALI).
The ALI is a partnership comprised of state and federal agencies and public and private organizations working to conserve and restore a viable and well-connected ecosystem in eastern Washington’s arid lands. This group is working to determine priority areas for achieving landscape-level conservation goals. ALI completed an assessment of collaborative conservation goals and targets for the Columbia Plateau ecoregion. The next step was to develop a spatial conservation design for the region that meets the articulated conservation goals. This webinar will present the methods and results of this collaborative spatial prioritization in the Columbia Plateau, as well as discuss some lessons learned and next steps.
