Utah Wants Wolves: ACTION URGENTLY NEEDED!

Dear friends of wolves,
We are sharing this urgent action alert on behalf of the wolves and our colleagues with Utah Wants Wolves.

Calls are needed ASAP and no later than 5 p.m on Friday, March 8 to protest a line item in the Utah budget for efforts to delist wolves nationwide.

Don Peay, founder of Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife, has worked tirelessly to have wolves delisted throughout the West.  On February 21 he asked the Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environmental Quality committee of the Utah legislature for $300,000 from the state general fund (taxpayer money) to pay him to lobby in Washington D.C. to have wolves delisted nation-wide and to ensure that neither Mexican wolf nor Rocky Mountain wolves ever live in Utah, Colorado, Nevada or California.

This money is YOUR tax money, and it will be allocated to a private business — essentially to one individual, Don Peay — to engage in efforts to undermine the Endangered Species Act and to ensure that YOUR wild wolves on YOUR public lands are killed if they should stray beyond arbitrary boundaries. The very idea is a moral affront to the citizens of Utah and to the citizens of the United States.  It is especially egregious to Utahans because Utah taxpayers will be required to pay for it at the expense not only of wolves and healthy ecosystems, but of public education and other worthy public goods that the money could otherwise be used for.  Killing wolves should not be given priority over educating our children!

Please take a few minutes to call (most effective) or email the members of the Executive Appropriations Committee listed below. I have separated them by party, but you should contact each one of them so that we have a chance of persuading a majority to strike this line item from the budget.  This is our only opportunity to do it.

When you call, simply say that you find this proposed allocation of your money to pay Don Peay to lobby against wolves morally reprehensible and economically irresponsible and you expect the legislator to oppose it. If you email, say the same thing and in the subject line of your message say in capital letters NO MONEY FOR DON PEAY’S PERSONAL VENDETTA AGAINST WOLVES!  Don’t attack the legislator personally; save any attacks you may not be able to resist making for Don Peay.

Your message need not be long. If enough people protest this allocation of public funds, it just might be enough to persuade a majority of legislators to vote against it.

Please forward this alert to known friends of the wolf!  Thank you for your attention — wolves would thank you if they could.

Kirk Robinson
Executive Director
Western Wildlife Conservancy
1021 Downington Ave.
Salt Lake City, UT 84105

Executive Appropriations Committee:

Sen. Lyle Hillyard, Co-Chair (R)     lhillyard@le.utah.gov 435-753-0043
Rep. Mel Brown, Co-Chair (R)   melbrown@le.utah.gov 435-647-6512
Sen. Jerry Stevenson, Vice Chair (R)    jwstevenson@le.utah.gov 801-678-3147
Rep. Brad Wilson, Vice Chair (R)     bradwilson@le.utah.gov 801-425-1028
Sen. Stuart Adams (R)      jsadams@le.utah.gov 801-593-1776
Rep. Brad Dee (R)     bdee@le.utah.gov 801-479-5495
Rep. Greg Hughes (R)        greghughes@le.utah.gov 801-572-5305
Rep. Don Ipson (R)                     dipson@le.utah.gov 435-673-8216
Sen. Pete Knudson (R)    pknudson@le.utah.gov 435-730-4569
Rep. Becky Lockhart (R)   blockhart@le.utah.gov 801-369-6784
Sen. Wayne Niederhauser (R)    wniederhauser@le.utah.gov 801-942-3398
Sen. Ralph Okerlund (R)        rokerlund@le.utah.gov 435-979-7077
Rep. Joel Briscoe (D)      jbriscoe@le.utah.gov 801-946-9791
Rep. Rebecca Chavez-Houck (D)       rchouck@le.utah.gov 801-891-9292  
Rep. Tim Cosgrove (D)      tcosgrove@le.utah.gov 801-685-0673
Sen. Gene Davis (D)         gdavis@le.utah.gov 801-647-8924
Sen. Pat Jones (D) patjones@djasurvey.com 801-278-7667   
Sen. Luz Robles (D)     lrobles@le.utah.gov 801-550-6434
Rep. Jennifer Seelig (D)  jseelig@le.utah.gov 801-519-2544