NEWS RELEASE
PYRAMID COMMUNICATIONS
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SEATTLE—The Wilburforce Foundation presented today a 2021 Conservation Leadership Award (CLA) to Colorado Plateau Foundation CEO Jim Enote (Zuni) for his decades of service to Native American communities.
“Jim is a one-of-a-kind combination of farmer, executive, organizer, philanthropist and artist,” said Rose Letwin, president and founder of the Wilburforce Foundation. “He has a rare ability to move between worlds, and that has redounded to greater power and influence for Native communities in the Southwest.”
The Colorado Plateau Foundation (CPF) works with tribes across the Colorado Plateau, which stretches over and beyond the Four Corners region of Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah. Currently, the foundation prioritizes efforts to protect water, sacred places and languages and to ensure food security.
Enote said the Conservation Leadership Award was a celebration not only of his work, but of the work of many who came before him, including bold Native leaders and non-Native advocates for justice and equity in the conservation field.
He noted that as a boy in 1962, he encountered a whites-only restroom, which motivated him to change the asymmetries of power in the world. Today, he and his staff, along with tribes and tribal organizations, are growing indigenous leadership in various ways across the Southwest. He said that would be impossible without the work of countless others who came before to make inroads in conservation, politics, philanthropy and other fields.
A board chair with Grand Canyon Trust, Governing Council member of the Wilderness Society, and board member of the Trust for Mutual Understanding, Enote has also served UNESCO, the U.S. National Park Service, National Geographic Society and numerous other organizations. At CPF, he leads a majority-Native staff.
"You can read books about how to lead, but CPF has a different way of managing our work," he said. "I follow what I've learned from the natural world around me, to work with nature as a team—as seeds are to soil and the way ducks understand a river's flow.
CPF's slogan is “We live where we serve,” reinforcing CPF's unique understanding of Native communities' economic, cultural, social and political perspectives on the Colorado Plateau. CPF grantees are not far-off entities but neighbors.
Established in 2000, the Conservation Leadership Award recognizes groundbreaking leaders protecting wildlands and wildlife in western North America. The CLA comes with a cash award for both the individual winner and the organization they represent. Since its inception, Wilburforce has recognized nearly 100 leaders with the CLA.
About the Colorado Plateau Foundation
Colorado Plateau Foundation connects the philanthropic community to on-the-ground initiatives by growing a sustainable supply of resources and giving grants that enhance the work of Native-led organizations on the Plateau.
About Wilburforce Foundation
Wilburforce Foundation is a private philanthropic organization that supports land, water and wildlife conservation efforts in western North America. We invest in natural and social sciences to advance conservation, working with our grantees to defend and use policies that protect our natural world.
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