11/23/1995 2

MEXICAN GREY WOLF REINTRODUCTION HITS ROADBLOCK

After supporting and working with the Fish and Wildlife Service to reintroduce wolves into the SW, both the New Mexico and Arizona Game and Fish Commissions have come out against wolf reintroduction. Two sites were being considered. The superior site by far is the Blue Primitive Area on the NM/AZ border. It would allow wolves to disperse into the Gila and Aldo Leopold Wilderness. The second site is the DoD's White Sands Missile Range in south-central New Mexico. Arizona opposed the Blue, but supported reintroduction in NM's White Sands. New Mexico opposed introduction altogether. This is a major setback to a program which had tremendous momentum- a direct result of strong-arming by Governors Johnson and Symington, both of whom are businessmen with strong wise-use ties.

While opposing reintroduction in AZ, the game commission noted that polls have established that Arizonans are overwhelmingly in favor of wolf reintroduction. The New Mexico game commission canceled its public opinion poll when it voted against introduction. The game commissioner stated that he knew what the poll would say: that the majority of New Mexican's would support reintroduction while rural folks would not. The polling consultant, however, revealed that had it been allowed to be completed, the poll would show strong rural support for reintroduction. The League of Women Voters has leapt into the fray, funding their own New Mexico wide poll.

R.E.I. meanwhile did its part for wolf extinction by canceling a talk by Bobbie Holiday, director of Preserve Arizona's Wolves, just before the Arizona Game and Fish Commission's vote. Though a tireless wolf advocate, Bobbie is a friendly, mainstream, retiree. Hardly a threat to R.E.I.'s rock shredding customers. R.E.I. stated it's members were not interested in wolf reintroduction and would henceforth not permit conservation talks. All you R.E.I. members know where to write to...and where to shop at.

There are no Mexican grey wolves in the wild in the U.S. and very few in Mexico.