Cooperative Conservation

Cooperative Conservation describes the efforts of landowners, communities, conservation groups, industry, and governmental agencies who join together to conserve our environment. Through cooperative conservation, citizens from every walk of life enhance, restore, and protect lands, waters, air, and wildlife resources on public and private lands. Citizens play a central and substantive role in the stewardship and governance of the environments in which they live, work, and play. Cooperative conservation's principles are simple. It is voluntary and incentive-based: people associate together voluntarily to pursue common conservation goals. Solutions are found and priorities are implemented, challenges are addressed by people working together. Cooperative conservation is rooted in local action and reliant on local knowledge and is based on sound science. It is the practical option to litigation and polarization that otherwise divide Americans. Finally, it is entrepreneurial: innovation and creativity by citizens is the engine that drives cooperative conservation problem solving. The Fish and Wildlife Service plays an important role to turn cooperative conservation into on-the-ground results. The Service does this through several programs of which the Coastal Program is specifically focused on coastal resources. This Program is designed to develop partnerships, work with local communities and provide financial and technical assistance to implement habitat conservation projects. Coastal areas provide many important resources and it is important to conserve them. They provide important fish and wildlife habitats, sustain coastal communities, are economically important and promote human health and safety. These benefits provided by the Texas Coast have been recognized as nationally significant. The partnerships on the Texas coast are some of the strongest and most diverse in the nation, and have produced nationally significant results. The Service and its Texas Coastal Program are grateful to be part of these partnerships and are proud of the award winning projects these partnerships have developed.