Denver, Colorado – The following statement is from Ted Kowalski, director of the Colorado River initiative at the Walton Family Foundation, in support of the U.S.-Mexico Colorado River agreement announced today:
We applaud the USDA’s announcement today that the Colorado and Mississippi River basins will be included as critical conservation areas in the agency’s new Regional Conservation Partnership Program. The new initiative, part of USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, is a Farm Bill conservation program that will focus on locally-driven projects that restore rivers, improve water quality and support economies across the country.
The Walton Family Foundation is proud of our decades-long track record investing in real solutions to tough environmental challenges. Over the last five years alone, we’ve invested $351 million in efforts to support real, lasting ecological restoration in the Gulf of Mexico, to tackle the water policy challenges in the Colorado River Basin, to conserve some of the most ecologically rich seascapes around the globe and to push for sustainable fisheries management that benefits fishing communities and families. Our grantees include many of the nation’s leading environmental groups, as well as local organizations working on behalf of the communities that depend directly on healthy rivers, oceans and wildlife.
