Tim Peterson, BHLP Director

Due to the success and expansion of Broads Healthy Lands Project (BHLP), in January 2007, Broads welcomed Tim Peterson as the Director of BHLP. We opted to let Tim introduce himself.

As a fifth generation westerner, I care deeply about our public lands, and I value the window they can give us into a time when North America was still a vast, wild and unforgiving expanse. We are so lucky to have been given the gifts of shared ownership in the land, as well as a shared responsibility to leave it in better shape than we found it. We are truly blessed that, in many places, our public lands retain traces of that wild character.

I joined the Great Old Broads because they believe in direct involvement, through ground-truthing, in managing our public lands. I am excited to help the BHLP get more concerned citizens involved in land management planning processes while proactively protecting ecosystems and repairing resource damage. We have our work cut out for us in the coming years, as those at the helm of our public land agencies are attempting to frame public lands recreation planning exclusively as a matter of designating motorized corridors, without taking the necessary hard look at how those motorized corridors affect other recreationists and ecosystems. We have a choice now, to let the few remaining adherents to the last century’s model of extraction usurp the public good, or to boldly speak for the majority, a majority that wants to preserve and restore our still-wild landscapes.

I come to the Broads with nearly a decade of on-the-ground field experience inventorying and advocating for wildlands in five western states. I cut my teeth assisting with a comprehensive statewide field re-inventory of Utah’s Redrock Wilderness Act, and moved on to conduct field inventory and off-road vehicle monitoring on Utah’s National Forests, and in Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, and Montana. Between stints, I’ve conducted GIS mapping, NEPA project work, and policy and legal analysis for local, regional and national conservation groups, most recently with preservation powerhouse Wildlands CPR.

I appreciate the prescience of Broads, as they allow me to continue my active participation in the Utah Forest Plan revision and recreation planning while managing and expanding BHLP. I am delighted to have joined Broads – for their dedication, humor, exceptional perspective, and dogged determination to fight for what’s essential for all— protection of our shared natural heritage.

*Abajo Mountains, Manti-La Sal National Forest, UT – to collect baseline data on use routes and dispersed campsites to inform the Travel Planning (TP) process.
*California National Forests – continued data collection for over a dozen California forests to inform Resource Management Plans (RMP) and TPs.
*Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, CO – continued data collection to inform the BLM RMP and TP process.
*Dixie National Forest, UT – continued data collection to inform the Three Forests Coalition’s Natural Heritage Alternative (NHA) for the TP revisions.
*Factory Butte, UT – document success or failure of BLM closures/route designations.
*Kane County, UT – inform agency of WSA and designated route
infractions and compel proper management.
*Moab, UT – conversion of historic baseline data to BHLP database.
*Recapture Utah, UT – compel proper management and inform RMP/TP.
*Sky Island Alliance, AZ – conversion of baseline data to BHLP database.
*Wasatch-Cache National Forest, UT – continued baseline/impact data collection.

Our Project Partners
Bear River Watershed Council, BLM, Boulder Community Alliance, California Wilderness Coalition, Canyon Country Heritage Association, LUV (Land Use Volunteers) of Kane County, Red Rock Forests, Sky Island Alliance, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Three Forests Coalition, U.S. Forest Service, Wild Utah Project, and many citizen volunteers.