Hi everyone,

The Center for Western Priorities is excited to share the most recent Postcard in our Road to 30 Postcards campaign, this time featuring Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge (NWR). The new blog post highlights efforts taken by the International Sonoran Desert Alliance (ISDA) to encourage Interior Secretary Deb Haaland to expand Arizona’s Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge to include Cuerda de Leña ACEC, a BLM Area of Critical Environmental Concern that includes nearly 60,000 acres of land in Southern Arizona.

Hear from artists and long-time residents of the town of Ajo, a small, once-booming mining community overflowing with cultural and historical significance just north of the proposed expansion area. Bobby Narcho is one of the artists featured in the post—an artist, musician, photographer, and entrepreneur, Bobby has helped revitalize Ajo by championing an artistic renaissance that has occurred in recent years.

Learn about the region’s significance as one of the most biodiverse desert ecosystems in the world, providing habitat for a variety of desert species like javelina (or peccaries), Sonoran pronghorn, and elegant trogons, a vibrant tropical bird species. Due to the changing climate, elegant trogons have been found north of Ajo, hundreds of miles north of their previously-known habitat.

In the blog post, Lorraine Marquez Eiler, President and co-founder of ISDA, describes what it’s like to see the landscape harmed by unauthorized camping and off-road vehicle use, which have damaged natural wonders like desert pavement. Eiler is Hia C-eḍ Oʼodham, a Native American group who lived near Ajo thousands of years ago and who continue to live there. Including Cuerda de Leña ACEC as part of the wildlife refuge would protect land sacred to the Tohono O'odham and Hia C-eḍ Oʼodham Nations.

Please read the postcard and amplify it on your social media channels. Here are links to CWP’s posts on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Feel free to explore the many other multimedia stories that are part of CWP's Road to 30 Postcards campaign.

Thanks!