Wendi Weber, Northeast Regional Director for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) in Hadley, Mass., has received the 2018 Robert McDowell Award for Conservation Management Excellence, the highest honor awarded by the Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (NEAFWA). Weber received the award at the Association’s annual conference April 16 in Burlington, Vermont.
The Robert McDowell Award was established by the NEAFWA Directors to honor career professionals who have made significant contributions to fish and wildlife conservation in the northeastern U.S. and eastern Canada.
As regional director, Weber oversees FWS activities in 13 states -- from Maine to Virginia -- and the District of Columbia. She currently leads more than 800 employees at more than 130 offices, including 72 national wildlife refuges. Weber has worked for the FWS since 1998 but also has experience working for state fish and wildlife agencies in both Georgia and Florida.
“Throughout her career, [Weber] has consistently demonstrated the essential principles of collaboration and cooperation with conservation partners at all levels. She is deeply respected and appreciated by her colleagues in the state fish and wildlife agencies in the northeastern states,” said NEAFWA President James Connolly in presenting the award.
“While it’s always been true that effective conservation requires collaboration, our award winner has excelled at the difficult task of motivating and inspiring citizens, key stakeholders, elected leaders, policy makers, and colleagues in other agencies -- both state and federal,” Connolly said. “Indeed, our award winner understands that conservation today does not happen in the absence of partnerships and teamwork.”
Weber was cited specifically for her leadership in region-wide FWS and state efforts to restore Atlantic Coast habitats in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. She also was recognized for guiding FWS and state efforts to restore White River National Fish Hatchery in Vermont, which was nearly destroyed by Hurricane Irene in 2011. At the dedication ceremony to reopen White River in 2017, Vermont U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy called the effort “a story of heroics.”
Nowhere has Weber’s leadership been more evident than in the work of Northeast states to conserve the New England cottontail, Connolly said.
“Because of long-term, landscape-scale habitat alteration throughout their native range, the New England cottontail is indeed in perilous condition. With careful attention to the requirements of the Endangered Species Act with a focus on the Congressional intention of the Act -- namely conserving and restoring rare species -- [Weber] has proven the value of cooperation and collaboration in conservation.”
He added that the approach works, and success with the New England cottontail effort has proven to be a respected model. It is now used in other landscape-scale conservation efforts, such as protecting monarch butterflies.
