New conservancy office now open

A new office of the Nature Conservancy of Canada officially opened here Monday, making history as the first time in the NCC’s existence that a second office has been opened in the same province.
The official opening was held at the new office on Scott Street, attended by Rainy River MPP Howard Hampton, new local program manager Ilka Milne, members of the Rainy Lake Conservancy and Rainy River Valley Field Naturalists, and Fort Frances Clerk Glenn Treftlin, who also is a member of the Trillium Foundation’s local grant review team.
This grant is the second that has been given to the conservancies here, with the first being for an initial systematic bio-diversity study of Rainy Lake.
This information obtained was used by many government organizations and the Ministry of Natural Resources here.
The most recent two-year Trillium grant of $48,900 was granted to the Northwestern Ontario Conservation Partnership to help fund three initiatives:
•to get this office established so all local groups can make use of expertise of the Canadian and American conservancies;
•to help RRVFN’s “bog walk” project; and
•to get a local “Volunteer for Nature” program started.
“It goes without saying that this is quite the feat on behalf of the Rainy Lake Conservancy, the Nature Conservancy of Canada, and the Rainy River Valley Field Naturalists to bring this project together and bring it to fruition,” said Treftlin.
He explained the Ontario Trillium Foundation receives $100 million annually from Ontario’s charitable casino initiative. Of that funding, Rainy River District sees just over $170,000 of that—five percent of which is designated for the environment.
“This grant is significantly more than that,” noted Treftlin. “So it shows how the Trillium Foundation is really looking here.”
“This would not have happened but for the activism of the Rainy Lake Conservancy,” added Hampton. “It would not have happened without the financial support of the Trillium Foundation.
“I don’t think the public at large realizes how significant this is, but it is very significant.”
Milne recently was hired to run the office, and is excited about the project.
“We’re working on a regional conservation plan—a conservation blueprint to identify the most significant bio-diversity areas in the region and work to protect the sites that are most critically in need,” said Milne.
“Instead of taking a confrontational approach to problem-solving in conservancy, we work with partners to find solutions,” she added. “We’re an organization that looks at the threats on private land and works with land owners to protect that.”
Milne, who has lived here for the past seven years and is a founding member of Rainy River Valley Field Naturalists, completed her undergrad in biology and her Master’s in forestry.
She will be working closely with the NCC’s head office in Guelph, Ont. as well as the Minnesota conservancy.
“The border is really irrelevant as far as ecology goes,” Milne noted. “The Minnesota conservancies have expertise, and have offered help and mentoring and financial support to get this off the ground.”
The role of the new NCC office here, in terms of the “bog walk” in Alberton, is to provide interpretive expertise to the RRVFN, which is primarily responsible for the undertaking.
“The bog walk is something that has been near and dear to my heart for about five years. It’s beautiful beyond words and my heart is just really out there in the bog,” said Bill Morgenstern of the RRVFN.
“We took this project on as a place for educational purposes, an outdoor classroom,” he added. “The main goal is to present it educationally, for schools and the public.”
The site of the “bog walk” is at the old peat extraction site in Alberton, with the trail placed where they used to take peat out on rails.
“The Nature Conservancy is very pleased to work with groups to get this ‘bog walk’ going and also to work to get a conservation initiative established in Northwestern Ontario,” said Milne.
These projects include a partnership between the Federation of Ontario Naturalists and the NCC to help form nature-oriented volunteer events, which already are taking place across Ontario.
Milne said she would like to see some of these kinds of events happening in Northwestern Ontario, adding it would be nice to offer another opportunity for people interested in volunteer issues to get involved.
Over next two years, Milne said she will seek to establish a presence in this area and “get a couple of good, solid interesting projects going,” with the focus area being from Thunder Bay west along the U.S. border and north to Kenora.
“There’s a real opportunity here to do something that will have a huge impact,” said Hampton. “This will be an important legacy for years and years to come.”