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Colorado River Update: Stop The Gondola! Save The Vaquita!

Hello Friends of the Colorado River!

We have two items to TAKE ACTION for this week!  First, as you may have heard, a developer is proposing to build a massive hotel and casino on tribal land at the Screenshot (116)confluence of the Little Colorado River and Colorado River in the Grand Canyon. What’s worse is that the developer also wants to build a gondola that gives tourists rides from the rim of the canyon all the way down to the Colorado River.

This story has gotten nationwide attention, including here with an editorial by Kevin Fedarko in the New York Times last week. In our opinion, this may be the worst development proposal in the history of American development proposals (and that’s a high bar!). Is nothing sacred? You can learn more about the development proposals by visiting the website, “Save The Confluence.”  And, our friends at the Grand Canyon Trust have created a petition to key decision-makers — you can sign the petition here.

Second, the vaquita is almost extinct — please help!  What’s a vaquita, you ask? The vaquita is a small porpoise that lives in the upper reaches of the Gulf of California Screenshot (117)where the Colorado River no longer meets the sea. A recent population count has vaquita numbers down to 97 (from over 500 a decade ago), and scientists believe that if something isn’t done, the vaquita will be extinct in 2 or 3 years.

The Cousteau Society says it is the “most endangered marine mammal on the planet.” It is endangered mostly by gillnets and illegal fishing; it is also endangered by poor water quality — because the Colorado River no longer flows into the Gulf, there are water quality problems in the vaquita’s habitat. Yesterday I posted this story on EcoWatch — click through here to read the story and take action.  The story is titled, “The Most Endangered Child At Our Border.” At the bottom of the story is a link to a Change.org petition to Mexican officials demanding that they take action to protect the vaquita before it is killed into extinction.  Again, take a look at the EcoWatch story here.

Here’s our pic of the week!  Summer is almost over — get out there and enjoy it!

paddleboard-coriver

Thank you for your support!

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