Editor’s Note: After nine years of service on New Mexico Wild’s board of directors, Ernie stepped down this summer. He is the Southwest Regional Director for the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), covering 64 park units in the Four Corners states.
Mark Allison: Hi Ernie, thanks for making time and great to see you. Ernie, how did you get into conservation? You’ve been doing this work for a long time in various ways. What drew you to it originally?
Ernie Atencio: I’m not sure if you’ve heard this story, but it all goes back to what we participants called a “Hoods in the Woods” Outward Bound trip when I was 18 years old, right out of high school. I got the one scholarship at my inner-city high school for a 23-day Wilderness course in the Sangre de Cristos in Colorado, near the sand dunes. It just blew my mind and opened up a whole new world I didn’t even know much about. I had some yearnings about being out there but didn’t have a clue how to do it. It started there. I fell in love with wild places and saw the incredible power of places like that. Little by little, I ended up working for Outward Bound for a while, leading trips, then as a park ranger for many years. I did some environmental education work in Yosemite, and then I did an internship with High Country News and worked freelance for them for a while, publishing several articles. That was all before I started doing environmental advocacy work, but it all had something to do with the wild, natural world. In the early ‘90s, I started thinking about graduate school, not long after a pretty well-known letter from the Southwest Organizing Project came out in 1990. It was a broadside against the environmental community for not being diverse and ignoring communities of color and poor communities. They were absolutely right. One of the 10 groups targeted was the group I work for now, the National Parks Conservation Association. That letter got my attention, and it resonated with me. It was inspiration for me to go to grad school. I studied applied anthropology with the intention of applying a cultural and social lens to environmental protection and conservation. So, that’s the long story of how I got into this.
MA: I’m just trying to picture you in a Park Service uniform.
EA: I’ll send you a picture.
MA: We talk and think a lot about how to create opportunities for young people to get outside—some of whom might live in Albuquerque but have never been in the foothills or live in Santa Fe and have never been in the mountains. Your story about the importance of that as an entree into what became your life’s work really resonates. So, the Southwest Organizing Project, here in Albuquerque?
EA: Yeah, those kinds of experiences at the right moment can be absolutely transformational. Richard Moore was the primary author and signer of the letter. At the time, Moore was the executive director of SWOP. In my opinion, that letter was a wake-up call and led to the modern environmental justice movement. Immediately after, all those 10 organizations established diversity committees and put taglines on their websites. But change happens slowly, and the transition is still underway.
MA: Where did life take you after graduate school?
EA: My roots are here in Northern New Mexico, for many centuries. I grew up in Denver, living the inner-city life when I got the scholarship opportunity. I had an epiphany during graduate school—while doing fieldwork on the other side of the planet—about coming back to Northern New Mexico. The irrigation system where I was working on the Tibetan Plateau is a perfect parallel to the acequia system here in Northern New Mexico and it transported me back to Dixon as a young kid. I later learned that it may have originated there and made its way across to Northern Africa, Spain and then here, just a few miles north of where I live. Within about a year after grad school, I had a job offer to work for Amigos Bravos, which brought me back to Northern New Mexico. I worked for Amigos Bravos for a few years, did some contract work and publications for the Quivira Coalition and was on the board of Quivira for many years. I was also involved with the Northern New Mexico chapter of the Sierra Club and was the executive director of the Taos Land Trust for many years.
MA: That’s quite a career. You mentioned seeing some movement toward inclusiveness and the environmental justice movement. What are you seeing now compared with when you started your career? What are some of the themes, good and bad, in the conservation world?
EA: There’s a lot to unpack. This is important and nuanced stuff, and I’m sure I’ll gloss over some important things. But for instance, when I worked for Amigos Bravos, someone once called me the “Chicano poster child.” I looked around and realized that in 1996 or 1997, I might have been the only Hispano working as a full-time environmental advocate in the entire state of New Mexico. I knew people who were involved, were on boards or doing contract work, but I think I might have been the only hired staffer in the entire state. That was a wake-up call. I realized we had work to do. I felt like a misfit, and that was a big part of it. The whole culture was really different, without a lot of room for diverse perspectives. That’s changed—it’s not representative by a long shot, but we definitely have more diversity now. Here in New Mexico, there’s more sensitivity and awareness of issues of justice, equity, diversity and inclusion. At NPCA, we call it JEDI. I had the opportunity to work with a team to create a robust JEDI program for our national organization. These days, it feels like more than just lip service. Back in the ‘90s, there was a lot of lip service and not much cultural change within the conservation community. But now, I see organizations that are more diverse and representative. This is reflected internally within the organization and externally in how we do our work, the communities we work with and the issues we tackle. Indigenous communities have really become front and center in many of our conservation campaigns, and we couldn’t do it without these communities, the original stewards. The conservation community has a lot of damage to repair with Indigenous communities, but I think we’re working in the right direction.
Another shift is the openness to working landscapes, whether it’s regenerative ranching or small-scale stewardship thinning for healthier forests and watersheds. Back in the ‘90s and early 2000s, some groups were adamantly opposed to anything like that. But now, there’s more openness, which has made the conservation community a little more welcoming to diverse land-based communities that we have a lot of here in New Mexico. In particular, I think New Mexico Wild has led on some of that work in the state.
One thing that concerns me is that as we work more in coalitions and alliances. There’s a tendency for everyone to be in perfect, synchronized lockstep, and I think we lose something in that. When that happens, we lose some of the diversity in our approach. We need the whole spectrum of strategies and tactics. We might not always agree with each other, but we’re all working toward the same goals, and I think we need that diversity to move forward. When we’re all saying and doing the same thing, I think we lose some power.
MA: Interesting. So, in that instance, maybe communication or some coordination might be more appropriate than trying to achieve formal consensus across the entire effort?
EA: I think so, yeah. We’ve seen a bit of divisiveness even within the conservation community here in New Mexico around certain campaigns, which I think is unfortunate. It’s really just a matter of communicating and coordinating, even though we don’t all have to do the same thing. It’s about keeping open lines.
MA: On the topic of diversification, throughout your career—as you’ve reached higher levels of responsibility and been in a position to hire people and grow teams—are there lessons you’ve learned about hiring and retaining people of color and others who haven’t been included in the conservation movement?
EA: For all the idealism around that, it’s still challenging, even as a person of color. When I was with Taos Land Trust, I was always trying to recruit a representatively diverse board, but it was hard to find the right people with the time, background and ability to contribute. There are so many considerations when staffing an organization and hiring people. It’s hard. But I do think it’s crucial for an organization to be open to new ways of thinking, new approaches, new perspectives. That’s the only way we’re going to evolve toward a more inclusive approach. It’s a slow process, but necessary. I’m no longer the Chicano poster child but I’m, like, one of three (laughs). Including Indigenous communities, Indigenous voices in a really meaningful way—that has changed so much in recent years, even just in the five years I’ve been a regional director.
MA: I’ve seen that, too. Any other significant thematic changes, good or bad, that you’ve observed throughout your career?
EA: Well, there are a lot more conservation groups these days, and to some extent I think that’s a reflection of the scope and level of threats against our natural world. On one hand, that’s a good thing because it shows growing awareness and constituency. But it’s also unfortunate because it means we have to continue working so hard just to protect these places.
MA: It’s all hands on deck right now. Well, I know you’re humble, but looking back on your career, are there particular accomplishments you’re most proud of?
EA: A few things stand out. Back in the early 2000s, I published a couple of reports—small book-length projects—one called “Of Land and Culture” and the other, “La Vida Floresta.” The first one dealt with the environmental justice dimensions of the movement to end all public lands grazing in Northern New Mexico—such a unique, important history and part of the culture here. And it’s small-scale and, I think, arguably sustainable. I was commissioned to write a report to push back on an initiative from the Sierra Club to adopt a policy that was going to oppose all public lands grazing everywhere, always. And we just thought, one size fits all just doesn’t quite cut it, especially in a place like New Mexico. And then I was hired to write a companion piece, “La Vida Floresta,” about an effort to ban all commercial public lands logging, so that meant even anybody who went out to cut firewood and sell it to their neighbor. It was broadly interpreted. And that caused a lot of strife in Northern New Mexico. I’m very proud of those, and although both reports were controversial at the time, they have over the years helped shift the conversation. Now, there’s the Rio Grande Water Fund that’s out there supporting all kinds of timber thinning to protect watershed health and beneficial fire.
With Taos Land Trust, I worked for almost seven years to legally transfer a piece of property to Taos Pueblo as a gift. There was a site that had a hot spring that was very sacred to several clans of Taos Pueblo. I thought it was going to be a simple, straightforward project, and it took seven years to build the trust and relationships, but it was a worthwhile process. I was really proud of that. This was before the land-back movement gained wider recognition. There has been so much I’ve had the opportunity to do with NPCA on a broader canvas across the Southwest, especially the Chaco withdrawal. It’s only for 20 years from now, but I think we’ll get that legislation passed for permanent protection, or if we haven’t broken our petroleum addiction by then, it’s just going to be too late.
I’ve also been proud to work closely with the Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition to support their land use management planning and outreach to tribal communities and bringing those voices into the dialogue. We were involved in the recent establishment of the Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni—Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument, which protects almost a million acres around the Grand Canyon. That was thrilling, as NPCA had been working on it for decades.
Since I became regional director, we took on a campaign to advocate for a new National Park unit. It was passed by Congress and is now officially the Amache National Historic Site in southeastern Colorado, one of the sites of a Japanese incarceration camp during World War II. We worked with descendants and a few survivors to bring that to fruition, and it was very exciting. The timing was just right, and we moved that fairly quickly, and within a couple of years it passed Congress on an almost unanimous vote.
MA: That’s a remarkable achievement. Congratulations on all of that. Being involved in an effort to create a new park or monument that will exist in perpetuity is just really heady stuff.
EA: What’s really exciting is that just a few miles from Amache is the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site. And we’ve created some common community between descendants of both those sites. Different kinds of trauma caused by our government, but they feel some shared experience, and we are developing a youth program connecting descendants from both groups.
MA: Amazing. I want to mention that I have both of those reports you referenced earlier on my office shelves and have read them.
EA: They were so controversial at the time, but now they don’t spark as much opposition.
MA: They have an obvious cultural connection, especially to Northern New Mexico. Did you feel ostracized by the larger conservation community when those reports were published?
EA: Honestly, yes, particularly with “La Vida Floresta.” The Sierra Club took it as a direct attack on one of their standing policies. And it was one of their chapters that commissioned me to write this! There were threats to disband the Northern New Mexico Group. The publication was essentially banned by the Sierra Club for public distribution.
MA: They weren’t prepared for the conclusion you reached, apparently.
EA: The local chapter was bought into it, they fully supported it. That’s what they wanted, right? But the national group didn’t like it. They came out here, we had a couple of meetings, and, essentially, they shut it down. I had a friend who had access to all the undistributed books, and we managed to quietly distribute them and got them into a few libraries. So, I stepped away from the world of advocacy for a while and went to work for a land trust. But you know, the people who were so ardently opposed to that stuff at the time—we’ve made up since then, because the culture has shifted a bit.
MA: Weren’t you also involved in the acquisition of Ute Mountain, which is now a Wilderness Area?
EA: Yeah, that was another one. Taos Land Trust didn’t take the lead on that—it was the Trust for Public Land—but we worked hand in hand with them, mostly on local support, letter writing and petitions. That was before there was any discussion about a National Conservation Area or a National Monument for Rio Grande del Norte. But this was an opportunity that came up for 14,000 acres, including Ute Mountain and some surrounding areas. It’s an incredible wildlife habitat—a real oasis in the middle of that high plateau. So, we worked with TPL, and there was a federal purchase under the Land and Water Conservation Fund for those 14,000 acres. After that, Ute Mountain became the northern keystone of the monument proposal. I can see it from here—right here from my house. Now it’s designated Wilderness. That’s something I’m really proud of. I get to look at it every day.
MA: Thank you for that. I want to turn to your role and tenure at New Mexico Wild. You served on the board for nine years. Being on a board of directors is a volunteer position, in addition to everything else you have going on. Can you say a bit about why you devoted the time and energy to be on the board of New Mexico Wild? What has it meant to you personally?
EA: As I’ve told you before, I’m particular about the organizations I support. I really appreciated the approach New Mexico Wild has been taking, especially under your leadership, Mark—being more open to listening to community voices and different ideas about what conservation means in Northern New Mexico. I was really proud to participate and be part of that. I didn’t realize how much the organization has grown in those nine years. It’s great to see, and it’s just from doing good work. I think New Mexico Wild has really become a leader and a shining example of how to do this work in New Mexico. I’m proud to have been part of that.
MA: Thank you. That’s extremely flattering. What niche does New Mexico Wild fill in the conservation environment? Are there things you feel we do particularly well or areas where we really add value that would be missed if we weren’t around?
EA: I think John Olivas might have been the first person with the title of Traditional Community Organizer. Just that alone was huge because, in Northern New Mexico, that’s a community that felt ignored for a long time. The conservation community had a deaf ear to their concerns and priorities and the environmental values of Northern New Mexico. They run deep—different, but they run deep. New Mexico Wild has done a good job of listening, trying to understand and creating important partnerships and friendships. For example, bringing (the late) Esther Garcia, former mayor of Questa, into the fold on her terms was significant. Her conservation values were rock solid. She cared about these places differently than the mainstream movement, but she cared at least as much, if not more. So, I think that sort of approach has been transformational—I look around and realize that we have more friends in the Wilderness movement among ranchers and traditional land users than we used to.
MA: Yeah, that’s an interesting development.
EA: Anyway, in so many ways, New Mexico Wild has been an example of how to do this work well and appropriately in a diverse community, with deeply rooted local traditional cultures who have their own really strong relationship with natural resources and the natural world. Nobody’s perfect, but I’ve admired how New Mexico Wild worked hard to create those relationships and to recruit that kind of diversity to the board and staff. It makes a huge difference.
MA: Thank you for that. I have to ask the flip side, too, though. Relationship building is hard. Building trust is a long-term effort, and sometimes we make mistakes. There are a lot of areas we could improve upon. From your vantage point, what could we doing better or more of? Are there areas where we could improve or increase our investment?
EA: That’s a tough one. It is a slow process, and I feel like New Mexico Wild is on a good and healthy trajectory in terms of those values. But it just takes a while. I know from experience trying to build a representatively diverse board for Taos Land Trust and hire representative staff—it’s not easy. Maybe in theory, but the reality is never that easy. New Mexico Wild is absolutely moving in a good direction on those fronts. But a challenge for any conservation organization is allowing that growth in diversity to potentially change the way you do your work, the direction and the priorities. That can be tricky, but it’s an important part of recruiting diversity—really integrating it, not just checking a box that says, “We have this many Hispanics on our board.” It’s about listening to those Hispanic voices.
MA: Having those different perspectives educate and inform us.
EA: And we’re never going to agree on everything but having those civil conversations, learning from each other about these shared values and maybe trying different approaches to how we take care of these places.
MA: You’ve been very generous with your time. I have just one more question. What would you say to people thinking about serving on a board of directors, either New Mexico Wild’s board or any conservation board? What guidance might you have for future board members about their role and responsibility?
EA: That’s a good question. This staff is on a good path—you’re doing great work, and the organization’s growth shows that. I think board service is an opportunity to work quietly behind the scenes to slowly push for this kind of cultural change, to provide oversight and general guidance, but don’t get in the way of the executive director and the staff if they are on a good path. The board needs to be a step removed from the day-to-day and let you and the staff take care of that. Most board members are good about that, but I know that the tendency to micromanage can complicate things.
MA: That’s a great distinction and an important point. Well, thank you so much. I appreciate your time this morning and thoughtfulness, as always. But also, I appreciate your years of service—not just with New Mexico Wild, but for lands, waters and wildlife in New Mexico. Beyond just being present on the board, I’ve always appreciated being able to call on you for guidance and advice and the way you model how to do this work. I’ve always looked up to that.
EA: That’s great to hear. Honestly, it’s been a totally unexpected blast. I never imagined myself in this work—I didn’t even understand it. When I was in my late teens, early 20s, I’d heard about the Sierra Club and other organizations, but I didn’t even know how to join an organization like that. I was a slow starter. But it’s been a great adventure.
