Saving the polar bear and getting more members top the priority list for Tucson's Center for Biological Diversity, says its new director.
Kieran Suckling, a founder of the center, resumed the executive director's job this week after the resignation of Michael Finkelstein. Finkelstein was director for three years before resigning for what he said were personal and professional reasons.
Suckling, 43, the group's science and policy director under Finkelstein, said getting the polar bear in the Arctic listed as a threatened species is a key step toward focusing the center on global conservation issues.
The group started in southwest New Mexico in 1989, working mainly on endangered-species issues in Arizona and New Mexico. In recent years, it has expanded its reach to species issues nationally and, in some cases, internationally.
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The center, Greenpeace and the Natural Resources Defense Council have petitioned the federal government to list the Arctic-based bear as threatened as a way of protecting the animal and raising the global warming issue. If the Fish and Wildlife Service agrees, the center will press the fight against coal-fired power plants and for stricter gasoline mileage standards, Suckling said.
After proposing a year ago to list the bear, the agency missed an early January deadline to make a decision. It said it hopes the parent Interior Department can make a final decision by early February.
Suckling said he hopes the polar bear will revolutionize how people think about global warming.
He said he hopes to continue the center's membership growth, to keep financing stable during a tight economy.
Foundations that support non-profit groups often cut back during economic downturns but individuals keep giving, he said.
Under Finkelstein, the center's membership grew from 15,000 to 45,000, its annual budget jumped from $2.8 million to nearly $6 million, and the staff expanded from 34 to 58.
The center won some big cases, including a ban in California on the use of lead shot in eight counties that contain habitat for the endangered California condor.
Closer to home, Fossil Creek in central Arizona became an undammed river after the center led a successful campaign to get a Phoenix utility to remove the dam as a power source.
But the center also lost a big Tucson case when the service in 2006 de-listed the pygmy owl as an endangered species, reopening the Northwest Side for development. The group is petitioning the service to re-list the bird in Arizona and Sonora.
Finkelstein, 46, said Wednesday he's ready for a new challenge and wants conservation work that leaves him a little more time for his personal life.
"I did three years and felt a huge sense of accomplishment," he said. "Now, I need a new environmental campaign that gives me a little time to get some hiking and running in. The center is all-consuming, all the time."
