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- By Tribal Business News Staff
- Energy | Environment
Brad Parry, vice chairman of the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation, has been awarded the inaugural Schnitzer Prize of the West for leading a large-scale land and water restoration project in Idaho.
The award, administered by the High Desert Museum, recognizes Parry’s leadership on the Wuda Ogwa Cultural and Land Restoration Project, which focuses on ecological and cultural restoration at the site of the 1863 Bear River Massacre in Preston, Idaho.
The Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation acquired the 350-acre site in 2018. Since then, the project has focused on restoring wetlands, reestablishing native vegetation and improving water flow in a tributary of the Bear River, according to the announcement.
Project partners include tribal members, local farmers and ranchers, academic institutions and state and local governments. The effort has included planting more than 70,000 native plants, removing invasive species and restoring natural water pathways, with an estimated 10,000 acre-feet of water returning annually to the Great Salt Lake system.
Parry will receive the award at a ceremony in Portland, Ore., on May 16.
The prize was launched in partnership with the Harold & Arlene Schnitzer CARE Foundation, a Portland-based philanthropic organization that has funded hundreds of nonprofit projects across the region. It recognizes collaborative work related to sovereignty, water management and land restoration in the American West.
