The Intertwine Alliance is one of several conservation coalitions operating in the United States. Others include Chicago (Chicago Wilderness), Cleveland (Lake Erie Allegheny Partnership), Houston (Houston Wilderness), and Los Angeles (Amigos De Los Rios). In aggregate, these coalitions represent more than 500 private, nonprofit and public organizations and serve a total of twenty-three million people. Each of these organizations have strong track records going back many years.
In 2009 the leaders of these organizations joined forces in a partnership that we now call the Metropolitan Greenspace Alliance. We have met in Houston, Chicago, and West Virginia and orchestrated several trips to Washington DC to work with federal officials on a national agenda for nature in urban areas.
In February 2011, the Obama administration released the America's Great Outdoors report, which calls for more federal involvement in urban regions and recommends that federal agencies form broad and diverse coalitions of partners as the best means to leverage federal investment. Of course The Intertwine Alliance and other metropolitan conservation coalitions ARE broad and diverse coalitions that leverage investment in urban regions. There's no need to reinvent the wheel.
In February, representatives of the Metropolitan Greenspaces Alliance met with Will Shafroth, Acting Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks at the Department of the Interior to propose that conservation coalitions, like The Intertwine Alliance, be a primary conduit for federal agencies to implement AGO objectives in metropolitan regions. I recently completed a follow-up memo to Mr. Shafroth outlining our proposal.