DDWS named ‘Friends Group of The Year’ by FWS region
In a recent virtual award ceremony, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service’s Southeast Region honored the “Ding” Darling Wildlife Society-Friends of the Refuge with the 2021 Regional Director’s Friends Group of the Year award.
The DDWS is the nonprofit partner to the J.N. “Ding” Darling National Wildlife Refuge, one of 146 refuges and fish hatcheries in the southeast region, which encompasses 12 U.S. states and territories. The DDWS was one of only two refuge friends groups out of 49 to receive the award this year.
“This stands as a testimony to the hard work each of you put in to make the Lee Anne Tauck Conservation Tract acquisition happen,” Refuge Manager Kevin Godsea, who nominated the group for the award, said.
In partnership with Lee County Conservation 20/20, the DDWS worked to raise $9.5 million to acquire the largest remaining parcel of undeveloped land on Sanibel in 2019. The 68-acre tract was deeded for up to 29 luxury homes. As an important corridor between the refuge and Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation lands, the property originally known as Wulfert Bayous was deemed critical to the refuge’s conservation mission. The refuge now manages the 68 acres as part of its complex. The tract soon will be undergoing restoration, thanks to grants the DDWS helped to facilitate.
“Our amazing staff, donors and board of directors so deserve this award, but it also could not have happened without our wonderful partnerships with the refuge team and Lee County,” DDWS Executive Director Birgie Miller said. “This is a huge honor, but even more gratifying is knowing what we all achieved in the name of keeping Sanibel a sanctuary island and this property a valuable habitat for wetland and upland species.”
Miller was among the award recipients named, along with immediate past Board President Mike Baldwin, President Sarah Ashton, acquisition project leader John McCabe, and Board Members Wendy Kindig and Bill Valerian.
The Regional Director’s Honor Award goes out annually to volunteers, partners and employees who have contributed to the accomplishments of the FWS’s mission and vision in the South Atlantic-Gulf and Mississippi Basin Interior Regions.