We live in an age of unraveling — ecosystems fraying below the stress of local weather disruption, species loss, and human overreach. From report ocean temperatures and vanishing salmon runs to catastrophic wildfires, intensifying hurricanes, and tornadoes in locations they don’t belong, the proof is throughout us. This isn’t a distant disaster. It’s right here, now, and rising.
Each considered one of us has a task to play. Whether or not we’re scientists, policymakers, or advocates, we feature a duty to behave — to defend the pure programs that maintain us and to insist our leaders do the identical.
That’s why Gov. Bob Ferguson’s quiet dismissal of Timothy Ragen from the Washington Fish & Wildlife Fee — considered one of his first acts in workplace — despatched a troubling message on the worst attainable time. Ragen, a globally revered marine mammal scientist and former government director of the U.S. Marine Mammal Fee, was among the many most certified commissioners this state has ever seen. His elimination, with out clarification, casts doubt on whether or not Washington’s environmental management will probably be formed by science and ethics or political comfort.
Simply earlier than leaving workplace — and after consulting instantly with Ferguson and his senior advisers — Gov. Jay Inslee reappointed Ragen and appointed Lynn O’Connor to the fee. Ferguson agreed. However inside days of taking workplace, he reversed course. He requested the Senate to rescind each appointments and, with out public clarification, summarily fired Ragen — an motion that shocked observers and eroded public belief.
Ragen’s expertise spans many years of labor recovering endangered species and advising federal companies on marine ecosystem safety. His position on the fee was to make sure selections affecting species just like the southern resident killer whales — whose inhabitants has fallen to simply 73 — had been grounded in science, not stress from particular pursuits. His absence leaves a void at a time when management rooted in proof and ethics is important.
Additionally dismissed was O’Connor, a Ferry County landowner, businesswoman and conservation advocate whose balanced, community-based method made her a uncommon and revered voice bridging rural values with ecological stewardship. The lack of each voices has deeply unsettled the conservation neighborhood.
I used to be considered one of 74 scientists, conservationists and environmental advocates who signed a letter urging Gov. Ferguson to rethink. We did so not out of partisanship, however as a result of this choice undermines public belief and weakens the Fee’s skill to fulfill our state’s environmental challenges.
Much more troubling than the choice itself has been the silence that adopted. No public rationale. No transparency. No clear path ahead.
The Fish & Wildlife Fee shapes coverage on every part from salmon and steelhead to ungulates and keystone predators like wolves, cougars and bears. These selections ripple by means of ecosystems, tribal nations, rural economies and concrete communities. We can’t afford to allow them to be guided by something aside from science, public curiosity and ecological integrity.
We’re all on this collectively — and our shared future relies on selections that put science, integrity and stewardship forward of politics. Washingtonians deserve leaders who rise to fulfill the challenges of our time with braveness and readability — not retreat into silence or short-term calculation.
Gov. Ferguson’s elimination of Ragen and O’Connor was a grave mistake — one which have to be reversed. Something much less alerts a troubling disregard for science, transparency and the belief of Washingtonians who anticipate principled management within the face of ecological disaster.
And whereas that duty rests squarely with the governor, the bigger work belongs to all of us. Every of us has a task to play in turning this disaster round. We should communicate out, keep engaged and demand higher from these entrusted with the care of our pure world. The wild locations and species we stand to lose aren’t simply symbols of magnificence or biodiversity — they’re important threads within the internet of life that sustains us all.
