Bob Keiter

Thirty years ago, the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) concept and ecosystem management surfaced as a key to preserving the legally fragmented region’s public lands and wildlife in the face of mounting development pressures.

Yellowstone’s grizzly bears were in sharp decline and wolves were absent from the landscape, while bison and elk management issues festered. The GYE’s national forest lands were subject to extensive logging, energy leasing and other commercial activities that cumulatively threatened the region’s ecological integrity.

In the face of extreme jurisdictional complexity and a strong commitment to agency discretion, a high-profile federal “Vision” effort to improve and better coordinate resource management practices cratered under intense political pressures. Since then, however, much has changed in the GYE.

On Thursday, at a a free, Draper Natural History Museum Lunchtime Expedition at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody, Bob Keiter will revisit the concept.

His talk, titled “The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem Revisited: Law, Science, and the Pursuit of Ecosystem Management in an Iconic Landscape,” begins at 12:15 p.m. in the Coe Auditorium and via Zoom. To join virtually, pre-register at https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_rOHwTJ1BStO4SnjUN3pVPw.

Keiter first explored the related GYE and ecosystem management concepts in the late 1980s and recently returned to the GYE to assess what has transpired during the past 30 years, what forces for change have been at work, and where GYE conservation efforts stand today.

Keiter is the Wallace Stegner Professor of Law, University Distinguished Professor, and founding Director of the Wallace Stegner Center for Land, Resources, and the Environment at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law. Bob holds a J.D. degree with honors from Northwestern University and a B.A. degree with honors from Washington University. He has taught at the University of Wyoming, Boston College and Southwestern University — and he served as a Senior Fulbright Scholar in Kathmandu, Nepal.

His books include: “To Conserve Unimpaired: The Evolution of the National Park Idea”; “Keeping Faith with Nature: Ecosystems, Democracy, and America’s Public Lands”; “The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem: Redefining America’s Wilderness Heritage”; and “The Wyoming State Constitution.” He has served on the boards of the National Parks Conservation Association, Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation, Greater Yellowstone Coalition, Sonoran Institute, and the University of Utah’s Institute for Clean and Secure Energy.