Wanted by Alaska lawmakers: PR firm to fight species listings

The Alaska Legislature is paying for a conference and public relations campaign to persuade Congress to limit the Endangered Species Act. The Legislative Council is asking public relations firms to bid between now and Jan. 4 on the effort, which lawmakers appropriated $1.5 million to fund. The PR pros are to assemble a panel for an "Alaska Conference on Climate Change," after suggesting how the panel debate should be framed. They'll launch a public relations campaign "based on the conclusions reached by the conference panel," according to the Legislature's request for proposals. The goal of the project is figuring out how to reverse what the Legislature calls negative economic effects from listings based on climate change, like the designation of the polar bear as a threatened species. "The (PR firm's) main role will be taking information from the conference and other information gathering efforts and trying how to initiate a grass-roots movement, for lack of a better term. For going to Congress and asking for some reform changes," said Eddie Grasser, a legislative employee who is organizing the PR effort. He said Alaska will be working with other states seeking the same changes to the Endangered Species Act. "It's not challenging the idea that maybe we need to do something about climate change but challenging the idea that the (Endangered Species Act) is the tool to use in doing that," he said...read more