The Public Lands Foundation grants to Al Wright its Lifetime Service Award for excellence in public land management. The Foundation provides this award to deserving members who have perpetuated and enhanced the proud tradition of public service. Al, you have exemplified that tradition through a lifetime of service in managing and protecting America’s National System of Public Lands.

A native of California and a graduate from the University of Nevada, Reno, with a degree in Agriculture and a major in Renewable Natural Resource Management in 1967, you joined the Bureau of Land Management as a Natural Resource Specialist in Ely, Nevada in 1967, and retired as BLM’s Associate State Director in California in 2000.

During the intervening 33 years, you served in a variety of BLM management positions – Area Manager in Ely, Nevada and Glenwood Springs, Colorado; Management Analyst in Washington D.C.; District Manager in Ukiah, California; and Associate State Director in Sacramento, California.  Because of your diversity, knowledge and talents, you served on details such as Acting Denver Service Center Director; Acting Assistant Director in the National Headquarters Office; and Special Assistant to the BLM Director. You also served on the Board of Directors for the Tejon Ranch Foundation and as a principal on the California Bio-diversity Council, in addition to numerous other special assignments.

Your have been rewarded eight Special Achievement and Unit Citation Awards, most prestigious of which was the Department of the Interior’s Meritorious Service Award. In addition, your services outside the Bureau, while still an employee, were recognized by letters of appreciation from the Boy Scouts of America, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force, County Commissioners from Nevada and Colorado, the Trust for Public Lands, and the Commonwealth of California, to name a few. You have been effective in developing those under your supervision for completing complex assignments and for future managerial positions, as noted in several of your awards.

After 33 years of exceptional dedicated public service to the Bureau of Land Management, you dedicated the next six years as Executive Director of the California Wildlife and Conservation Board, in which you are still active. During your term as Executive Director from 2000-2006, 853,256 acres of sensitive wildlife habitat were restored and protected.

The Public Lands Foundation is honored to recognize you with this Lifetime Service Award.