Lucas is working for The Nature Conservancy’s Colorado River Program (CRP). His focus for the CRP is two-fold: first, Lucas is researching environmental governance and finance models to facilitate the creation of a water fund for the Colorado River delta. This work entails outreach to stakeholders and coordination with existing environmental funds to glean best practices. The second part of Lucas’ work is focused on storytelling along the Colorado River, to highlight conservation success stories and explore where work still needs to be done. Lucas has written about restoration work along the parched Colorado River delta, demand management with farmers along the Western Slope, and a critically important endangered fish recovery program in the Upper Basin. Through his summer work with the CRP, Lucas hopes to gain the skills and experience needed to be an effective professional in the water management space, galvanizing support for sustainability and conservation policies.
Collaborator
The Nature Conservancy, Colorado River Program | Website
Deliverable
The Death and Rebirth of the Colorado River Delta Storymap
Student Researcher
Lucas Isakowitz, Western Resource Fellow | Lucas Isakowitz is an environmental writer working hard to keep alive the natural curiosity that we all had as children. His focus at Yale F&ES is environmental governance and storytelling, and most recently a growing interest in water issues. Through the Western Resources Fellowship, Lucas will work with the Nature Conservancy’s Colorado River Program, focusing on coalition building and storytelling along the Colorado, and diving into the world of water resource management. See what Lucas has been up to. | Blog