For more than 15 years, we have been working our butts off to save the spirit bear. While we’ve accomplished a lot, today I am asking for your help to assist us in taking the final steps to reach our goal.

Together, our efforts have resulted in the enactment of the largest land protection measure in the history of North America – a framework that permanently protects two-thirds of the spirit bear’s last intact ecosystem. I thank you for contributing to the largest youth environment network in the world and the most supported conservation initiative in Canadian history. The size and scope of our network have attracted international awareness through at least one mainstream or online media story everyday for more than a decade.

But there is still much, much more to be done, if we are to safeguard the gene pool of this fragile and globally important subspecies.

1. We must create meaningful sanctuary for the spirit bear, including: a) protection for the remainder of the spirit bear’s last intact global ecosystem and b) abolishing the coastal bear trophy hunt.

2. We must shift the route of the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline that will send oil tankers through spirit bear waters.

In the coming months, we are stepping up our efforts as the urgency to save this bear closes in. We need to make sure everyone is heard on this issue so, with your support, I personally commit to speaking to 500 schools and conducting 50 town halls. We want to engage hundreds of thousands of students globally by encouraging them to launch their own authentic and innovative social media campaigns to rally their peers on this issue. And we want to meet with every elected representative in British Columbia and Canada to ensure they know a balanced alternative is on the table that will save the bear without harming the economy.

But we can’t do it alone.

This holiday season, please consider making a donation of $50 to the Spirit Bear Youth Coalition. Each and every dollar makes a difference. You can make a donation online or by sending a cheque to PO Box 91933 W. Vancouver, BC V7V 4S4.

You have always responded generously and passionately to our pleas for help. The timing has never been more important. And we can’t accomplish the goals we’ve set without the support of each of you.

I thank you for your consideration, for your ongoing support, and for your compassion for the spirit bear.

All my best to you and your family this holiday season,

Simon
—
D. Simon Jackson
Founder and Chairman, Spirit Bear Youth Coalition
www.spiritbearyouth.org

Due to massive public interest in the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline that will send oil tankers through treacherous waters within the spirit bear’s habitat, a decision on the project’s fate has been delayed until 2013 in order to ensure everyone has a chance to make their voice heard.

A new report released today shines a light on the dangers associated with Enbridge’s proposed Northern Gateway project which would send massive oil tankers through spirit bear waters for the first time. The report by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the Pembina Institute and Living Oceans Society, has also been endorsed by nine British Columbia organizations.

Read the Vancouver Sun article on Pat Carney – a former Conservative senator from BC and a former Minister of Energy with the federal government – and her views on why the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline that will send oil tankers through the spirit bear’s habitat doesn’t make sense.

Read the Ottawa Citizen article that investigates why environmentalists succeeded in shifting the proposed Keystone XL pipeline from a sensitive ecological region in Nebraska to a less harmful route – and what lessons can be learned by all parties working to decide the future of the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline to the BC coast, a route that would send oil tankers through spirit bear waters.

The white Kermode or spirit bear is one of the most endangered animals in the world, numbering fewer than four hundred and calling home an ecosystem that is as wild as it is globally important.

There are two major preventable threats to the spirit bear: an urgent need for a meaningful sanctuary in their last intact ecosystem and the long term concern of oil spills from proposed oil tanker traffic in the treacherous waters within this wilderness.

Thanks to millions of people from all walks of life, from all corners of the globe, we’ve made remarkable progress and created hope that we can save the spirit bear.

And with your continued support, we will save our spirit bear.

The Spirit Bear Youth Coalition has a fair and balanced plan to create sanctuary for the spirit bear without harming the economy. We need every concerned citizen from around the globe to help us make sure decision makers do their part to work with us to create a lasting solution that saves the Kermode and makes all citizens proud of our collective achievement.

FIVE WAYS TO SAVE THE SPIRIT BEAR:

1) Email, write and/or phone Canadian Prime Minister Harper and BC Premier Clark
2) Sign the petition to stop this hunt
3) Adopt-a-Spirit Bear
4) Donate to the Spirit Bear Youth Coalition volunteer-run campaign
5) Spread the word by forwarding this message

FIVE WAYS TO STAY UP-TO-DATE:

1) Follow us on Twitter @SpiritBearYouth
2) Join our Facebook group
3) Visit www.spiritbearyouth.org and www.adoptaspiritbear.org
4) Become a member
5) Sign-up for our new education program

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

The Case to Save the Spirit Bear
The Case to Stop the Coastal Bear Trophy Hunt
The Case for an Alternative Pipeline Route
Global TV Spirit Bear Series

Globe and Mail article discusses why the proposed Enbridge pipeline that would send oil tankers through the last intact home of the spirit bear shouldn’t happen.

With only a few days notice from the Canadian government, we asked you to sign-up to be heard at the upcoming federal government review panel on the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline that would send oil tankers through the last intact habitat of the spirit bear.

And what a resounding response of support.

More than 4000 people – of all ages and from all corners of the globe – registered within 48 hours to give the spirit bear a voice at the decision making table. That’s a record-shattering seven times the number of people who have ever registered to be heard at previous review panels, making this outpouring of support the largest in Canadian history.

THANK YOU!

(Read more about the difference you’ve already made for the spirit bear.)

What’s next?

1. For those who registered to be heard, we will be in contact to help ensure your voice is indeed heard by the Canadian government at the upcoming review panel meetings that will go a long way toward deciding the fate of the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline.

2. For those who were unable to register – and for those who did register – we are urging you to make your voice heard in a more traditional sense: Write BC Premier Clark and Canadian Prime Minister Harper and tell them why this pipeline route needs to be altered to save the spirit bear.

A Balanced Alternative

With the proposed Keystone XL pipeline from Alberta’s oil sands to the USA having been at least temporarily shelved, increased pressure will be placed on decision makers to fast-track plans to build the Northern Gateway pipeline to the BC coast in order to find consumers for Alberta’s oil.

The Keystone pipeline was heralded as a “no-brainer”, but failed to receive approval for one critical reason: the proposed route was ecologically dangerous and the public made sure decision makers knew that the plan was simply unacceptable.

Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline proposal is fraught with considerably more risk to the environment than Keystone given plans to send oil tankers through treacherous waters in and around the highly endangered spirit bear’s last intact habitat. It will also likely garner considerably more opposition than Keystone considering already most British Columbians and almost every First Nation band along the proposed route oppose the pipeline.

However, like Keystone, a viable and reasonable alternative is available to Enbridge and decision makers.

A different route for Northern Gateway – in this case utilizing existing infrastructure and the polluted, less dangerous Port of Vancouver – would allow for oil exports, job creation, economic certainty without threatening the globally important spirit bear and the future of an area labelled by National Geographic as the last wild place in North America.

If the builders of the Keystone pipeline had simply heeded the public’s concern for their planned route, it is almost a certainty that the majority of the opposition would have melted away and the project would have been allowed to move forward.

Our challenge is to make sure Canadian decision makers and Enbridge executives are clear: the current plan for Northern Gateway won’t work and the reasonable alternative on the table must become the focus to ensure a repeat of the Keystone affair doesn’t occur in BC, for the sake of the economy and the future of the spirit bear.

MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD TODAY.

Read the Vancouver Sun article that breaks down why the US decision to make no decision on the proposed Keystone XL pipeline from Alberta’s oil sands to America creates new pressure to build the proposed Enbridge pipeline to the BC coast – and oil tanker traffic through the spirit bear’s last intact habitat.

Spirit Bear Youth Coalition founder Simon Jackson will be speaking to high school students from across Fort McMurray – the heart of Alberta’s oil sands and the starting point of the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline that would send crude oil to the BC coast and, ultimately, on tankers through spirit bear waters.

Jackson will be speaking at the annual youth empowerment conference put on by the Justin Slade Youth Foundation. His message of the power of one will aim to encourage students to take ownership of their community and world by taking a stand for the issues they care about – such as saving the spirit bear and altering the route of the proposed pipeline that threatens its future.

While in Fort McMurray, Jackson will also meet with local leaders to discuss the pipeline and advocate for the Youth Coalition’s balanced vision: environmental innovation for the oil sands, an alternative route for the proposed pipeline using existing infrastructure that still allows for critical exports, and a sanctuary for the spirit bear that does not burden any community or the Canadian economy.