{"id":23013,"date":"2025-03-25T20:04:56","date_gmt":"2025-03-26T02:04:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/montezuma-land-conservancys-traditional-harvest-program-awarded-299k\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:23:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:23:14","slug":"montezuma-land-conservancys-traditional-harvest-program-awarded-299k","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/montezuma-land-conservancys-traditional-harvest-program-awarded-299k\/","title":{"rendered":"Montezuma Land Conservancy\u2019s Traditional Harvest Program awarded $299K"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The Montezuma Land Conservancy is hiring a cross-cultural programs coordinator, thanks to Great Outdoors Colorado grant money. The deadline to apply is April 15. (Molly Mazel\/Courtesy photo)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

The Montezuma Land Conservancy recently received grant money that will allow it to expand a project that supports tribal access to culturally significant plants.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s called the Traditional Harvest Project, and in addition supporting such access through partnerships with private landowners, it \u201caddresses habitat loss and degradation\u201d on and off the reservation and supports \u201cintergenerational knowledge-sharing,\u201d according to a news release.<\/p>\n

The boundaries of the reservation are \u201cfinite,\u201d and \u201coverharvesting of culturally significant plants has become a serious problem for the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe,\u201d said MLC\u2019s deputy director, Molly Mazel, in an email.<\/p>\n

\u201cDrought and a changing climate have only exacerbated habitat loss for these plant communities,\u201d said Mazel.<\/p>\n

Importantly, this project \u201cexpands tribal member access to their ancestral homelands\u201d and contributes \u201cto tribally informed restoration projects\u201d on and off the reservation, said Mazel.<\/p>\n

The almost $300,000 that Great Outdoors Colorado\u2019s Planning and Capacity program awarded the Montezuma Land Conservancy will help it hire a full-time cross-cultural programs coordinator to expand the program to the greater Southwest region.<\/p>\n

The money will also \u201csupport ongoing relationship building\u201d between the land conservancy and the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, a relationship that really began back in 2021 when the Traditional Harvest Project started.<\/p>\n

That year, the project began under the tribe\u2019s Environmental Department.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt began as a partnership between the Tribe and Trees, Water & People<\/a> with the goal of restoring native plant habitat on the reservation,\u201d said Mazel.<\/p>\n

\u201cMLC got involved in 2021 to help expand the project by incorporating harvesting access on private lands\u201d with its network of landowners, she said.<\/p>\n

In the past four years, 25 landowners have participated in the project to give Indigenous people access to plants \u201con ancestral homelands off the reservation,\u201d according to the news release.<\/p>\n

The project has also helped facilitate harvest opportunities for \u201ctribal ceremonies and traditions,\u201d and \u201claunched pilot habitat restoration projects on private lands,\u201d the news release said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing an active partner in the Traditional Harvest Project \u2026 has given us the privilege to invest in local, place-based efforts that protect critical natural resources and facilitate authentic relationships between communities,\u201d said James Calabaza, director of Trees, Water & People\u2019s Indigenous Lands program.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, \u201cinterest in this work has not only grown among landowners in our region, but also among conservation organizations throughout the state,\u201d said an email from MLC.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re interested in the cross-cultural programs coordinator position, which is a shared one between the land conservancy and Trees, Water & People, the application is live on the Montezuma Land Conservancy\u2019s website.<\/a> The deadline to apply is April 15.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

to expand its reach to the greater Southwest region and grow its team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23014,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,60,29,547],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-23013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-montezuma-county","tag-newsletter","tag-ute-mountain-ute-indian-tribe"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23013"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77942,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23013\/revisions\/77942"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23013"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}