FRIENDS OF AVI KWA AME NATIONAL MONUMENT MISSION STATEMENT
PURPOSE: The Friends of Avi Kwa Ame help ensure protection of the ecological, cultural, historic, and recreational resources of the Monument area through community engagement, advocacy, interpretive & educational programming, support of academic research, site stewardship, and restoration efforts.
VISION: We envision the Monument being co-stewarded by the Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service and affiliated tribes as an integrated and interconnected landscape with adjacent protected areas in a way that can best respond to climate change, engage the local communities, and provide for responsible recreation use.
CURRENT INITIATIVES
We are working to protect Avi Kwa Ame's 506,000 acres of fragile desert ecosystem and cultural sites, while developing and maintaining resources for the public (like parking and camp site demarcation, area clean ups, trailhead info, directional signage and maps) throughout the monument.
We bring the monument's stories to life, through professional research, developing interpretive signage and displays, oral history projects, and our yearly history, science and nature journal, The Searchlight Gold Beam.
Public lands are currently under threat, and we work hard to engage the public and our representatives in protecting our national monument and its resources. Support this important work to safeguard Avi Kwa Ame for future generations.
We are transforming Walking Box Ranch into a well-maintained and informative historical site, and a visitors center for the monument. We have a long way to go with repairs, maintenance and creating interpretive resources for the public.
Avi Kwa Ame is blessed with beautiful dark night skies and views of the Milky Way Galaxy. We want to protect this valuable resource for the future and are applying to become an International Dark Sky Park. This project includes regularly hosting astronomy events, measuring light levels, creating dark sky viewing areas around the monument, and educating the public on the role darkness plays in the health of plants, animals, and ecosystems.
We host monthly Walking Box ranch tours and history, science, arts and nature events in the monument.
