2022 AWARDS bighorn sheep biologist Tim Schommer in his nomination letter. “In my opinion, Lee exceeds the criteria for receiving the Grass Roots Award.” According to Shane Clouse, past president of the Montana WSF Chapter, Howard has helped numerous times when Montana didn’t have the funding for a conservation project. “Lee helped MTWSF (MTFNAWS) procure the funding for major projects in 2002, 2005 and another in 2006. At a time when MTWSF was a very small organization with limited funding, Lee helped us find more than $100,000 for projects,” said Clouse.
GORDON EASTMAN GRASS ROOTS AWARD The late Gordon Eastman created the Grass Roots Award to recognize extraordinary commitment of Chapter and Affiliate members to WSF’s mission. This year’s winner is Lee Howard of the Utah, Montana and Idaho WSF chapters. Howard has been involved in various bighorn sheep restoration projects over the past three-plus decades. Beyond substantial financial support for countless projects encompassing habitat enhancement and wild sheep transplants and reintroductions, Howard proved himself a champion of hands-on conservation. Howard has promoted wild sheep research, wild sheep management plans, habitat acquisition and restoration, and transplant and reintroduction projects for over 30 years. He has worked with multiple states and provinces including Utah, Montana, Arizona, Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, British Columbia and other states to capture and relocate sheep to their historic ranges and establish new wild sheep herds. As a lead negotiator, he achieved domestic sheep grazing 176 WILD S HEEP® ~ SPRING 2022
allotment buyouts in Utah, Idaho and Nevada to prevent wild bighorn exposure to disease. This included negotiating domestic sheep grazing allotment buyouts for WSF’s Hells Canyon Initiative. Howard co-founded the Utah Foundation for North American Wild Sheep, where he served as president and a member of the board of directors. He served nine years on the Utah Wildlife Regional Advisory Council and six years on the Utah State Wildlife Board. From 2011 to 2019, he served on the Idaho WSF Chapter board of directors. In one of his most memorable roles, Howard was instrumental in organizing a capture of wild sheep in Montana’s Bitterroot Valley and transferring them to Utah in the early 2000s. Howard even drove the truck to haul the bighorns back to Utah in the dead of winter. “What has impressed me with Lee is his bighorn sheep volunteer work has been over so many years,” said retired federal
Echoing this was another Montana WSF past president Tom Powers, who noted that, over the decades, he and Howard worked closely on many different grantin-aid endeavors that benefitted wild sheep in Montana, Utah and nationally. “When I called Lee Howard at Utah FNAWS, which was on a regular basis, he would say to me, ‘How much should we write the check out for this time, Tom?’ Utah was always there for us.” This included habitat project funding, donating a Dall’s sheep hunt for the Montana WSF fundraiser, and contributing to buyouts of domestic sheep grazing allotments to protect wild bighorns from disease. According to past Idaho WSF president Brad Morlock, when Howard began working for wild sheep restoration in the late 1980s, Utah had approximately 500 wild sheep. Today, Utah hosts between 5,000 and 6,000 of three subspecies: Rocky Mountain, California and desert. “While working with Utah FNAWS, Lee was involved in over 20 major habitat acquisition projects and nearly 30 wild sheep transplants,” said Morlock in his nomination letter. “On October 10, 2021, I was privileged to be present when an 82-year-old Lee Howard harvested a fine 10-plus-year-old California bighorn from the Newfoundland Mountains in Utah, a herd he helped transplant and establish. Lee has taken his four North American wild sheep, but he has put THOUSANDS back!
