Great Plains Restoration Council (GPRC) has convened an A-team of executives from State agencies, conservation non-profits, foundations and banking to: “Establish a historic, landscape-scale shortgrass prairie preserve (up to 100,000 acres or more) in the Texas Panhandle for wild Texas bison, pronghorn, black-tailed prairie dogs, black-footed ferrets, elk, grassland nesting birds, swift foxes and more that also offers multicultural human engagement, including ancestral connections for Indigenous Kiowa and Comanche people.” Additionally, this will be a new kind of wild Park for America, explicitly interweaving human wellness, mental health, and personal recovery into conservation while addressing the extinction crisis.

According to Jarid Manos, GPRC’s Founder and CEO, “Sorrow and loss from the past can feel bottomless, but history is not over. We’re all in this together now. Through the audacity of hard work and loving more, we are bringing people together of all colors, cultures and communities to create the nation’s first-ever Southern Great Plains Conservation & Recreation Area in the Texas Panhandle and combine human wellness with biodiversity protection. This landscape-scale grassland conservation area out in America’s “Flyover Country” will breathe life back into the Texas High Plains, provide an extraordinary public refuge of sun, wind, grass and blue sky for wildlife and people that has to be experienced to be believed, and show what we can do when we tangibly work together.”