25 Year Anniversary Archives - Winter Wildlands Alliance

Member Profile: Mark Menlove

Emily Scott — Wed, 12 Mar 2025 19:58:31 +0000

Member Profile: Mark Menlove (Boise, ID)

Former Winter Wildlands Alliance Executive Director, Idaho State Director at the Nature Conservancy, and Winter Wildlands Alliance member.

Photo by Dana Menlove

Meet Mark Menlove, the second executive director of Winter Wildlands Alliance (WWA), from 2004 to 2019. When Mark joined, WWA was a fledgling organization, driven by volunteer board members. Mark’s 15-year tenure was instrumental in steering WWA’s growth.

Mark joined WWA because its mission resonated deeply with his values. After leaving behind a career in ski resort management due to conflicts over unchecked expansion, he experienced firsthand the conflicts between skiers and snowmobilers while living in a remote corner of the Wasatch Mountains. Joining WWA allowed him to apply his passion for winter solace and seek solutions on a broader scale.

One of Mark’s most memorable moments from the early days at WWA was a late-night bluegrass folk jam during an early Grassroots Advocacy Conference at Donner Summit. He recalls:

“Guitars, mandolins, harmonicas, and singing, laughter, and pure unadulterated love and joy in the experience of being together in the mountains and showing up for something we all love. I’m so happy to see this tradition has carried on.”

Mark also vividly recalls hiring Charlie Woodruff, WWA’s first outreach coordinator, whose idea to screen a backcountry film in Boise sparked the genesis of the Backcountry Film Festival. Mark loves how the festival has become pivotal in engaging the community and promoting WWA’s mission. He reflects:

“Establishing the Backcountry Film Festival as a means of gathering in celebration of winter, creating community among likeminded people, and raising funds for local groups doing such important work is certainly one of our greatest achievements.”

Alongside the Backcountry Film Festival, Mark considers WWA’s greatest achievements to be the growth of SnowSchool, co-founding Outdoor Alliance, and securing policy victories such as integrating over-snow vehicle use into Forest Service plans and influencing Yellowstone’s Winter Use Plan.

When asked how he thinks WWA’s work has evolved over the past 25 years, Mark shared:

“I love witnessing WWA’s mission and focus continue to become more inclusive and more focused on partnerships and win-win solutions.”

Mark’s advice to members today is simple but powerful:

“Keep showing up where decisions are being made that impact your winter experience. Keep it joyful. Keep having FUN!”

We owe a great deal to Mark for his leadership, vision, and enduring impact on Winter Wildlands Alliance. Join us in celebrating the legacy he helped build by continuing to support WWA’s mission.

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Winter Wildlands Alliance is a national nonprofit organization working to inspire and empower people to protect America’s wild snowscapes.

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Finding The Line: A Journey In Advocacy With Outdoor Alliance

Emily Scott — Mon, 13 Jan 2025 22:40:53 +0000

Finding The Line: A Journey In Advocacy With Outdoor Alliance

Winter Wildlands Alliance, a founding member of Outdoor Alliance, has united outdoor enthusiasts to protect public lands for over a decade. Together, we’ve protected 40 million acres, secured $5.1 billion in funding, and inspired 100,000 advocates. To celebrate, Outdoor Alliance interviewed our Executive Director, David Page, to reflect on ten years of conservation.

Photo by Bianca Germain

Outdoor Alliance interview with David Page, WWA Executive Director (1/9/25)

Can you tell us how you first got started working at Winter Wildlands Alliance, and how we work together as a coalition at Outdoor Alliance?

Photo by Torch Pictures

When I first got involved with Outdoor Alliance, I was the Advocacy Manager at Winter Wildlands Alliance (WWA). I quickly became the Advocacy Director and went from part-time to full-time, because I realized there was a ton of work to do. Part of that was jumping into the Joint Policy Shop, which was super motivational as well as being a good learning curve for me. It was a bunch of smart minds getting together once a week talking about outdoor recreation policy and conservation pretty efficiently. I was impressed with the brains in the group, and now having just done a ten year fly-in together, it’s pretty cool to see the things we’ve talked about over the years rolling off the tongues of people in high up positions in the Forest Service and in Washington D.C., and to know it is a result of our work together in the Joint Policy Shop.

I have a number of different perspectives being involved with the Outdoor Alliance, and one of them includes the more localized work we have done getting Outdoor Alliance California, one of two regional networks, up and running. But overall, making productive relationships with Forest Service leadership at the local and regional level, as well as in D.C., has been impactful. Those relationships have stood the test of time, and they have ended up being key in implementing policy.

You were in Washington D.C. when the Great American Outdoors Act passed, one of our most significant victories together. Can you tell us what that was like and how it has established us as a powerful voice and presence with lawmakers?

It was amazing. We didn’t think we had it, and then suddenly, it made it through after years and years of educating the outdoor recreation community about it and rallying thousands of letters in support of it. This is also what recently happened with passing the EXPLORE Act.

The Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA) was a huge success for Outdoor Alliance and its member groups. It secured guaranteed funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LCWF), addressed the maintenance backlog across parks and public lands, and now five years later, we’re working to reauthorize it. It’s been inspiring to once again help get a number of priorities passed during a lame duck session, with the EXPLORE Act, and recognizing that our past work on GAOA has positioned us to have influence in nearly every congressional office on both sides of the aisle, and we definitely have the attention of land management agencies, as well as the administration. In ten years, to have built an organization that has that kind of street credit in D.C. is super impressive.

Photo by Torch Pictures

What people don’t see is how hard we work on the language of these bills, the wrangling that has to be done to get them in a package, and how important each clause is, and how that goes back to us working on the committee level over the past five years. We’re doing this work on behalf of the outdoor recreation community, and the public, who generally has no idea how long it takes to pull together legislation. And then the thousands of letters from our members and supporters that help elevate the issues to the point they actually get a vote. Having Outdoor Alliance on the ground in D.C. makes a huge difference in achieving these successes especially for an organization like Winter Wildlands.

Engaging in forest planning has been a cornerstone of Outdoor Alliance and Winter Wildlands work together. A forest plan creates a blueprint for how each National Forest is managed, including where certain activities including outdoor recreation can happen. How has working in coalition advanced some of these plans?

One of the biggest successes we’ve had was in the Inyo National Forest, the first of a series of “early adopter” forests under the latest forest service planning rule. There were a lot of entities involved, both local and national groups, a number of conservation and recreation orgs, as well as special interest groups. I think it came out to be a fair and good plan that maps out a generation’s worth of forest management, and it built a lot of trust between different user groups. We would still like to see it followed up by adequate funding and also full implementation by the Forest Service, but it laid some really good groundwork for wildfire management, sustainable recreation, and even winter travel management, which is something Winter Wildlands is very interested in.

The Travel Management Rule governs how motorized vehicles can use backcountry roads and trails on public lands. WWA has been instrumental in advocating for a winter travel planning process, one that takes steps to reduce use conflicts and ensure that high quality winter recreation opportunities exist for all users.

In 2015 the Forest Service issued what’s called the OSV Rule, requiring every unit of national forest that gets enough snow for winter recreation to go through a public process—essentially a zoning effort—to determine where motorized over-snow recreation (e.g. snowmobiling) should be allowed and where it shouldn’t. In so doing, they’re supposed to consider how best to minimize impacts to natural resources and wildlife, as well as conflict between motorized use and other uses (for example with nordic and backcountry skiing, or family snowplay). We’re talking about 83 national forests, everywhere you could plausibly ski or snowmobile on Forest Service land. Of these, fewer than 10 have gone through the process of producing a winter recreation map to guide the public.

Our role is to make sure that non-motorized winter recreationists—skiers, snowshoers, people who just want to play in the snow with their kids—have a voice in the process. Now that the EXPLORE Act has mandated that every forest have an accurate and legal winter recreation map within ten years, we should see a lot of opportunity in the near future for folks to have a say in how their favorite public lands are managed for winter recreation.

Winter Wildlands is actively engaged with its community through programs like SnowSchool and the Backcountry Film Festival. Can you talk a bit about these two things and how public engagement also helps to move the needle on policy?

Photo by Dawn Kish

Photo by Emily Sierra

SnowSchool is a program we’re super proud of. It got its start 25 years ago and has grown to about 70 places nationwide. Each year, it serves 30-40K kids and we just crossed a huge milestone—half a million kids who have participated in SnowSchool. We’ve seen some amazing success stories of kids who have done SnowSchool and now they’re working as guides in the mountains, or they’re in grad school working in snow science. The curriculum is STEM based, so it fits right in for K-12. Over half of all SnowSchool participants are kids from underserved communities, learning about watersheds, snow science, wintering wildlife, winter ecology, a whole range of things that kids wouldn’t otherwise learn about if they didn’t have access to the mountains in winter.

The Backcountry Film Festival is a great opportunity for us to interface with and inspire folks in our communities. As backcountry skiers, we spend a lot of time alone, we go out into the Wilderness and often don’t see very many people. It’s not just watching films together, there’s a lot of conversation about character driven stories, decision making and social issues, as well as a dose of adrenaline and skiing pow. This year we formed a selection committee to help us find the very best from over 400 submissions. Going through all of them is a lot of work, but it ends up being great work. Then we hit the road with it and show it to sold out audiences in over 100 locations across the country—and even in Antarctica.

Outdoor Alliance is closing out on celebrating its ten year anniversary. What do you see as we chart the path forward, and what are your predictions for achieving success and navigating challenges?

I think we’re on track, and we have built an effective machine for defending the places where we like to get outside, and for keeping public lands public. I think that’s going to be a big focal point again with this incoming administration, as it was back in 2016. I think the vision we ought to have now and for the next ten years, is rebuilding our public lands agencies to be effective at taking care of the places we care about. Congress especially has to step up with funding, and this to me is an issue that is bipartisan in nature. Our public lands are such an important piece of the American dream, and of how we work and play together in a democracy, and we should be stewarding them together.

Learn more, take action, and become a Winter Wildlands Alliance member by visiting https://winterwildlands.org/action-center/.

Photo by Dally Hue

Winter Wildlands Alliance is a national nonprofit organization working to inspire and empower people to protect America’s wild snowscapes.

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Backcountry Film Festival 20th Annual Season Lineup

Emily Scott — Thu, 05 Dec 2024 17:24:49 +0000

Winter Wildlands Alliance Presents: The 20th Annual Backcountry Film Festival

The Backcountry Film Festival, presented by Winter Wildlands Alliance, celebrates the power and spirit of humans in winter.

Since its inception, the festival has toured across states, countries—even Antarctica—screening hundreds of inspiring films that celebrate adventure, conservation, and the magic of winter. Over the years, the festival has raised millions of dollars to support local projects that strengthen winter communities and protect our wild snowscapes.

The 2024-25 winter season, celebrates the 20th anniversary of the Backcountry Film Festival! This milestone year showcases a dynamic lineup of short documentaries and ski films that transport audiences straight to the heart of winter. Adventure, travel, ski culture, ice, pain, laughter, and DEEP POWDER—you’ll find it all as the festival brings these powerful stories to towns around the world.

Join us on tour and be part of a movement that combines art, outdoor culture, and grassroots action to celebrate and protect winter for generations to come. Let’s make the 20th season our BEST tour yet!

Tour Schedule

Host a Screening

Film Descriptions

SURVIVING OUR STORY

2024-25 Human Powered Film Grant Winner

24:33 minutes

By Connor Ryan and Isaiah Branch Boyle

For two skiers caught in back-to-back Colorado avalanches, surviving the accident is only the beginning of the journey to reclaim their lives and find their way back to the snow.

DRAWN IN

7:33 minutes

By Jessa Gilbert and Justin Taylor Smith

Artist Jessa Gilbert finds inspiration, lines in the snow, and a beginning at the bottom of the world.

A ROSE FOR ALL

6:00 minutes

By Chris Kitchen, KGB Productions

Half an hour from downtown Reno, Nevada, lies a public gateway to wild snow. But can we make room for everybody?

SVEN – A LIFE IN FRONT OF THE LENS

16:05 minutes

By Gabe Rovick, F4D Studio

Veteran cover boy Sven Brunso may just be the most photographed man in backcountry skiing. Will he ever give up?

THE GLIDE

Backcountry Film Festival Jury Award Winner (2024)

3:00 minutes

By Luc Mehl

After several close calls in avalanches, Winter Wildlands Alliance’s Alaska-based ambassador Luc Mehl wanted to explore some different terrain.

A LINE IN THE SNOW

14:02 minutes

By Ryan Rumpca, Manifested Moose Media

Professional arctic explorer Annie Aggens, her daughters and their four-legged friends go winter camping in the wilds of Minnesota’s Boundary Waters.

THE POWER OF FOUR

7:33 minutes

By Forest Barton

Spandex, skinny skis, struggle and redemption in the headwaters of the Roaring Fork.

NOVELTY LINES

4:42 minutes

By Anthony Cupaiuolo, First Tracks Productions

Splitboarder Claire Hewitt-Demeyer pushes the limits of human-powered type 2 fun for a surprising first descent.

ON THIN SNOW

9:22 minutes

By Jonah Rafael and Kalef Steinberg

Avalanche scientist Brian Lazar digs into the increasingly variable snowpack in Colorado to see what climate change means for backcountry skiing.

NISEI

7:36 minutes

By Iz La Motte, Sierra Schlag

In the tension between her Japanese and American heritage, pro-skier Sierra Schlag finds graceful lines through deep powder.

SONG OF ICE

2:26 minutes

By Arthus Kauffeisen

A lyrical dance through frozen mountain landscapes with very earnest voiceover.

Tour Schedule

Host a Screening

Winter Wildlands Alliance is a national nonprofit organization working to inspire and empower people to protect America’s wild snowscapes.

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SnowSchool Grows Up!

Emily Scott — Tue, 03 Dec 2024 20:17:02 +0000

SnowSchool Grows Up!

Program alumni share SnowSchool’s lasting influence on their lives and early careers

Ashley Phillips, SWEP Project Director works with SnowSchool students outside the Winter Discovery Center Yurt. Photo courtesy of SWEP

From Kerry McClay, National SnowSchool Director (12/6/24)

As Winter Wildlands Alliance’s National SnowSchool program celebrates its 25th season, we’re reflecting on the profound impact it’s had over the years. Since its inception, SnowSchool has reached over 500,000 students across dozens of communities, and many of those students are now spreading the impact far and wide.

With so many former students now grown— pursuing college, careers, and their own outdoor adventures—we’ve begun collecting stories about the accomplishments of our former SnowSchool kids. In this first installment of “SnowSchool Grows Up,” I caught up with two former students at our longtime SnowSchool site in Tahoe City, California, hosted by Sierra Watershed Education Partnerships (also known locally as the Winter Discovery Center Yurt). Meet Koson Verkler and Lily Murnane. They are both in their final years of college, have already amassed amazing accolades, and are both dreaming big!

Photo credit Koson Verkler

Koson Verkler

Koson Verkler is a senior at the University of Montana, majoring in Forestry with a minor in fire science and management. Growing up in North Lake Tahoe, Koson participated in SnowSchool programs at the Winter Discovery Center during his elementary and middle school years.

“I think of that as the start of my science career,” said Verkler. “It was my first immersion in science based education and I remember learning about hydrology and snow and how the experience coincided with the drought in Tahoe. We were learning about the environment, in the environment.”

Koson loves backpacking, Nordic skiing, backcountry skiing, mountain biking, road biking, hiking, camping and wanted to choose a career path that would always allow him to be outside. Koson credits his love for the outdoors with being immersed in nature at a young age by his parents and the adults in his life. He emphasized the importance of education programs like SnowSchool in remove barriers to outdoor exploration.

“On those days everyone became an outdoorsy person because they had everything we needed from gear to clothing”.

Koson found his way to The University of Montana and Forestry after traveling to campus and meeting with a family friend and science professor on campus.

For his summer job, Koson works with the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation as a lead member of the Helitack crew out of Missoula. Now in his 3rd season as a crew member, his team mostly focuses on quickly responding to new fires in Western Montana. He recently received an Incident Commander Type 5 certification and hopes this will open doors and continue to improve his skills and experience. Looking ahead, Koson plans to continue working in fire management, with an eye toward graduate school in ecology.

“I think I’ll be in fire for a few more years, but then I think it would be awesome to go back to graduate school, maybe in ecology.”

Koson has keen interest in pro active fire management and supporting and helping bring back Indigenous knowledge and burning techniques. He currently works on prescribed burning in collaboration with the Nature Conservancy in Western Montana.

Photo credit Lily Murnane

Lily Murnane

Lily Murnane is on the Division 1 Nordic Ski Team at Montana State University and is a senior majoring in Psychology with a minor in Coaching. Lily also competes for the Australian National Nordic Team where her mother was born.

Lily grew up in Tahoe City CA, and as an elementary and middle school student, she attended programs at the SnowSchool site at the Winter Discovery Center. Lily remembers her early SnowSchool days fondly.

“I remember them packing all of us in a bus, driving us to the yurt so we could explore topics around snow and natural sciences. We always talked about what we can do for the environment and we always had fun in nature. It was an amazing opportunity to get out of the classroom.”

For her love of winter and the outdoors, Lily credits the her access to nature and the example set by adults in her life.

“I grew up having access to trails and nature right out my back door. Being outside is the most fun … it certainly was growing up. The snow… Some people think there is a limit… but there really isn’t. It’s such a different experience in winter. I grew up with a community of people and my parents who loved and ran the Tahoe Cross Country Ski Area.”

Those early lessons in stewardship have stuck with her.

“If we don’t protect snowscapes and our climate it affects the entire sport. We really need to increase awareness and work to protect the places we ski.”

As Lily looks toward her final collegiate season, her goals are ambitious.

“It is my senior year and I am shooting for a Top 20 in my college racing circuit. I was introduced to the Australian racing scene through my mom, and I’ve been connected with and racing for the Australian National Team since. I want to keep that up and try to qualify for the World Cup. Also one of my goals is to compete in the World U23 Championships in Italy this year.”

After graduation, Lily plans to explore a career in coaching and possibly pursue graduate school.

Photo courtesy of SWEP

Winter Wildlands Alliance is a national nonprofit organization working to inspire and empower people to protect America’s wild snowscapes.

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