探花精选 Spotlight: Desiree Loggins Is Building a Diverse Coalition by the Border
As a regional network manager working in the Southwest, Loggins unites communities to fight against a wall that would harm birds and people.
The lush Santa Ana Wildlife Refuge in Texas teems with a surprising diversity of birds, from White-faced Ibises and Bald Eagles to Burrowing Owls and Yellow-billed Cuckoos. So it鈥檚 no wonder that Desiree Loggins comes to the refuge as often as she can. But as much as she enjoys the birds, she鈥檚 even more interested in its people.
Santa Ana also boasts a diverse array of neighbors and visitors, including lifelong birders, people whose heritage is in migrant farm working, and DREAMers who were brought to the United States as children. They all see the refuge, which would be of President Trump鈥檚 proposed border wall, as special, says Loggins. As a regional network manager for 探花精选听in New Mexico and Texas, Loggins is now working on a campaign to stop the wall from slicing through this sensitive environmental sanctuary. 鈥淭he wall would be a symbol of divisiveness in a place that brings a lot of different people together,鈥 Loggins says.
To combat the wall, Loggins is building a coalition of people who live on the borderlands, involving environmental justice groups, indigenous groups, farm workers, and DREAMers at every step. 鈥淲e want to make sure they know that 探花精选 supports them in this fight, even if it鈥檚 not directly focused on birds,鈥 Loggins says. 鈥淢y goal is to recruit people one by one.鈥 Her projects in New Mexico take听a similar tack, working with farmers and ranchers to preserve tributaries on the Rio Grande.听
As a young black woman working in conservation, Loggins has always centered diversity in her work. 鈥淲hen I joined 探花精选 California, I felt immediately welcomed and supported, but also very aware of my blackness,鈥 Loggins says of her first 探花精选听job. 鈥淚 had no naivety about being the only one.鈥 At that office, she later won a grant to lead a series of workshops on equity and inclusion.听
She鈥檚 also starting these conversations with local 探花精选 chapters,听paving the way for more conservationists of color to do field work alongside volunteers who tend to be older white men. 鈥淲e鈥檙e trying to make these discussions go beyond 鈥楾his is what a microaggression is鈥 and more of听鈥楾his is how to be human and work in a positive and empowering way across these differences without erasing these differences.鈥欌
For all that she does for them, Desiree Loggins wasn't always interested in听birds. She fell in love with native plants and grasses while going to school in Santa Cruz. Later, at听探花精选 California, she'd join her colleagues in听watching听Sandhill Cranes soar over wetlands in the Central Valley that they fought to preserve, under a purpling twilight sky. 鈥淵ou鈥檝e seen birds your whole life, but might not recognize how special they are until someone asks you to look at them,鈥 she says.
In turn, Loggins passed along her newfound appreciation of birds to others. Her mother never paid much attention to the birds in the backyard trees of their home in northwestern Sacramento. Then听Loggins pointed out a group of Cedar Waxwings in the branches one time. Now her mother watches for the birds and calls Loggins whenever she spies them.
Just as she asked her mother to recognize the beauty of a small brown bird with cherry-red wingtips, Loggins now asks the conservation movement, a historically homogenous group, to recognize the need for a diverse, inclusive organizing constituency. In her eyes, it starts with hiring people of color to meaningful roles and building relationships with local, marginalized communities. If her mother can fall in love with waxwings, Loggins is sure the conservation movement can fall in love with justice.
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