WEBVTT 00:00:01.129 --> 00:00:06.247 This is Paul Her of Arizona State University with Jen Sweeney, also of 00:00:06.280 --> 00:00:11.646 Arizona State University interviewing Lawrence David Garrett uh at his 00:00:11.679 --> 00:00:18.806 home in Olaf Colorado on August 9th, 2018, 00:00:18.839 --> 00:00:23.896 Dave. Why don't you start by telling us uh a little bit about your career 00:00:23.929 --> 00:00:27.556 in natural resources management and how it eventually led you to 00:00:27.589 --> 00:00:32.856 involvement in the Glen Canyon Dam Adaptive Management Program and the 00:00:32.889 --> 00:00:40.195 Grand Canyon Research and Monitoring Center. OK. So I'll try to show the 00:00:40.228 --> 00:00:47.926 connectivity between the activities that uh we put together directed and 00:00:47.959 --> 00:00:54.436 my past, which was so it's a long chronicle, but I'll make it sure. So my 00:00:54.469 --> 00:00:59.957 interest in resource management goes to my junior year in high school 00:00:59.990 --> 00:01:03.995 where my brother and I took a course in wildlife management out of outdoor 00:01:04.028 --> 00:01:08.977 life, which proved to be, of course futile. It had not added nothing to 00:01:09.010 --> 00:01:15.766 nothing but it did sparked my interest in resource management. So I went 00:01:15.799 --> 00:01:23.799 on to do uh uh fisheries and forestry bachelors and then a management um 00:01:24.668 --> 00:01:31.876 uh uh street management masters, but with natural resources as a minor, 00:01:31.909 --> 00:01:35.876 where was that? And that was at Southern Illinois University. For the 00:01:35.909 --> 00:01:39.995 Bachelor's and Michigan State for the master. 00:01:40.028 --> 00:01:46.426 And then uh uh worked for the Forest Service a while and then thought I 00:01:46.459 --> 00:01:52.555 needed a doctor because I questioned a lot of management strategies. And 00:01:52.588 --> 00:01:58.995 so it caused me to go back and take a, a doctorate action in a different 00:01:59.028 --> 00:02:03.525 direction. So it was operations research which now is referred to as 00:02:03.558 --> 00:02:10.346 systems analysis and um and economics. I took a major in economics and a 00:02:10.379 --> 00:02:18.379 minor in operations research. And then uh spent uh it 12 different loca 11 00:02:20.419 --> 00:02:27.196 different locations across this country. East west south in north um time 00:02:27.229 --> 00:02:31.975 with the US forces first with private industry, actually uh with a couple 00:02:32.008 --> 00:02:35.775 of private industry companies and then with the forest service because I, 00:02:35.808 --> 00:02:43.808 I like the forest service past image in conservation man practices. So uh 00:02:45.250 --> 00:02:53.250 I, I did that for 20 some odd years and then decided that I needed uh a 00:02:55.000 --> 00:03:01.566 change and I went into consulting for a while. Um but didn't like that 00:03:01.599 --> 00:03:08.656 aspect of it at that time during that era. So then I decided to go um into 00:03:08.689 --> 00:03:15.126 the academic side of programming. When was that 20 year period that you 00:03:15.159 --> 00:03:21.077 were working? That would have been, that would have been from uh around 65 00:03:21.110 --> 00:03:23.755 to 84 00:03:23.788 --> 00:03:28.866 time of significant change. Time of significant change, I became to 00:03:28.899 --> 00:03:34.096 question everything and, and I directed research facilities all over the 00:03:34.129 --> 00:03:41.717 country and uh and I didn't like where, where I did not like where we were 00:03:41.750 --> 00:03:45.816 not going with forest service research in the West. I guess that's the 00:03:45.849 --> 00:03:52.275 best way. So I looked around at universities, I looked first at Colorado 00:03:52.308 --> 00:03:56.906 State and they have a good program up there in uh in forestry and natural 00:03:56.939 --> 00:04:04.939 resource management. And uh I, I got, I made it on the first draw and they 00:04:06.288 --> 00:04:11.856 changed provost while, while the faculty was considered bringing me in, I 00:04:11.889 --> 00:04:16.627 won the, won the pole in other words, and then lost it. And uh because 00:04:16.660 --> 00:04:22.276 that new Provost wanted to run it back out, I encouraged the existing, the 00:04:22.309 --> 00:04:26.726 uh director of Natural Resources program, throw his hat and ring and he 00:04:26.759 --> 00:04:30.426 got it and I came in second on the second one. So it's interesting 00:04:30.459 --> 00:04:34.697 lifestyle. So, but then uh Northern Arizona University wanted me because 00:04:34.730 --> 00:04:38.575 the president wanted to change there. And I, and he agreed to what I 00:04:38.608 --> 00:04:43.387 wanted to do and what I wanted to do was to take a program that was a 00:04:43.420 --> 00:04:49.555 traditional forestry program and turn it into an ecologically based um 00:04:49.588 --> 00:04:55.226 program that looked at both biophysical and socio-economic issues related 00:04:55.259 --> 00:04:58.825 to natural resource management. 00:04:58.858 --> 00:05:04.606 He agreed gave me free reign. And so I spent 11 years there building and 00:05:04.639 --> 00:05:08.555 doing that program and you might know Covington, Wally, Wally, Covington, 00:05:08.588 --> 00:05:15.555 Covington, I brought in uh a diverse uh set of faculty, female and male 00:05:15.588 --> 00:05:20.495 and a Native American start Native American for forestry. Program. But all 00:05:20.528 --> 00:05:25.697 of those programs had to have a basic twist to it. Everything in forestry 00:05:25.730 --> 00:05:33.730 , resource management, natural resources, fish Walla had to be um adaptive 00:05:34.160 --> 00:05:37.055 management base. 00:05:37.088 --> 00:05:44.637 All not theoretical, not all, all of the courses had to be team talk. No 00:05:44.670 --> 00:05:49.526 courses could be not, could be single disc one taught. All had to have 00:05:49.559 --> 00:05:55.765 both economics, social issues, biological issues, physical issues in the, 00:05:55.798 --> 00:06:01.096 in the classroom at one time. So we used teams of three. So the entire 00:06:01.129 --> 00:06:06.236 program and so that was the 19 eighties. That was, that went all the way, 00:06:06.269 --> 00:06:10.325 I think uh to 9495. 00:06:10.358 --> 00:06:17.825 So I went from about 84 to 95. And I uh I, the president allowing me free 00:06:17.858 --> 00:06:24.877 range, like I said, I had a lot of, I mean, I was strongly connected to, 00:06:24.910 --> 00:06:29.955 to many political leaders in the southwest and uh from the county 00:06:29.988 --> 00:06:37.286 government side and uh who had many diverse ecological uh economic social 00:06:37.319 --> 00:06:43.486 issues. So I was, I also was connected to both the environmental community 00:06:43.519 --> 00:06:50.387 and the industrial community and the Graziers, timber producers, um river 00:06:50.420 --> 00:06:56.887 rafters, Sierra Club, well, society and work with everybody. So um they 00:06:56.920 --> 00:07:04.920 love my program and we had a good program and uh I, I left there, I was 00:07:05.399 --> 00:07:13.236 gonna retire and uh OK, I decided I, I lasted six months now, I decided I 00:07:13.269 --> 00:07:16.627 was gonna open a consulting firm that consulting firm was 00:07:16.660 --> 00:07:21.976 interdisciplinary science and management. And So, uh it's called M Three 00:07:22.009 --> 00:07:28.745 Research. It was originally multi resource management uh research. Uh but 00:07:28.778 --> 00:07:36.778 then I just call it M three. And so, um that's when I connected with uh 00:07:37.178 --> 00:07:41.986 the secretary. I've been very good friends with him when I was a dean 00:07:42.019 --> 00:07:49.296 because he wanted uh some, he wanted to look at these diverse social, 00:07:49.329 --> 00:07:56.895 economic and biophysical um dysfunctional program and he thought there was 00:07:56.928 --> 00:08:01.757 a lot of problems And as you know, he ran for president uh when he was 00:08:01.790 --> 00:08:07.036 governor there. And uh so then uh when there was administration change and 00:08:07.069 --> 00:08:11.075 he went to Washington, he called me up and wanted me to come and interview 00:08:11.108 --> 00:08:17.705 for a position with him. Uh and, and he stabbed in his direct staff at the 00:08:17.738 --> 00:08:21.916 time, I didn't really, I knew he wanted to try to do something with a 00:08:21.949 --> 00:08:27.736 biological survey with uh science and interior. He wanted to change the 00:08:27.769 --> 00:08:34.784 direction of science and interior. I don't know at that time, uh science 00:08:34.817 --> 00:08:40.225 and interior was vested into individual management groups, but it was 00:08:40.258 --> 00:08:46.615 directed all by management officials rather than science directors. So uh 00:08:46.648 --> 00:08:52.596 they were, they were moving that direction. He wanted an entirely new 00:08:52.629 --> 00:09:00.629 concept. He wanted to take all the science out of every area of Management 00:09:00.869 --> 00:09:08.525 Bureau of Reclamation, National Park Service BLM and put it under one 00:09:08.558 --> 00:09:14.005 science entity called the National Biological Survey. Now, if you recall 00:09:14.038 --> 00:09:19.836 through history, there was a National Biological Survey way back when, but 00:09:19.869 --> 00:09:23.515 it didn't have the context that he wanted to entirely new. He wanted a 00:09:23.548 --> 00:09:28.866 science program that really was driven out of adapting management concepts. 00:09:28.899 --> 00:09:36.899 And uh so when I was with the Forest Service, I uh CS Holly and I became 00:09:37.619 --> 00:09:45.359 good friends and uh and that work that.