 |
Matthews to Head Recreational Fishing and Boating FoundationA new foundation that will administer a $36-million public outreach campaign to promote fishing and boating announced today that it has hired Bruce Matthews to serve as its president. Matthews, an Outdoor Writers Association of America board member and Chief of the Office of Information and Education for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, will begin in July as president of the Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation (RBFF). "Bruce's international reputation in aquatic education and outreach as well as his work to recruit non-traditional anglers made him the ideal candidate for this job," said Tom Bedell, president of Outdoor Technologies Group and chairman of RBFF. "Through his work in state government, Bruce has also formed close relationships with our state natural resource agency partners and that will be very helpful as we work with this critical stakeholder group to implement the outreach plans." As head of RBFF, Matthews will work during the next five years to implement a national outreach strategy that was developed during the last two years by the federally-chartered Sport Fishing and Boating Partnership Council, which held stakeholder meetings around the country. The plan that emerged from those meetings was approved by Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt earlier this spring. The outreach effort will be funded by a five-year, $36 million appropriation made by Congress when it reauthorized the Sport Fish Restoration Act (Wallop-Breaux) last year as part of the massive federal highway bill. RBFF will locate in the metropolitan Washington, DC, area, and Matthews is expected to conduct a national search for other key staff positions for the foundation, including a chief financial officer, a director of communications, and three other key positions. RBFF will be discussed during Monday's OWAA newspaper section meeting from 10:30 a.m. to 11:55 a.m. Matthews will participate in that session along with Mike Dombeck, chief of the U.S. Forest Service; Norville Prosser, vice president of the American Sportfishing Association; and Jim Range, a key Washington, DC, fisheries lobbyist. The text of the outreach plan approved by Babbitt to guide RBFF currently is available on the Internet at http://www.fws.gov/r9sfbpc. Copies of the plan are being reprinted and will be available upon request later this summer. 1033 N Fairfax St.,
Suite 200, Alexandria, VA 22314 |