U.S. Department of the InteriorDOI News Header
Office of the Secretary
FOR PLANNING PURPOSES
February 7, 2008
Contact: Chris Paolino
(202) 208-6416

MEDIA ADVISORY

Secretary Kempthorne, Governor Jindal to Make Key Announcement on the Status of the Brown Pelican

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne will join Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal on the steps of the Governor’s Mansion in Baton Rouge, La on Friday, February 8, to make a major announcement about the status of the Brown Pelican.

The brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis), the state bird of Louisiana, was listed as endangered throughout its U.S. range in 1970 because of sharp population declines. In 1985, brown pelicans along the Atlantic Coast states of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Alabama’s Gulf Shore had recovered to the point where they were removed from the Endangered Species List. Currently, the brown pelican is listed as endangered where it lives in the rest of the United States and in Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Mexico, Central and South America, and the West Indies.

Who: Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne
Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dale Hall
Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Secretary Robert Barham
What: Key announcement on the status of the brown pelican
When: Announcement and Press Conference
10:00 a.m. CST
Friday, February 8, 2008
Where: Governors Mansion - front steps
1001 Capitol Access Road
Baton Rouge, La 70802
Media:

All credentialed media are invited to attend and photograph the event. For more information please contact:

Chris Paolino, Press Secretary, U.S. Department of the Interior
202-208-6416
Melissa Sellers, Press Secretary, Office of the Governor
225-342-8006
Tom MacKenzie, Chief of Media Relations, U.S. FWS Southeast Region
678-296-6400 (cell); 404-679-7291 (office)
Bo Boehringer, Press Secretary, La. Department of Wildlife & Fisheries
225-765-5115

 
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