Don Stuart
Don Stuart has worked in natural resources and the environment for over 40 years of which 20 included intensive legislative lobbying on farm, fisheries, and environmental policy. He served as Pacific Northwest Regional Director for American Farmland Trust (2000-2011), a national environmental organization that protects agricultural lands and supports their environmentally responsible management. He was Executive Director for the Washington Association of Conservation Districts, a professional association representing local governments that assist agricultural and other private landowners adopt sound conservation management on their lands (1997-2000). He was Executive Director for Salmon for Washington, a trade group representing commercial fishermen and fish processing firms (1990-96). Don was also the campaign manager and public spokesperson in the successful defense of a Washington statewide anti-commercial fishing ballot initiative (I-640) in 1995 and he ran for the U.S. Congress in Washington’s First District in 1996. Don is also a former Alaska commercial salmon troll fisherman (1962-65, 1980-89), a formerly practicing Seattle trial attorney (1972-79), and was a Lieutenant in the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps during the Viet Nam War (1968-72). His opinion column on fish politics appeared monthly in the Fishermen’s News from 1990-96. He is the author of several books, including Barnyards and Birkenstocks: Why Farmers and Environmentalists Need Each Other (2014).