Andrea Zaccardi had just moved to Idaho Falls, a city of roughly 70,000 people not far from Yellowstone National Park, when she was startled by the shadowy creature that darted in front of her. This was roughly a decade ago and Zaccardi was up early in the morning to drive to her new job. Suddenly a "black figure" ran in front of her car, "so quick it was just a flash," she said. Zaccardi stopped the car, looked to her left and saw it: A large, majestic gray wolf, staring at her from the top of a nearby hill.
Today, Zaccardi is carnivore conservation legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit focused on protecting endangered species. So part of her job is to protect the Mountain West's population of wild wolves, like the one who caught her by surprise more than a decade ago. That task has become increasingly complicated: Earlier this month, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service denied a listing petition from a coalition of wildlife conservation groups (including the Center for Biological Diversity) that sought to expand the Endangered Species Act to protect northern Rocky Mountain gray wolves. According to a press statement by Kristine Akland, northern Rockies program director at the CBD, the decision amounted to "turning a blind eye to the cruel, aggressive wolf-killing laws in Montana and Idaho." Officials at the Fish & Wildlife Service, a federal agency under the Department of the Interior, declined to respond.
