A stream runs through pristine forest near Lutsen, Minnesota, part of the wilderness landscape at the center of conservation efforts in the Boundary Waters region.
Image Credit: Matias North on Unsplash

For decades, a battle has been raging between corporations that want to mine the minerals lying underneath the more than 1.1 million acres of pristine wilderness known as Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA), and those who want to conserve them.

“There always seems to be some kind of challenge facing the Boundary Waters,” Pete Marshall, communications director at Friends of the Boundary Waters, a nonprofit on a mission to preserve the BWCA since 1976, told NPQ.

The federal government first issued leases for copper mining in the Superior National Forest surrounding the BWCA and its watershed in 1966. In 2012, when a Chilean mining company called Antofagasta (Twin Metals) bought old leases for sites just a handful of miles from the Boundary Waters, the fight really ignited.

Today, dozens of organizations, conservation groups, businesses, and citizens are working to protect both the BWCA itself as well as its watershed, intricately connected to the larger Superior National Forest. Many of the organizations involved are nonprofits, and they’re working together as Minnesota is still reeling from escalated immigration enforcement raids.

Organic Collaborations

“We are one of many clean water organizations in Minnesota, which makes sense because it’s the land of 10,000 lakes,” said Marshall. “Since we actively work to stop multiple mines in different watersheds, namely the proposed [Antofagasta] Twin Metals mine and the New Range Mine that was previously called Polymet … we’ve worked closely with [organizations like] WaterLegacy, the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, and other groups.”

While there are strong connections between Minnesota-based organizations to fight for the BWCA, the collaboration doesn’t stop there.

“The National Wilderness Coalition started up a couple of years ago, uniting folks around the country that are working on different wilderness issues,” Libby London, communications director of Save the Boundary Waters, another nonprofit working to protect the wilderness, explained in an interview with NPQ.

“It can be as simple as realizing, hey, our groups share a lot of the same concerns.”

London added that “we’ve got members that range from large organizations like the Sierra Club and the Center for Biological Diversity, based in D.C., all the way to a smaller organization called Standing Trees, for example, that’s based in Vermont.”

London said that sharing resources and lessons about what has (and hasn’t) worked to activate supporters are among the exchanges made between member organizations, and that a listserv keeps discussions going. “It’s a nice resource for nonprofits working towards wilderness [conservation that] we didn’t have four years ago.”

It’s this sort of largely organic collaboration that Katie McKalip, a communications consultant who works with another conservation nonprofit called Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters, said is key to making progress toward shared goals.

“There are more top-down and formal ways of building partnerships, but I’ve always been a big fan of seeking out shared common ground and being alert to opportunities to build organic partnerships,” McKalip told NPQ. “I don’t think it needs to come from a strategic plan and be decided by CEOs and boards of directors. It can be as simple as realizing, hey, our groups share a lot of the same concerns.”

It’s this awareness of overlap and the ability to see potential, rather than competition, that has driven collaborations between Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters, a group of hunters and anglers, and Save the Boundary Waters.

“There’s strategic value to having an entity like Sportsmen for the Boundary Waters that’s focused on connecting with and addressing the concerns of the hunting and angling community that are somewhat set apart from the broader, larger, more general concerns, interests, and values that are part of the Save the Boundary Waters community,” McKalip said.

Everything isn’t smooth sailing all the time, though. There are disagreements between organizations. People get disgruntled. But what tends to take center stage is the desire to preserve the BWCA—especially in light of a recently renewed threat in the form of H.J.Res. 140, a joint resolution that nullified a 20-year mining ban in the area and was signed into law on April 27.

The passage of the bill has injected new energy into collaborations among the nonprofits that work to protect the BWCA.

Caring Deeply About Multiple Issues

While any projects would still be subject to state-level reviews, Public Law119–85 means that BWCA is now available for mining on the federal level.

And while the reversal was a disappointing turn of events for conservationists and nature-lovers in Minnesota and beyond, the passage of the bill has injected new energy into collaborations among the nonprofits that work to protect the BWCA.

“Since the passage of H.J.R. 140, we had a big Earth Day rally. Save the Boundary Waters’ executive director Ingrid Lyons spoke. We also had representatives from Water Over Nickel, MN 350, the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy, Rise and Repair, and legislators as well,” Marshall said. “It was really heartening because there’s a massive swell of frustration and political will to do something now that Washington has removed these protections. All of these organizations are on board.”

Ultimately, the message from Minnesota…is that they’re not done fighting yet.

Looking to further leverage the Earth Day event that followed the bill’s passage, Save the Boundary Waters, Friends of the Boundary Waters, and 11 other organizations collaborated on an op-ed titled “On Earth Day 2026, Minnesota’s water is at risk,” published in MinnPost, a local publication.

“We had a bunch of different nonprofits come together to publish this piece around Earth Day and our shared responsibilities for caring for water,” London said.

London also noted that all of this environmental advocacy came on the heels of the devastating and deadly ICE raids in Minnesota, known as Operation Metro Surge.

“They’re different issues completely, obviously, but there was space and abundance for Minnesotans to care deeply about both issues,” she added.

Ultimately, the message from Minnesota—whether it’s regarding the ongoing immigration raids that are still taking place or the renewed threat to the BWCA—is that they’re not done fighting yet.

“We will fight and we will win. We’re going to save the Boundary Waters for sure. This is a massive bump in the road, but we have a strong strategy,” London said.