We’re thrilled to announce that Bella Eldridge has joined our team as a full-time Staff Attorney!
Bella brings a unique blend of passion for outdoor recreation and legal expertise to our mission of protecting public lands for recreational access. Growing up in central Oklahoma, she developed a love for the outdoors early on and later fell head-over-heels for dirt biking and mountain biking while exploring iconic trails across Utah and Colorado.
After graduating law school in 2022 and passing the Utah Bar, Bella was eager to combine her legal career with her love for outdoor recreation. With experience in litigation and a passion for striking a balance between responsible use and recreational access, she’s the perfect fit for our team.
We are preparing our end-of-year report, which we will share with all of you in the coming weeks. This report will show that we have engaged on hundreds of federal actions that will affect how over 100 million acres of public land will be managed. Of these hundreds of actions, we have dozens that are ready for some form of legal response. With the reversal of the Chevron Deference and other tectonic shifts in the courts, we have a generational opportunity to make a massive course correction in how our lands are managed.
Throughout this year we have been laying the groundwork to launch an internal legal center that is dedicated to taking advantage of this important moment of opportunity. Hiring Bella is one of the first steps for completing our vision. The next steps include hiring an additional staff attorney to balance the heavy workload, developing an attorney volunteer network that wants to support our fights, and strengthening our relationships with our existing legal partners. None of this would be possible without the support we’ve enjoyed from you.
Bella has already been hard at work this week drafting a response to an administrative appeal we have filed to challenge trail closures in Eastern Idaho. She’s enthusiastically diving in, and we’re aggressively driving forward.
We are grateful that Bella’s path has crossed with ours, and we’re excited to have her on board as we continue to advocate for access to the great outdoors.
We hope you will join us in giving a warm welcome to Bella as she joins us in our fight to Defend Your Ground!
