Ernie Atencio is an applied cultural anthropologist, conservationist, and writer with deep Indo-Hispano roots in northern New Mexico. He recently retired as Southwest Regional Director for National Parks Conservation Association, where he managed staff and advocacy campaigns to protect parks and public lands throughout the four-corners states, supported Indigenous co-stewardship initiatives, and helped create a new national park site and a new national monument. Ernie previously spent many years as Executive Director of the Taos Land Trust, where he developed innovative community partnerships, permanently protected thousands of acres of land, and returned a sacred site to the legal ownership of the Taos Pueblo Tribe. He has also been executive director of a national association of cabin owners, coordinated the Valles Caldera Coalition, and worked with a number of other conservation organizations.
Growing up in inner-city Denver, Ernie discovered the larger world—and the land—through an Outward Bound “hoods-in-the-woods” program and, in addition to conservation activities, has worked throughout the West ever since as a wilderness instructor, national park ranger, environmental educator, and journalist.