BISMARCK, N.D. (KFYR) – After several recent apartment fires in Bismarck-Mandan, a volunteer group is helping families rebuild.

North Dakota Lions Emergency Relief has been helping families affected by apartment fires in the Bismarck-Mandan area since 2019. The non-profit is still in need of volunteers and financial donations while it works to get fire victims closer to normal.

Coordinator Patty Barrette said the focus is on more than immediate needs.

“So our goal is not to just get them through today and tomorrow. Obviously that’s very, very important, but we want them to think long term. We want to try to help everyone get as close to normal as we can,” Barrette said.

The organization is positioned to help 150 people in the first 48 hours after a disaster with clothing, hygiene supplies, bedding and household basics.

Once families find a place to stay, volunteers help them prepare for the months ahead by providing winter clothing and other essentials they may not think about in the moment.

“We have people that can kind of have been through this before either personally or have been part of our organization. They can sit down and say, okay, you know, what size underwear do you need? What size socks do you need?” Barrette said.

Barrette said helping families through traumatic situations can also weigh heavily on volunteers.

“We get the residual trauma. And so I have to monitor the team, make sure that they’re doing okay too, because there’s a lot we’re dealing with. You get a lot of tears coming in,” Barrette said.

Clothing and household donations are temporarily paused because of the overwhelming community response.

The group said financial donations, gift cards and volunteers are still needed to support families. Donations are helping families impacted by the Alberta Heights and Kirkwood Park fires.

The volunteer-run group said the first week after a disaster often brings a strong response, but as time goes on, families are still rebuilding and the need for help continues.

The group is looking for drivers, sorters, intake takers and bilingual volunteers. One-shift commitments are welcome.

One hundred percent of donations go through the North Dakota Lions Emergency Relief fund. More information is available on the group’s Facebook page.

BISMARCK, ND (KXNET) — With the temperatures warming and the summer around the corner, emerald ash borers are picking up their activity.

Governor Kelly Armstrong proclaimed May 17-23 Emerald Ash Borer Awareness Week, and the North Dakota Department of Agriculture (NDDA) is giving North Dakotans advice on how to protect their trees.

Emerald ash borers (EABs) attack true ash trees. The larvae feed under the bark, which disrupts the movement of water and nutrients. This often leads to the death of the tree within several years.

According to the NDDA, EABs have killed hundreds of millions of ash trees in the United States over the past decade.

North Dakota is home to more than 90 million ash trees, which are found along streets, in city parks, rural plantings, forests, and along the edges of rivers and lakes. EABs have been found in LaMoure and Cass counties.

The NDDA says EABs can be moved in firewood, and people in North Dakota should do what they can to prevent the spread.

“EAB spreads slowly on its own, but it can be moved long distances in firewood and ash nursery stock,” State Forester Tom Claeys said. “Please buy your firewood from local sources, and if you are coming from out of the state, please don’t bring firewood with you.”

The NDDA and North Dakota Forest Service (NDFS) will be placing nearly 300 traps around the state this month to attract EABs. These are two-footlong, three-sided, and purple, and people are asked to leave them alone.

People can use a treatment to prevent EAB from establishing in an ash tree, but this is not recommended until EAB has been found within 15 miles of the tree. It is prohibited to move firewood or other things from an ash tree outside a regulated area, including LaMoure and Cass counties.

Does Poaching Really Matter?

District Game Warden Gavin Herbert

The reason I got into this profession was to protect the natural resources that we enjoy so much. It never crossed my mind as a game warden that I would have the opportunity to inspire others by writing directly to them. But there has never been a better time to inspire others and protect our way of life.

In a recent study published by the Boone and Crocket Club as part of their Poach and Pay program, it unveiled that only 3-5% of poachers get caught nationwide, meaning around 95% of poaching incidents go undetected. These poaching incidents that go unnoticed cost the American public billions of dollars that could be better spent on conservation.

Billion is not a small number and it is a huge loss to the public for the replacement cost of illegally taken wildlife. Not to mention that hunting is on a decline across the U.S., which is where much of the funding is generated for conservation.

This is a very thought-provoking dilemma for how the North American Model of Conservation is being undermined by those who discredit our system by poaching.

Never has it been clearer to me the harm that poachers cause. Hunting is often looked through a negative lens by portions of the public, and these negatives are often confirmed by examples of poaching. Now we all know hunters and poachers are not the same but how will someone that is not a part of our hunting community see it? In a world where support for hunting is declining, do we need poachers making our way of life look bad? How do we recruit people when their examples of hunting come from bad places or at least how do we gain support?

How poaching affects public perception, along with the impact it has on conservation, has never been clearer, so why do we as the public tolerate it?

This new information has brought more meaning to my career and the importance of what I do, but I believe that the changes will start with you. Wardens make many cases off of public reports. My best case ever came from a phone call. I could never have caught the man responsible without that call. We often cannot do it alone and it is important that you see why your role is so important.

It is easy to say that an individual warden is Behind the Badge, but what is truly Behind the Badge is a community of enthusiastic conservationists, hunters and anglers who support us. We cannot do it without you.