Pac/West Communications

Pac/West Communications is a public relations firm with offices in Oregon, Washington D.C., Sacramento and Alaska.

Anti-Enviro Front Groups Grow on Trees

Paul D. Thacker reports on "one short-lived 'grassroots' organization" based in Oregon, whose leaders "played a key role in passing President Bush's Healthy Forests legislation and are now promoting changes" to the Endangered Species Act (ESA) that would reduce protections and require the government to compensate landowners if the law impedes them from developing their land. One key figure is Tim Wigley, the director of the PR firm Pac/West Communications. After working for a timber industry trade group and a forest-products company, Wigley led the group Project Protect, which supported the Healthy Forests bill and was run out of the offices of the American Forest Resource Council. Wigley is now the campaign director of the Save Our Species Alliance (SOSA), "which has become a prominent voice in convincing voters that change to ESA is needed." Other SOSA figures include Steve Quarles, a timber industry lobbyist; supporters include the Competitive Enterprise Institute and the National Center for Public Policy Research. [1]

Pushing For Drilling In the Artic Wildlife Refuge

In May 2006 PR Week reported that Pac/West Communications had won a $3 million contract with the state of Alaska to co-ordinate a campaign to gain access to Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) for oil exploration.

"At this point, it's research-based, [with] a number of phases," he said. "One, determining where the issue sits with the American people, with all the other discussion about energy floating around these days," Pac/West's president and CEO, Paul Phillips, told PR Week. [2]

Friends Formerly in High Places

In February 2007, Pac/West announced that former U.S. House Resources Committee Chairman Richard Pombo was joining the firm as a "senior partner." Previous Pac/West campaigns had backed Pombo's "attempts to rework the Endangered Species Act and open the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve to oil drilling." [3]

"What I will be doing is primarily working with grass-roots groups doing strategy and organizing, looking at a lot of the issues that I worked with in Congress -- resource issues, agriculture issues," Pombo told the Contra Costa Times. "What I'm doing really doesn't involve lobbying Congress." Pombo declined to say what Pac/West was paying him, but joked, "I'm doing OK." [4]

Personnel

• Paul Phillips, President/CEO
• Nancy Phillips, Owner/CFO
• Pam Wilson, Senior Vice President
• Tim Wigley, Executive Vice President
• Angela Dilkes, Vice President
• Richard Pombo, Senior Partner [5]
• Larry Harvey
• Liz Arnold
• Emily Hascall
• Jerod Broadfoot
• Ray Phelps
• Laura Probst
• Kent Burton
• Jeff Blanton
• Janis Ward
• Rashad Henry
• JoLonna Windsheimer
• Suzanne Foster
• Katie Handel
• Liz Good

Contact Details

Pac/West - Oregon
8600 SW Saint Helens Dr., Ste 100
Wilsonville, Oregon 97070
503-685-9400
Fax 503-685-9405
Web: http://www.pacwestcom.com/

Pac/West - Washington D.C.
2600 Virginia Avenue, Ste 505
Washington, D.C. 20036
703-360-2384
Fax: 202-333-0178

Pac/West - Alaska
3136 Pioneer Avenue
Juneau, Alaska 99801
907-586-1851
Cell: 907-957-1579

External links

• Paul D. Thacker, "Hidden ties: Big environmental changes backed by big industry. Lobbyists and industry officials who once pushed for the president’s Healthy Forests legislation now collaborate with Rep. [Richard] Pombo to alter the Endangered Species Act", Environmental Science & Technology, March 8, 2006.
• Hamilton Nolan, "Pac/West prepares oil exploration push for AK", PR Week (sub req'd), 11 May 2006.
• Josh Richman, "Pombo hired by firm that supported his bill," Contra Costa Times (California), February 21, 2007.