Pruzan’s Many Hats — River Champion, Business Owner, Conservation Advocate

From Planet Jackson Hole, 2017

Story: Jessica Flammang | Photo: Jessica Sell Chambers

Aaron Pruzan, a co-founder of the Snake River Fund, isn’t just an advocate for revamping the boat ramp eyesore. He’s spent the last 20 or so years living, eating, and breathing water sports as the owner of Rendezvous River Sports. He’s the founder of the Jackson Hole Kayak Club — the group championing for the river park — and is a river runner, a river enthusiast, and most importantly — a river champion.

In 1998, he co-founded the Snake River Fund, alongside Reynolds Pomeroy, Teton County planning commissioner and board of Jackson Hole Land Trust; Frank Ewing, owner of Barker-Ewing Whitewater and pioneer of Jackson’s whitewater rafting scene; Jan Langerman, of the Forest Service; and Linda Merigliano, current Wilderness and Recreation Program Manager for the Bridger-Teton National Forest.

For the past eight years, he has worked alongside the Board of American Whitewater, the main national organization for river stewardship. He currently sits on the board, working to restore stream flows to rivers that have been dammed and on dam removal projects. A member of C-FSH, the Campaign For the Snake Headwaters, Pruzan worked with the team from 2006 to 2009 to secure a federal Wild & Scenic designation for 414 miles of the Snake River headwaters.

Pruzan says whatever happens with the river park proposal, he is determined to preserve rivers for generations to come. When the Greater Yellowstone Coalition formed an action committee for the Wild and Scenic Campaign, Pruzan was on board. For two years, he and colleague Scott Bosse held after-hours meetings at Rendezvous. In 2005, after soliciting the original $100,000 donation, they had to convince outfitters, conservationists and Teton County of the importance of the designation.

“It was a federal process. It didn’t matter if you were a fisherman or a rafter — it brought a national spotlight onto what could have led the Hoback to a horrible fate,” Pruzan said. In order to be successful, the motion had to go through the US Congress. Pruzan pitched the plan to Senator Barrasso during his first month in office. Barrasso spearheaded the Snake River Headwaters Legacy Act under the umbrella of the Wyoming Range Legacy Act, which was signed into law in 2009.

Dedicated to River Stewardship

Pruzan hails from Mercer Island in Washington, where his parents bred him to be an activist. In 1990, Pruzan moved to Jackson Hole from Durango and began teaching kayaking in 1993. Two years later, he founded Rendezvous River Sports, a stronghold in the valley’s outdoor industry. In 1996, he started the Jackson Hole Kayak Club to provide an outlet for kids to get into kayaking.

Twenty years ago, the US Forest Service was at its wits end due to chronic underfunding for basic river safety and stewardship needs in the Snake River Canyon. Pruzan co-founded the Snake River Fund two decades ago with an anonymous donation of $50,000. He served as the original board chairman. The fund has allowed the Snake to remain one of the only user fee-free rivers in the West.

Pruzan and other river leaders were also at the forefront for the push behind SPET Proposition 8 in 2010, which generated $1 million toward river management, planning and capital improvements at Wilson and South Park. Pruzan has led the advocacy for regulated limits on commercial floating between Wilson and South Park under the Teton County Snake River Management Plan and has led the campaign to eliminate motorized use on the Snake River in Wyoming.

Pruzan is also a co-founder of the local SHIFT festival, a nationally recognized event for bringing together conservation and recreation, which seeks to improve civic understanding on outdoor recreational access and stewardship.

From Big Sky Journal, June 2018

Written by Kristen Pope

If you’re looking for Aaron Pruzan, there’s a good chance you’ll find him out on the water, at least from early spring through late fall. Rivers and the sports associated with them are deeply interwoven into every aspect of his life, whether he’s running raging Class V whitewater with some of the best paddlers in the world; plowing through the rapids on his hometown waters, the Snake River in Jackson, Wyoming, with his wife and kids; or helping others learn how to hold a paddle correctly through his paddle sports shop and kayaking school.

Pruzan first became acquainted with paddle sports while attending summer camp at age 8. After passing a “flip test,” he was free to check out a canoe and paddle his way around a lake all by himself. He was hooked.

In middle school, Pruzan gave kayaking a try, and by the time he went to Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado, he was fully immersed in the sport. His first long expedition involved 18 days on the big waters of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon.

In 1993, Pruzan began teaching kayaking in Jackson and guiding people on the Snake River. When he decided to delve further into the business side of kayaking, Pruzan joined his friend Greg Goodyear in founding Rendezvous River Sports in 1995. Pruzan later acquired Jackson Hole Kayak School, which Goodyear founded.

In 1996, he started the Jackson Hole Kayak Club to introduce kids to river sports. The club began with just five local kids, and now has more than 75 participants. Some alumni, including Jules Domine, have won prestigious kayaking awards, and alum Eric Parker is now a professional photographer who specializes in shooting whitewater images for big brands and publications.

Pruzan completed the “Triple Crown of North America,” which included stretches of the Susitna, Alsek, and Stikine rivers, as well as the “Triple Crown of South America,” which included sections of the Río Pascua, Río Baker, and Río Futaleufú. He’s paddled big water all over the world, and even heli-kayaked in New Zealand.

His biggest conservation accomplishment was winning Wild & Scenic River status for the Snake River headwaters. Pruzan and a coalition of conservationists began to pursue the designation, meeting in private homes and at Pruzan’s shop after hours to plan and coordinate their efforts. They held their first official meeting in 2003.

The group succeeded in their efforts in 2009, when the designation was approved. Pruzan is quick to say, however, that conservation is an ongoing effort. “The story’s not over,” he says.

American Rivers — 40 River Champions

Aaron Pruzan was named one of American Rivers’ 40 River Champions for its 40th Anniversary Year, alongside Thomas O’Keefe, Yvon Chouinard, Former Secretary of Interior Babbitt, Tom Skerrit, and many other notable leaders in the river conservation world.