With 167 years of experience between them and 57 years of marriage, Jill and Basil Seaton are no strangers to the Jasper landscape - especially if it involves upholding the mandate of the Park they’ve come to call home over the last 17 years. 

“If we’re going to live here, we’re going to fight for it,” said Jill. 

The environmentally conscious duo, leaders of the Jasper Environmental Association (JEA), were recently awarded the 2009 Emerald Award for a lifetime of environmental commitment and advocacy. 

“It’s encouraged us to keep going. I don’t know if it’s good for our health but still, we’ll go on doing it,” she added. 

Despite their long love affair with the natural environment and devotion to environmental issues, they were “absolutely astonished” to win the award.

“We knew nothing about this at all,” said Jill. “It came as a complete shock.”

The couple were nominated by Jasperite Marriane Garrah, who with the help of the Seatons’ daughter, organized an array of letters to be sent from organizations they’ve dealt with over the years in support of their efforts. 

“We were just overwhelmed by the letters that support us,” Basil added, “they were really touching.”

“That was the most gratifying part, we had absolutely no idea whatsoever that people felt so strongly about this and I think that was the most rewarding thing - that people had actually noticed that we were trying to do things.”

For the couple, their main aim - as members of the JEA - is to help Parks Canada fulfill its mandate, “which is to put ecological integrity first - protection of wildlife and wilderness first,” said Jill noting that a continued lack of funding to the Parks from the federal government has resulted in a shift in priorities for the organization. For her and Basil, Parks focus is no longer on wildlife and natural integrity but instead ensuring a memorable visitor experience which comes, often at the expense of the natural environment. 

Jill explained, “instead of ecological integrity being the first thing, it’s becoming visitor experience, which is fine, but just remember your first mandate.”

Obviously passionate about the natural residents of the park, Jill cites that 83 per cent of visitors to national parks come to see the wildlife which is constantly disappearing. “If you’re going to affect the wildlife, people aren’t going to see them,” said Jill.

Currently, the pair’s main priorities are ensuring that the numbers of species at risk, such as the caribou and the grizzly bears, are not damaged by the expansion of Marmot Basin, trail networks or any other development in the park, as well as ensuring mountain bikers are contained to ensure safe experiences for all users. 

Mentally and physically active at the ripe ages of 90 for Basil, and 77 for Jill, the pair said they’re just standing up for what they believe in, but enjoy the challenge of using their wits and mental talents to tackle these issues.

“When you see an injustice, you want to do something about it,” said Jill, adding that if Parks aren’t “we’re going to question them... we have a lot of fun doing this, it’s sort of a question of using your wits,” said Jill. “It’s a terrific exercise for one’s brain.” 

But, the pair don’t just question them, they enlist a variety of organizations - with similar environmentally conscious mandates - to help persuade Parks on particular issues. Networking and communication are key factors in all their pursuits, according to Basil who said Jill had worked tirelessly to communicate with an array of audiences.

Their research, which often involves Access to Information requests, engulfs their lives, with the pair spending hours on end researching on the internet and reading through official government documents - a skill which Basil owes to working in three different armies in his lifetime. 

Admittedly though, there are some draw backs to researching, writing letters and communicating with an array of non-government organizations at their age.

“The drawback is that we’re both hard of hearing,” said Jill, noting that the pair no longer attend public meetings due to difficultly hearing. 

Clearly environmentalists at heart, the pair originally hail from Europe - Basil from Scotland and Jill from England, but said they’ve always been active in the outdoors and love wildlife.

“We’ve always been outdoor people. We ski, we kayak, we sail and so on,” said Basil.

Given these sentiments, it’s no surprise that back in the 1970s when Jill came across two skinned coyotes while living south of Calgary she began her first mission (of many) in environmental activism. Organizing a group called Coyote Concern, she fought to have coyote hunting laws changed.

Thanks to her organization, “you can only kill coyotes between October and February on public lands and private lands if you’ve got access to it you’re allowed to shoot them anytime, but it at least got them some kind of a status,” she said.

But that was just the beginning. After leaving Alberta, the happily married couple headed west to British Columbia where they continued to be vocal in the environmental realm, fighting for the protection of wolves.

“Basil then got very involved with climate change issues in the seventies so we seem to have been involved ever since, non stop,” Jill explained. 

It was during their time in Cortes Island when they came to Jasper together (though Basil had visited before). Basil recollects sitting out by Maligne Lake, the temperature over 100 degrees and that was it - they were moving to Jasper and away from the rain. 

“We came out for three successive winters... and we stayed in the Bonhomme Bungalows and it was just marvelous. And finally we came and said, ‘lets go’,” explained Basil.

That was 1992 and they’ve been here ever since, deciding that if they were to live in the Park they would have to uphold the mandate it seeks to fulfill, said Jill adding that “then you move to the national parks - and you’ve got major problems here too, particularly as parks are so chronically under funded.”

While the pair front the JEA, they are supported by about 15 members, five of which are “active” members - helping out with writing letters, giving suggestions and feedback to the couple. 

“That’s the kind of thing we want,” Jill said. “We don’t expect them to (put in a lot of time). These are people that are trying to earn a living in a very expensive place, and you can’t blame them at all.”

For Basil, one particular occurrence is that while the organization used to have Parks Canada employees on board any Parks employees who used to be involved have slowly dissipated from the organization.