The original MOU cooperators included the Arizona Game and Fish Department, Eastern Counties Organization, Graham County, Greenlee County, Navajo County, USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service/Wildlife Services, USDA Forest Service, USDA Fish and Wildlife Service, and White Mountain Apache Tribe.

The following paragraphs are background taken from the November 2012 Addendum that summarize the purpose, roles and responsibilities of a Cooperator to this MOU:

"A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for cooperative management of the Mexican Wolf Reintroduction Project was developed and signed in 2010 by cooperating Federal, State, County, and Tribal agencies (MOU Cooperators). The primary purpose of the MOU is to provide a framework for collaboration that is based in sound science and which enables the Signatories to develop a mutually-agreeable, long-term collaboration in reintroduction of Mexican wolves in Arizona and New Mexico within the Mexican Wolf Experimental Population Area (hereafter MWEPA) as defined in the 1996 Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Mexican Wolf within its Historic Range in the Southwestern United States (EIS) and the Final 10(j) Rule for the Establishment of a Nonessential Experimental Population of the Mexican Gray Wolf in Arizona and New Mexico (63 FR 1752; January 12, 1998) (10(j) Rule).

Objectives of the MOU, included:

• Committing to developing documents such as: (a) Signatory authorities, roles, and functions (i.e. responsibilities or duties) consistent with applicable statute, policy, or regulation; (b) other processes or procedures by which signatories will coordinate and manage the Project, including mechanisms, formats, and priorities for inter-agency work planning, budgeting, outreach, wolf management (including nuisance or depredation response, interdiction, and compensation), performance reporting, and evaluation; and (c) processes or procedures by which signatories will enable the public to participate in this project. 
• Ensuring that efforts toward Mexican wolf conservation are productively integrated with, and appropriately balanced by, programs that prevent, reduce or mitigate any negative impacts that Mexican wolf reintroduction might have on lawful multiple or other uses of public lands, private lands or participating Federal Indian Trust Lands. Toward that end, the signatories will strive to stabilize existing funding for such measures and to develop additional funding to implement a comprehensive voluntary interdiction program among livestock producers that are affected by Mexican wolf reintroduction. In addition to the Mexican Wolf Interdiction Fund, the signatories will apply any other program that can help reduce wolf/livestock conflicts or alleviate the impacts of livestock depredation by wolves, while enabling progress toward the project’s wolf population objective and reintroduction success.
• Fostering cooperation which improves the science-based foundation for project success by actions that include revision of the: (a) 1982 Mexican Wolf Recovery Plan; (b) 10(j) Rule; (c) USFWS 1998 Mexican Wolf Management Plan; and (d) annual and long-term population objectives for the reintroduction effort.

Framework:

1. The purpose of this document is to provide guidance to the Mexican Wolf MOU Cooperators regarding their roles and responsibilities in implementing the Mexican Wolf Reintroduction Project.  MOU Cooperator authorities, roles, and functions (i.e. responsibilities or duties) are consistent with applicable statute, policy, or regulation.  MOU Cooperators consist of those entities that are signatory to the 2010 MOU, inclusive of their designee to the Middle Management Team (MMT). 

1. Each signatory to the MOU, or their designee, will serve as an Executive Decision Maker.
2. Each signatory to the MOU will designate a representative(s) to the MMT.  The MMT will be routinely updated on Mexican Wolf recovery planning and Reintroduction Project activities.  The MMT will review or develop:
   1. Interagency work plans
   2. Budgets
   3. Standard Operating Procedures (SOP’s)
   4. Outreach materials and processes
   5. Annual reports
   6. Interagency Field Team(IFT) major  proposals (e.g., removals, releases, trans-locations, and major shifts in management paradigms)
3. IFT members will consist of MOU Cooperator employees, whose primary duties involve on-the-ground management."