Legacy mining in California has left an estimated 200,000 hazardous abandoned mine features throughout the state. These mines, if left unremediated, pose a hazard for humans and the environment but are nonetheless critical habitat for bats and other wildlife. Several California Species of Special Concern, especially Townsend’s big-eared bat and California leaf-nosed bat use mines for hibernation, maternity, and other life history stages. The California Department of Conservation’s Abandoned Mine Lands Unit (AMLU) partners with federal, state, and local agencies to protect the public by closing mine entrances. Although maintaining bat habitat has long been a prime consideration when planning remediations, AMLU has revised our approach to consider bat habitat protection throughout the project lifecycle. We now employ a more bat-focused approach from the onset by conducting underground surveys of mines as early as the initial inventory phase to identify bat habitat for future remediation projects. By using a combination of historical bat surveys and our ongoing surveys, we can provide partners with the best remediation option for each feature by considering mine related habitat at a regional and statewide scale. Importantly, we can also identify wildlife friendly remediations that would benefit from continuous monitoring. This critical step can track changing conditions, caused by events such as human vandalism, wildfires, and unstable geology.