ROCKY MOUNTAIN MEDIA GROK

Public Land Sell-Off Plans All But Dead

By Chris Lombardi, 6-30-06

A US Senate committee put the last nails in the coffins of two Bush administration plans to sell huge chunks of public lands. President Bush's 2007 budget called for large sales of U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management acreage to fund a rural schools and counties program and to help service the ballooning national debt. But the Senate committee penned legislation that left out the two provisions, following a similar move by the House, which all but seals the plans' fates.

Senator Max Baucus (D-MT), an opponent of the plan, and author of an alternative proposal to fun the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act without land sales, was quoted in Lee Newspapers as saying, "We can declare victory on the BLM land sale proposal. It's clear to me the administration realized that was a very bad idea and they've backed off. This is a major victory for public land access in Montana and across the West."

The game of nuclear hot potato continues in the West. The Senate Appropriations committee passed a provision yesterday that would allow the secretary of energy to create nuke waste dumps on federal lands in the West over the objections of local and state officials. Interestingly, the two states most often targeted will nuke waste proposals, Nevada and Utah, would be excluded from the provision. Both Sen. Max Baucus and Gov. Brian Schweitzer of Montana, perhaps nervous that their state, with its low population and 30 million acres of public land, would be near the top of a proposed dump list, spoke out against the measure.

Forget the rockets' red glare this 4th of July weekend. Extreme fire danger in much of the Rocky Mountain region has put the kibosh on fireworks sales. Colorado's Jefferson County upheld a ban on fireworks sales, against the objection of fireworks sales outfits, who said the ban would destroy their businesses. Colorado's governor announced a ban on fireworks on all state lands earlier in the month. Utah's state forester has banned all fireworks and other pyrotechnic devices on state lands until further notice, following suit on a federal lands ban. Check your local restrictions before you go popping off, and be careful out there!

July 1st will also see the institution of several smoking bans in the West. The city of Santa Fe, New Mexico will begin a no-smoking policy in bars and restaurants. And Colorado will enact its statewide ban on smoking in all public spaces with the exception of casinos, tobacco stores, and the smoking lounge at Denver International.

Long-distance hikers got some good news out of Washington today. Congress ponied up $1.2 million to complete the Continental Divine Trail, the 3,100-mile trail running through the Rockies from Glacier National Park to the New Mexican border with Mexico. The money, combined with volunteer labor and private contributions, will help build the last 30% of the trail.

The Rainbow Family gathering outside Steamboat Springs just gets uglier and nastier. Following confrontations between Rainbowers and U.S. Forest Service rangers earlier in the week, a lawsuit was filed on the Family's behalf contending that access to court proceedings involving its members was so restricted as to be in violation of the constitutional right to a public trail. An additional door has been opened and more chairs have been added to the makeshift courtroom to provide more public access to the proceedings.

And, finally, a heart-breaking little tale out of Las Vegas, New Mexico. The Free New Mexican is running a story on what its like to be the city utilities administrator for a town facing serious drought problems. Richard Trujillo, the man in charge of water for this small town, finds that he's avoiding being seen in public, as everyone always asks him when it will rain and what he's doing about the city's water crisis, as if he has some sort of special line to the rain gods. To avoid these questions, Trujillo says, "I stay home a lot, just looking at the Weather Channel."

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