Wilderness Deflected
NREPA: New York Times Praises Wilderness Act, Unfortunately?
A Times editorial urges passage of the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act and calls it a noble idea. Oy.
By Amy Linn, 7-07-09
A New York Times editorial today calls for the passage of the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act, saying it’s a “truly enlightened environmental policy” that would balance “the needs of both nature and local economies.” So what’s the problem?
Foes already complain the bill is an elite Easterner’s idea being foisted on the West. And no matter how misguided it might be, the “you ain’t from aroun’ here, are ya?” backlash can be fierce.
An anti-NREPA Facebook group by today’s count has 3,090 members. (Not pulling any punches, it’s called Don’t Mess With the West: Oppose Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act.)
In a similar vein, Rep. Denny Rehberg, R-Montana, a staunch NREPA foe, wrote in a recent NewWest.net guest column that one of the problems with NREPA is that it’s being peddled by “sophisticated New Yorkers” who perhaps think folks in the Northern Rockies are “ignorant rednecks.”
In short, New Yorkers campaigning for NREPA have about as much chance of winning local converts as vegans at a cattle ranch. This isn’t just a wilderness issue—it’s become a class issue, a spin issue, a them-versus-us issue. It’s “rednecks” versus “Washington, D.C. bureaucrats”; it’s “top-down” (as foes describe it) versus “bottom-up” (the lingo used by fans). It’s preserving wilderness and boosting local economies versus logging and drilling the land. (Bill Schneider’s It’s the Wilderness, Stupid gives a fine overview of the controversy; Outside magazine also hits the mark in As A Matter of Fact, Money Does Grow on Trees by Bruce Barcott.)
This is not to say that the Times shouldn’t post an editorial supporting a worthy wilderness bill. It’s just to say that NREPA opponents will likely see the article as yet one more piece of evidence that know-nothing big-city types are trying to strip Westerners of our rights to moto-recreation, guns, private property and so on. The bureaucrats from thousands of miles away are trying to “tell us how to manage public lands,” as Rehberg puts it.
And so the NREPA battle is bogged down, as always. If only there weren’t so many words getting in the way.
Here are a few paragraphs from the Times:
“One of the most ambitious environmental bills in years, the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act, is awaiting action in Congress. It could be waiting a while. A version was first introduced in 1991, and while the bill has become a perennial focus of great hopes and fierce objections, it has never come up for a vote.
The bill, sponsored in the House by Representatives Carolyn Maloney of New York and Raúl Grijalva of Arizona, would designate more than 20 million acres of federal public land — mostly in Idaho and Montana, with parts of eastern Washington, eastern Oregon and western Wyoming — as wilderness, the law’s highest protection.
The great strength of the bill lies in the breadth of its vision. Recognizing that animals and plants thrive best within intact ecosystems, not governmental borders, it would reach across state lines to secure biological corridors where animals can roam freely. Yet while the bill has more than 90 co-sponsors, none are from the districts affected ... The bill’s conspicuous lack of local lawmakers’ support — and in many cases resistance — is evidence of the passions it arouses from hunters, fishermen, skiers, snowmobilers. ... But that is no reason for Ms. Maloney or Mr. Grijalva or the bill’s co-sponsors to give up on this bill or on the noble idea of preserving large, connected, intact ecosystems.”
Click here to read the entire bill.
For more articles on the wilderness debate, click here.
[End of article]Amy, Thanks for the article and for keeping NREPA on the pages here at NewWest.net. However, I have to say I was disappointed that you appear to give so much credence to the false notion that NREPA is an "Easterner's" or "New Yorkers" bill, without providing balance contained in the truth about the formation and development of NREPA.
Ironically, much of that truth about NREPA's origins can be found at previous posts here at NewWest.
For example, this recent NewWest.net post is from Paul Richards, a Boulder, Montana, area businessman and a former member of the Montana House of Representatives and a former newsman with The Associated Press. http://www.newwest.net/topic/article/northern_rockies_protection_act_preserves_land_saves_money_creates_jobs/C37/L37/
SNIP:
"After consulting with numerous Montana conservation organizations and wildlife biologists, I wrote the first draft of what-was-to-become the Northern Rockies Ecosystem Protection Act in 1986. After involving about a dozen more regional conservation groups, I wrote the text of the second draft of what-was-to-become NREPA in 1987.
I am hardly a fire-breathing radical. I am a former member (voluntarily retired) of the Montana House of Representatives. I have served as a member of the Montana Advisory Council on Children and Youth; the Montana Youth Justice Advisory Council; the Montana Drug Education Consortium; the Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday Celebration Committee; and the Technical Advisory Committee of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forests.
For over 40 years now, I have served with distinction on the boards of directors of numerous community and statewide organizations. I am proud of my record of public service and I will not let a land developer and spokesman for big oil like Rehberg impugn that record, simply because I believe in leaving future generations a public lands legacy."
I have to second the above. Further, it's sloppy journalism to simply take it at face value that the only people who support NREPA are ignorant city-bred, city-bound easterners. I can point to several people just here in little Dubois, Wyoming who are supporters.
Is it simply that you reporters are too damn lazy to go and ask real people about it?
RH
Right on the money, Matthew and Robert, and apologies. I never intended to imply that NREPA is an Easterner's or a New Yorker's bill -- NewWest has reported well and often that the bill was crafted by people in the West and enjoys broad support among all sorts of people in Montana and beyond. I was assuming (as I shouldn't have) that readers would know from my tone that I absolutely don't believe NREPA fans are ignorant city-bred types. I obviously didn't spell that out clearly enough en route to my other goal: bemoaning the fact that the NYT editorial might be used as ammo by NREPA foes.
Comment By Michael Pearlman, 7-07-09I have to agree with Amy's central point, which is that the debate about the legislation has been oversimplified to a "them vs. us" issue. Wyoming and Montana residents have a deep opposition to DC bureaucrats who, in their view, are trying to limit access to public land in the West.
While there's no doubt many Westerners who support NREPA and can see the benefits, their voices haven't been loud enough to overcome extremely vocal opposition. It would be nice to see a member of Congress from an affected district be courageous enough to support this bill. Right now, it's probably viewed by all of them as political suicide.
Sorry, Matt, but a snip from your pal Paul Richards doesn't cut it. And he can't deny himself no matter how much he protests.
And nobody can deny that NREPA is nuts.
Nor can anyone deny that the New York Times editorial board exemplifies flyover elitism at its worst. How about Bob Semple winning a Pulitzer for his ranting about Crown Butte, and only post-Prize being FLOWN over the park and site for the first time by Lighthawk after being feted by GYC?
Just goes to show the tawdry state of our press "elite"....
NREPA is a bent bill, kind of like anti-gun legislation written by people so screwed up they don't even realize how far gone they are.
The Wilderness Act was never intended to lead to an endless process. It was supposed to establish, fairly, this and no more lines of demarcation for wilderness and multiple use land. I wonder what Aldo Leopold and Bob Marshall would say today.
I suspect all of those Dubois folks in favor of NREPA are not natives, but more of the elitists that have decided folks in these states are not capable of managing our own lands and our own lives. On top of that how many of them live in homes of less than 1000 sf???? Less than 2000, less than 3000? In fact how many of you folks actually live what you preach for everyone else?
Comment By Mike, 7-07-09Dave Skinner, why do you want to end the Wilderness Act?
Comment By Matthew Koehler, 7-07-09Dave, Are you saying that what Paul Richards wrote concerning the origins of NREPA is false? If so, please let us know what the real origins of NREPA are. Otherwise, your first couple of sentences make no sense.
Also, I'm pretty sure that if Aldo Leopold and Bob Marshall were alive today and took a good, hard look at public lands management, they would wholeheartedly support protecting the remaining roadless wildlands in the northern Rockies as Wilderness. Do you honestly think that given the environmental and economic realities of 2009 that these Wilderness heros would actually support opening up these wildlands to roads, logging equipment and oil and gas wells? I mean, get serious dude.
"...NewWest has reported well and often that the bill was crafted by people in the West and enjoys broad support among all sorts of people in Montana and beyond."
Amy, could you point me to some of this reporting?
NREPA is the right bill at the right time. Why, it's such a good idea that even easterners have the good sense to support it!
Comment By Bill Croke, 7-07-09I read the whole editorial today. And I want to thank the New York "Times" for going the extra mile to help kill an extremely bad bill. With friends like the "Times"-- NREPA, Carolyn Maloney, Carole King, will have an even harder time of it. Unfortunately, the "Times" won't be around much longer to support the multi-use folks in the West. They're having a yard sale this weekend. They're trying to unload the usual stuff: office furniture, autographed pictures of Maureen Dowd when she was a bit younger, the Boston "Globe", etc. NREPA and the "Times" are dead. So, long live, etc, etc.
Comment By TreeHugger, 7-07-09Amy,
Thanks for the update on NREPA, also known as "the deadest bill on the hill". You did well in reporting on the editorial, but not so well when you tried to explain why the bill is forever bogged down.
The NYT editorial stated that the bill has only 90 sponsors. The U.S. house currently has 435 members with 255 Democrats who you might theorize would be more open to this type of bill (I'm guessing at least 90% of the co-sponsors are Democrats?). For a bill that has been around for so long you might think that it might gather a little more support. But the reality is that it has gone nowhere (21% support?).
The problem with the bill is that it simply is not worthy of serious consideration. Publicly elected Representatives from the states were NREPA lands lay have realized this as well as hundreds of other Representatives from around the country. It's seems obvious that not only "rednecks" oppose this bill (although you offer no evidence to this point) but also a large majority of the "big city types" (where the majority of our representatives come from)..(see 21% above).
It would probably be most accurate to say that this bill has very little public support, why else would it be floundering around so badly?
The enviros got yet another hearing with this new Congress which spurred all the local papers to once more put in a single token article about the bill..........and then pretty much silence (except for NewWest which seems to be trying really hard to keep it alive). The masses are speaking......by simply ignoring NREPA.
Also, real mike, you can count me in as one easterner who thinks that NREPA is a bad bill.
Amy, I got your point loud and clear - but then again, I wasn't trying to read between the lines (or just looking at a few select phrases) looking for a fight that just isn't there.
Comment By GC, 7-08-09As a conservationist, ex wilderness supporter i have to say that this bill equates to less use of forest lands. No paragliding, rock climbing, mountain biking, etc... They will create more wilderness, then the hikers and far left will shut everyone out. Americans need to spend more time outdoors recreating in the many ways available, not just walking. This stimulates economic growth and individual health. I was once turned away by a forest ranger for walking my 1 year old in a baby jogger in the wilderness. Been anti wilderness ever since...Theres enough wilderness established in the west, they should expand wilderness throughout the east coast.
Comment By Robert Hoskins, 7-08-09Todd
The only natives in the West are the Indians who were slaughtered, imprisoned on reservations, and callously exploited. I get a little tired hearing white people talk about being native. They're nothing of the sort. We're all interlopers. And this one, and lot like me, want to see more wilderness.
As for the achievements of local management, well, look at the disease-ridden elk feedgrounds, which we have thanks to local ranchers. Local stewardship? That's garbage.
RH
Sorry, Robert, the American Indians crossed the Bering Strait many years ago, I don't consider my American Indian great grandmother any more native than my great grandmother born on a wagon train coming west. The fact is the folks born and raised here, or even transplanted to stay, should not have to have the ideas of some half backed congress person who probably doesn't know a spruce from a lodgepole nor an angus from a buffalo, pushed off on them.
If she wants wilderness put it where she is. Do you have any idea how much fuel is burned by hikers and climbers driving across the country ? I'm sure it is far more than the young couple both working with kids who have a few hours off and want to drive to a fishing or picnicing spot. On top of that how about the extra taxes they pay for "public land" that they are not allowed to use?
Oh, come on, Bob. Native Americans aren't doing so bad. Look at all those casinos from coast to coast. They've figured it out.
Comment By Dave Skinner, 7-08-09Robert, if we are interlopers, then why don't you do us a fave and pioneer going where we truly belong and then report back how it works out?
And Matt, it's the "fire breathing radical" part Paul hides. Who precisely were the dozen groups? AWR is one for sure, and don't let me hold my break if the four EF co-founders were in on this.
Finally, Mike, I don't want to "end" the Wilderness Act. I'm cool with preserving outstanding wildernesses like those we already have. It's the distortions of original intent in its name I find tiresome, especially the distortions implicit in garbage legislation like NREPA.
Skinner,
One man's garbage is another man's treasure. Channeling Leopold and Marshall, now that's good humor. What's next? Any truth to the rumour you're starting a local Earth First! chapter in Kalispell this summer? I'll bring the buffalo hot dogs.
Perhaps a "Log the Other Planets Later" chapter, Steve.
As for channeling Bob and Aldo, apparently a lot of that was done. Marshall died in 1933 and Leopold in 47 or 48, and the Act wasn't passed for another 15 or so years.
I understand fully that Marshall was a socialist trust-funder, I suppose he'd be just as radical today as he was then. And I understand the temptation to quote Almanac when it suits...I sort of enjoyed it, but Leopold also discusses the use side of the equation, and that's never brought up.
Nonetheless, Congress did in fact have a this-and-no-more intent with the 1964 Act. The concept of unroading to "de-trammel" lands and "re-wild" them is a creature of "your" imagination. You may want those concepts codified. Fine.
If they are, however, to me it's just another indicator of how far our nation has declined.
That's all misleading horse manure ...just spin and disinformation.
Comment By Dave Skinner, 7-08-09In what way, Real Truther Mike?
Comment By paul stephens, 7-08-09NREPA is the most sensible, affordable, economically-viable, and scientifically sane idea I've ever heard of - at least in the environmental sustainability category. You'd have to be nuts to oppose it! And yet, all I hear - even from MWA people and other 'professional' environmentalists is similar to what I hear about Single Payer healthcare. It's "off the table." "It isn't politically possible." "We have to do something, now" - even if it means trading half our roadless areas to placate a few snowmobile bullies.
Maybe we should add a wolf-hunt provision to it. That's where I disagree with the rest of the "radical environmental community." I'm a fourth generation Montanan from a ranching family. We had a picture in our family photo album of the last wolf pelts from the Highwoods hung up on a log cabin wall to dry. I would like to shoot any and all wolves in my vicinity, even though I'm no longer a rancher. They breed like crazy, and the only way you can get rid of them completely is by poisoning.
The announcement of a hunting season is a good indication that there is some sanity left in Montana. Don't save the wolves. Save the wilderness. The wolves will do very well on their own.
Paul, haven't you figured out yet that environmentalism is not about saving anything, it is about controlling other people. You think anyone who wants access to the forests anyway but the way you deem acceptable is "greedy". Wolfers insist that any rancher not willing to sacrifice a few thousnad dollars worth of livestock is "greedy". I suspect it will be many years yet before wolves are delisted. The problem with the Wyoming plan is not a lack of science it is because the residents of the state want some control over where and how many wolves are roaming the state. That state is really considered "greedy" by those who wish to have control over the people.
Comment By paul stephens, 7-09-09Todd, NREPA IS about controlling people - or more specifically, corporations. It's already public land (except for a few corridors which will have to be purchased or traded for.) It costs the taxpayers nothing, while creating some 700 research and wildlife management jobs, and thousands of tourism jobs. Plus, it protects the watersheds and otherwise produces billions if not trillions of dollars worth of environmental/agricultural benefits. Being in favor of it is a total no-brainer. The comparison to Single Payer healthcare is apt. It costs nothing, but saves billions or trillions of dollars now being expropriated by corporate interests.
It already BELONGS to the people. Nobody is being "locked out" except those who want to destroy it.
Do insurance and pharmaceutical companies have a "property right" to our healthcare dollars? Sen. Baucus believes so. He also seems to believe that mining and logging corporations have a "right" to our public lands.
First of all Paul, you may not realize that fuel for your car and to heat your home is NOT mana from heaven, it comes out of the ground, every drop. When I see an enviro that parks his car and turns off his lights and heat, then I will know he is sincere about preservation being his primary goal, other wise he is demanding that others sacrifice so there is more for him.
"Natural" forest fires that enviros seem to love do far more harm to watersheds, to the forests and to the wildlife that live there than any other use, including timbering.
The word "public" is key, and the public should be able to use it for lumber, grazing, fishing, drilling, not for the exclusive use of hikers.
We need more researchers sucking up our tax dollars to prove what they want it to prove like we need another tax for breathing, (which I am sure is coming).
Todd,
i have driven for more than 2 years. And I've been opposed to the private, internal combustion-powered automobile since the 1970's - long before Al Gore. Henry Ford was a fascist.
I'm a free-market libertarian, and a Green Party activist. Unfortunately, most people think the two are mutually exclusive.
What we have now is corporate fascism/finance, monopoly capitalism, or something like that. Large corporations control the government. We don't have "government regulation of business." We have "business owning and controlling the government." If you're a businessman, you might think that's a good thing, but look at what it has led to - total bankruptcy and control by the "globalization" lobby - which now means India, China, Russia, and OPEC. Is this what you mean by "freedom" and "the American Way of Life?"
In theory, I should be aligned with the PERC people. But so far as I can tell, there's no longer any environmentalists OR libertarians, there. Of course, they're all financed by the same corporations and tax-exempt foundations which caused the problems in the first place.
That should have been "I haven't driven" - the clutch went out on my pickup, which I used mostly to haul stuff. I walk, take the bus, or ride a bike - winter and summer, now.
Comment By Historian Colonel Bain- Author - Monk, 7-09-09Humm.. thumbs Up from the Colonel AMY ..
"Author's in the Park" await me saturday in Sidney<..
Giddup
Well good for you Paul if you are able to go and do all you want with no motorized transportation. That doesn't work too well for those of us living in rural areas.
Your hatred of business surprises me since environmentalism is one of the biggest businesses on earth. On top of that they not only do not pay any tax money they get to take tax money from the rest of us. No worry though, President O is taking them over at a breath taking pace, time will tell how good that is for us.
It seems we always hear that the West doesn't want outsiders telling it what to do with lands owned by all citizens.
I'll elaborate more in a coming article, but to remind all of you folks that the West opposed Yellowstone NP. The West opposed the creation of the first national forests. The West opposed the creation of Glacier NP. Wyoming opposed Grand Teton NP and even went so far as to introduce legislation to unauthorize the park.
I challenge any of you so called locals to tell me that you think it was a mistake to create national forests and national parks in the West.
But if it had been left to locals, Glacier Park would be studded with oil wells, Yellowstone would have been carved up as ranchland and mini private hot springs resorts, and the national forests--well they would have been sold off to the highest bidders and a lot more of the West would be like Texas where there is virtually no public land.
Geo, please provide some documentation about the west not wanting Yellowstone. Westerners were the members who made up the Washburn Expedition, and they came with the idea of national protection for it and promoted it. Except for the Lamar valley where they cultivated hay for the imported tame buffalo, not much of the park is suitable for grazing any of the year and certainly not for ranching per sey.
Think up another story.
Todd
I'm writing an essay now that will be on New West in a week or less with some of those quotes and references.
Geo.
The thread on easterners v. westerners is a cute dichotomy, but it ignores that easterners often line up in opposition to other easterners, and that we westerners are as divided in our opinions as anyone else.
Back when NREPA was first introduced, a western paper, the Arizona Star, said western politicians were silly to try and make it an eastern idea. Westerners who were first to support NREPA only took it to eastern politicians, the Star editorial said, because western politicians somehow couldn't see what a good idea it is, and couldn't see it because they were blinded by, ahem, out of state corporations who want to mine, log, and drill.
Somehow, this out-of-state thing never gets reported in all the forms it really takes. I heard no politicans warning Montanans what would happen to the state's logging economy if Plum Creek came to the state in the 1980s. But Montana's senior senator, Max Baucus, waved the warning flag about NREPA by saying, in October 1992, that "Out of state groups are increasingly gaining control and influence over our state."
It fell to the Wall Street Journal to report on the consequences of out-of-state logging companies coming to Montana. In a page one article in late 1984 to early 1985, the Journal said big logging companies would make a move into the Northwest, cut hard, then leave. And sure enough, we had a short-lived boom, with consequences that continue even today. Also sure enough, there were as many Montanans cheering that ill-fated boom as there were who warned that it wasn't sustainable.
Wilderness is the least-cost land use alternative. We have too little of it, and too much land devoted to has-been boomonomics.