Environmentalists, Opponents Going for End-Zones in Utah
By Christian Probasco, 4-03-10
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| Utah Governor Gary Herbert: "Go long! No, really long!" | |
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It would be difficult to avoid football analogies at this point in the game. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) has been moving the ball down the field one running play at a time. Their next play may put them in the end-zone. Their opponents in state government, meanwhile, are tossing Hail-Mary passes, with the inevitable possibility of interception.
SUWA is again pushing for the adoption of the Red Rock Wilderness Act in U.S. Congress. The bill, sponsored in the House by Representative Maurice Hinchey of New York this time around, would set aside 9.4 million acres of land within Utah’s borders as wilderness. That’s about 40 percent of the BLM’s holdings in the state.
In the meantime, Hinchey wants the land under consideration for wilderness, much of which is criss-crossed by roads, managed by the Department of Interior as if it were wilderness.
SUWA has gotten one of its many congressional buddies to sponsor the act every legislative season, for about 20 years. Leaders of Utah Shared Access Alliance (USA-ALL), however, think they may have a good chance of getting it passed this time around.
“The possibility of losing this land in the next year is very real,” reads a pamphlet USA-ALL mailed three weeks ago. “(SUWA) has made huge progress on advancing their ill intended (Redrock Wilderness Act). Should this bill pass you can kiss goodbye recreational gems like the San Rafael Desert and Moab.”
One of USA-ALL’s talking points is that SUWA’s rich, donor board members have been engaged in an awful lot of seriously criminal activities, especially for an organization that harps on the alleged trespasses of motorized recreationists in Utah.
“Three of SUWA’s (former) board members have been charged with serious federal crimes,” the pamphlet reads. “Two have been convicted. One is awaiting trial. This is the caliber of SUWA’s leadership.”
USA-ALL exhorts its members to panic, donate, educate and scribble, scribble, scribble letters to members of congress and anybody else who will listen, or won’t, opposing the act. But that’s just a blocking tactic. Behind the defensive line, Utah’s Governor, and former high school quarterback, Gary Herbert is throwing long bombs with little chance of success, though the plays are being called by the legislature. A prime example is the bill he signed on March 27, which would funnel revenues from land seized from the federal government under eminent domain into Utah’s schools.
Utah’s lawmakers want to get their case before the newly centrist Supreme Court. However, even the attorneys for the Utah legislature admit the refs will probably toss a flag on the play, citing the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution.
SUWA’s reply to Herbert, an e-mail titled “Utah to feds: ‘You’re not the boss of us!’” rightly dings Utah lawmakers from sucking $3 million from the state’s beleaguered education fund to finance its legal plays. But Utah’s defensive strategy has gotten it nowhere, while SUWA, with District Judge Tena Campbell playing center rather than referee, has patiently moved the original definition of a “road” almost to the end zone, where only paved highways need apply. This despite a ruling by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in 2006 that the state’s definition of “roads” should, in fact, apply to roads within its borders.
The e-mail concludes, ominously, “Please be assured that we will never let this ‘land grab’ occur.” That’s it. No mention of the tactics they’ll use to stop it or the ostensibly democratic process the nation usually goes through in such matters. Not even an appeal for more moola.
The tone of USA-ALL, which has no billionaires on its board as far as I know, is more beseeching. “USA-ALL has the experience and ability to beat this bill (the Redrock Wilderness Act) and minimize it or eliminate it,” reads their pamphlet. “We need you to take action to help protect the public’s access to these valuable places.”
I’d like to finish by saying that the game is going into its fourth quarter, but it isn’t. It will continue for an indeterminate length. And unlike regular football, the rules will continue to change as the game progresses.
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Comments
New York is where the Congressional Chair of the Ways and Means Committee is trying to defend his lifestyle on the public dime, and he the successor of Adam Clayton Powell, no relation to the Colorado River Powell. Can we find a parallel there? NY is where the Governor was forced to resign because he could afford the time and money to access whores who make more a night than most blue collar workers do in a good month. Men died in a coal mine trying to make in a month what those whores cost a session. The Lt. Gov. who replaced the stained one is hardly the epitome of good behavior, and is lesser endowed with common sense. And not running for the office this year because nobody would put up money to have the clown run. New York, like California, is not able to run itself, which puts it one function below a case of dysentery. In the meantime, their congressional representatives are all very up to speed on Federal land management issues, and happy to carry legislation to govern land in other states.
And while mines ignore the law, West Virginia's leading Congressman is busy regulating how we live and live with Federal land. One would think he would take better care of W.Va. miners. Or at the least, regulate them like he wishes to do in states two thousand miles from home.
I am going to ask my Congressman what he is doing to regulate the lives of people in Vermont. Vermont needs regulation from the West. And so do Maine and New Hampshire. Maybe Florida. Someplace far from the West.
It's no secret that states with large, diverse populations are hard to run. That fact doesn't reflect on the competence of the state's congressmen.
Yes, WV's congressmen should be more concerned about protecting miners in that state. Again, that fact has no bearing on how those congressmen vote on issues relating to public land.
And yes, you should contact your congressmen to weigh in on issues concerning public land, no matter what state that public land is located in...because it belongs to everybody.