Obama Eyes Western Land for National Monuments, Angering Some

The Otero Mesa, a large desert grassland in New Mexico. (AP)

By William La Jeunesse
FOX News

More than a dozen pristine landscapes, wildlife habitats and scenic rivers in 11 Western states, some larger than Rhode Island and Delaware combined, are under consideration by the Obama administration to become America's newest National Monuments -- a decision the administration can make unilaterally without local input or congressional approval.

According to internal Department of Interior documents leaked to a Utah congressman and obtained exclusively by Fox News, the mostly public lands include Arizona deserts, California mountains, Montana prairies, New Mexico forests, Washington islands and the Great Basins of Nevada and Colorado -- totaling more than 13 million acres.

Sources say President Obama is likely to choose two or three sites from the list, depending on their size, conservation value and the development threat to each one's environment.

"Many nationally significant landscapes are worthy of inclusion in the NLCS (National Landscape Conservation System)," according to the draft report stamped NOT FOR RELEASE. "The areas listed below may be good candidates for National Monument designation and the Antiquities Act."

Presidential use of the Antiquities Act is highly controversial because the White House, with the stroke of a pen, can lock up thousands of square miles of federal lands used for timber, ranching, mining and energy development without local input or congressional approval. The Act is generally interpreted to commemorate or protect a specific historical landmark, not prohibit development or deprive local communities of jobs and tax revenues.

"Any federal action that could lead to limited access should be done in an open and public manner using extraordinary caution," said Rep. Dean Heller, R-Nev., upon seeing the leaked report. "The fact that this administration is already circulating internal memos to bypass Congress and the public process is troubling."

In 1996, President Clinton turned 1.3 million acres of southern Utah into the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument without telling the Arizona or Utah congressional delegation. Highly controversial at the time, the designation has withstood numerous legal challenges to the president's authority, and the national monument remains one of Clinton's boldest environmental accomplishments.

While Western politicians are still digesting the report, several properties stand out.

-- Otero Mesa, New Mexico: The area stretches over 1.2 million acres and is home to 1,000 native species. Gov. Bill Richardson has sought protection for Otero Mesa for years, but the Bush administration targeted it for oil and gas development.

-- Heart of the Great Basin, Nevada: Researchers call it a "globally unique assemblage of cultural, wildlife and historic values" that includes thousands of petroglyphs and stone artifacts dating back 12,000 years.

-- Owyhee Desert, Oregon: Called one of the most remote areas of the United States, the Owyhee is home to the largest herd of California bighorn sheep.

-- Bodie Hills, California: Located in the fast growing eastern Sierra Nevada mountains, Bodie contains the Golden State's best preserved ghost town. But the area is also loaded with gold, and several mining permits are pending.

-- The Modoc Plateau, California: Spanning close to 3 million acres in the northwest corner of California, the Modoc Plateau is "laden with biological and archeological treasures." Interior officials call it the second largest unprotected landscape in the state.

The list contains a number of political land mines for the president, according to a former Bush Interior Department appointee familiar with the document who asked to remain anonymous.

"Right now a number of senior officials are going over the report," he told Fox News. "When Clinton did it, most of the West was red states and he didn't have any blowback. Obama has to ask himself, if he chooses a Nevada location, will it hurt (Senator Harry) Reid's re-election. The same is true in almost every (Western) state where Democrats have made serious inroads."

The list was leaked just days after a story appeared in the New York Times outlining the administration's plans to use executive power to advance his agenda in the face of congressional opposition. "We are reviewing a list of presidential orders and directives to get the job done, across a front of issues," White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel told the newspaper.

Western representatives are planning a full-fledged assault on the report when Congress returns from its break next week.

Congressman Rob Bishop, R-Ut., co-founder of the Western States Coalition and now Chair of the Congressional Western Caucus, has also seen the leaked memo.

"We are taking this seriously. The tar is warming up. The pitchforks are ready. We will do what ever we need to make sure Congress is fully informed and fully aware of this action. This process should be open and transparent and President Obama should go though Congress and do it this the right way, not by presidential fiat," said Bishop.

"Outrage. In a country as dependent on foreign oil as this one, this kind of action on public lands is simply unacceptable."

Interior Department spokesman Craig Leff told Fox News late Wednesday the leaked document "reflects some brainstorming discussions within [the Bureau of Land Management], but no decisions have been made about which areas, if any, might merit more serious review and consideration."

Amargosa River bill will only affect California

By MARK WAITE
Pahrump Valley Times


During very wet periods, the Amargosa River can flow at the surface, as it did in Death Valley during the wet winter of 2005.

The passage in the U.S. Senate of the Omnibus Public Lands Bill of 2009, including the designation of wild and scenic river status for the Amargosa River in California, was like a dream come true for the newly-formed Amargosa Conservancy.

Across the state line, however, Nevada District 36 Assemblyman Ed Goedhart, R-Amargosa Valley, who has seen the influence of environmental designations like Death Valley National Park and Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge on water rights applications in Amargosa Valley, sees a possible nightmare.

Goedhart said a "wild and scenic river" conjures up images of people rafting through white water rapids in scenic national parks. The segment of the Amargosa River under wild and scenic river protection extends from four miles north of the Tecopa Hot Springs road, south to just past the Dumont Dunes access road crossing.

"Any time you want to make wilderness, national monuments, wildlife refuges, wild and scenic rivers, it's like dropping a pebble on a pond. These ripples go a long ways," Goedhart said. "It's an expansion of locking people out of not only public lands but also being able to utilize their own property and water rights, such as people in Amargosa Valley."

The legislation reminded him of the Death Valley regional groundwater flow model, which places limits on application for water rights. Goedhart said the area affected by that flow model would measure 20,000 square miles.

Amargosa Valley is being eyed up for solar power projects by companies like Solar Millenium and Ausra NV.

"When Death Valley was changed from a national monument to a national park, that now gives the National Park Service a buffer area where they can protest things being done outside the park borders up to 50 miles away. These types of things, they get increasingly difficult for people to utilize their land and water rights to attract capital, create wealth, produce payroll and pay taxes," Goedhart said.

Brian Brown, a founding member of the Amargosa Conservancy, which was formed as a nonprofit organization in September 2005, thinks those fears are overblown. Brown doesn't see any impact of the legislation across the state line. Instead, he sees benefits to the economy in the Tecopa-Shoshone area.

"Those small businesses that are surviving are doing it on tourism, and what we have to offer is the desert itself. It's a unique area. There's a lot of endemic plants and animals, and this will go a long way toward protecting their water source in that river," Brown said.

The lands bill is expected to be introduced in the House within the next couple weeks. The wild and scenic river designation was one of 160 bills in the Omnibus Public Lands Act introduced by U.S. Rep. Buck McKeon, R-Calif.

Brown said he met with the California delegation during a trip to Washington, D.C., in September, along with other residents of Inyo County.

"It's difficult to examine the scenario where this wild and scenic section might affect something 90 miles away in Beatty. It seems like a stretch," Brown said. "States control their water. That's their job. So this is in California, it's not in Nevada. The people in our area are looking forward to it. We look on it as an asset that will bring more tourism and travel to our area."

Brown said the conservancy is working with the state of California to cut a recreational trail down to the Amargosa Canyon from the China Ranch Date Farm he owns. A 17-mile hiking trail from Shoshone, Calif., to Dumont Dunes, part of it using the rail bed from the old Tonopah and Tidewater railroad, has also been discussed over the last several years, with kiosks, watch towers and other facilities.

"This legislation only affects federal land. It does not affect any private landowners' rights to their land," Brown said. "There aren't a lot of places in the lower 48 where you can get the vistas and quiet solitude like we have here. That has value. The truth is there are other values than an economic one, and those have to weigh into decisions on public land."

Brown said the public lands bill is an attempt to wrap up conflicts over wilderness study areas, enacted by the Desert Protection Act of 1994, which designated the Mojave National Preserve in a wide swath of desert from Interstate 15 to Interstate 40.

McKeon's legislation includes designating 11,000 acres in the Sierra Nevadas as a snowmobile area as well as wild and scenic river designation for places like Cottonwood Creek, just south of Lone Pine, Calif.

Brown said the legislation is written so there are seven different locations where off-highway vehicles can cross the Amargosa River.

The bill will also allow the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to measure the stream flow to prevent large diversions upstream that would lessen the flow through the wild and scenic section.

But Brown said that shouldn't affect users upstream since the Amargosa River doesn't have a lot of water.

Bob Haueter, deputy chief of staff for Rep. McKeon, said the water flow isn't sufficient on the Amargosa River to affect potential users in either California or Nevada.

"It has no impact in Nevada. It doesn't reach Nevada," Haueter said. "There can be no impact outside the area affected."

Roundtable Claims Victory as Senate Delays Lands Bill

Roundtable Applauds Congressional Allies for Standing Firm Against Lame Duck Consideration of The Omnibus Lands Bill

News Blaze

The Western U.S. came out a winner as the U.S. Congress was unable to pass a massive lands bill this week that would have placed millions of acres of federal lands under enhanced federal control.

Some Congressional leaders had sought to ram the bill through this past week's "lame duck" session of Congress. But public opposition -- rallied in part by the Roundtable and other Western groups, as well as the opposition of key Members of Congress -- blocked the land grab bill from being brought up.

Congressional leaders vowed to try to pass the bill when the Congress reconvenes in January 2009.

The massive, 1076-page measure included more than 150 bills that would:

• Create or expand a number of wilderness areas;


• Establish new conservation areas;


• Create/ add to wild and scenic designations;


• Designate new national scenic trails;


• Add new national and historic park units;


• Add nearly a dozen new national heritage areas.

Of greatest concern to the Roundtable is the inclusion within the package of language that would statutorily establish the National Landscape Conservation System (NLCS) within the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).

"Stopping this huge package from being rammed through the Congress is a big win for Westerners," said Britt Weygandt, Executive Director of the Roundtable. In particular, Weygandt lauded the efforts of Senator Tom Coburn (OK) and Representative Rob Bishop (UT), who led the fight to put the brakes on the package.

"Postponing consideration is the right thing to do. It is our hope that Congress will use the additional time to reconsider some of the package's more troubling provisions," Weygandt added, noting the Roundtable's particular concerns with provisions seeking to codify NLCS. The U.S. Department of Interior's Inspector General recently initiated an investigation for possible violations of anti-lobbying law, by federal employees, related to the NLCS provisions.

The NLCS is comprised of 27 million acres of federal lands administered by the BLM including National Monuments, National Conservation Areas, Wilderness and Wilderness Study Areas, Wild and Scenic Rivers, and National Scenic and Historic Trails. The vast majority of these lands are located in 12 Western states. The bill would give federal land managers the ability to alter the long-standing multiple use management philosophy of the BLM by elevating the conservation purposes above other purposes for NLCS units. To see a comprehensive breakdown of how each Western state is impacted by NLCS codification, go here.

The Roundtable had taken a lead role in rallying Westerners to oppose this huge federal land grab, spearheading efforts with dozens of other Western business, county, and fiscally conservative organizations who were concerned the bill would curtail the development of energy resources and public access for recreation on wide swaths of federal lands. Over the past several months, numerous letters from the Roundtable have been sent to Congressional Members calling on them to postpone consideration of this massive package.

While some of the provisions in this omnibus bill are non-controversial, there were key sections that raised serious concerns for Western multiple use access, agricultural, recreation, business, county, energy, and fiscal groups. "This legislation would give opponents of multi-use the ability to limit recreational access and restrict economic activity to vast "landscape-wide" areas," noted Weygandt. "This could mean agriculture, energy exploration and production and other economic uses could become imperiled on huge swathes of Western public lands."

"Certainly, for Westerners, there are always very real trade-offs involved with any public lands designation. We believe such bills need to be considered individually so each can evaluated carefully," said Weygandt. "Bulk packaging of legislation has a checkered record for Congress. It doesn't work well on Appropriations bills. It certainly doesn't work on land designations, where such designations can mean the difference between economic health and peril for Western communities. We hope the 111th Congress will do this the right way, letting each of these measures rise or fall on their individual merits."

Grijalva another rumored Cabinet pick from Arizona

Washington Post, politico.com cite him as leading contender for Interior

The Arizona Republic

Rep. Raúl Grijalva, D-Ariz

Arizona could lose not one but two of its elected officials to President-elect Barack Obama's cabinet.

Just days after officials with Obama's transition team said Gov. Janet Napolitano is the top choice for Homeland Security secretary, Rep. Raúl Grijalva, D-Ariz., has emerged as a leading contender for secretary of the Interior.

Grijalva, 60, is Tucson native and son of an immigrant Mexican farmworker. He served as Hispanic co-chair for Obama's presidential campaign and has been a fierce critic of the Bush administration's environmental policies. He serves on the House Committee on Natural Resources, and chairs the National Parks, Forests and Public Lands Subcommittee.

The Interior secretary traditionally comes from a Western state, where management of public lands is a key issue. The administration post oversees public lands and serves as a steward for the nation's Indian reservations.

On Friday, The Washington Post and the political Web site politico.com said Grijalva is a top contender for the post. Both cited transition officials as sources.

Grijalva could not be reached Friday, but spokeswoman Natalie Luna said the congressman has not received any word from Barack Obama's transition team. "He said he hasn't been contacted," Luna said, adding, "I think he would give it really good thought."

Luna said her boss has a "good rapport" with the president-elect. "I think he (Obama) knows the congressman's background, what he's interested in and passionate about," she added.

Last month, Grijalva issued a scathing report titled, "The Bush Administration's Assaults on Our National Parks, Forests and Public Lands. The 23-page critique accuses the President of carrying out "a concerted strategy" of reducing the protections for federal properties, "opening up these lands for every type of private, commercial and extractive industry possible."

Rodolfo Espino, assistant professor of political science at Arizona State University, said such an appointment would make sense.

Grijalva is an up-and-comer who recently became co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Espino, sharing Obama's liberal vision on public land policy. He also carries little baggage as a politician, worked on the presidential campaign and hails from a Western state where land issues are crucial.

If appointed, Grijalva would be the third Interior secretary from Arizona, following in the footsteps of Stewart Udall (1961-69) and Bruce Babbitt (1993-2001).

The Interior Department manages about 500 million acres of federal land, or one-fifth of the United States. It oversees 67,000 employees in a bureaucracy that includes the Bureau of Land Management, Bureau of Indian Affairs, National Park Service, Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Geological Service.

Environmental leaders were thrilled at the prospect of Grijalva assuming the secretariat. Mining, ranching and other land-use industry representatives expressed dismay.

"Talk about a 180 from where we are today," said Richard Mayol, communications director at the Grand Canyon Trust. "That is certainly something that we would love to get behind, something we would cheer."

By contrast, Basilio Aja, executive director for the Arizona Beef Council, said Grijalva has been "singularly focused on monument declarations," setting aside federal property so that it cannot be mined or grazed. Especially in tough economic times, he said, it will be critical to take advantage of federal grazing lands for food production.

Grijalva, serving his third term in Congressional District 7, was a Tucson schools trustee in the 1970s and '80s, then served on the Pima County Board of Supervisors from 1988 to 2002.

He has long been regarded as an environmental advocate, leading efforts to regulate hard-rock mining and establish a National Landscape Conservation System. He recently told The Arizona Republic that Bush's administration sold away public resources to private interests, performing "more like real-estate agents than stewards of (public) lands."

Sandy Bahr, conservation director for the Sierra Club in Arizona, praised Grijalva's efforts to ban uranium mining near the Grand Canyon, calling him a "real leader."

"Obviously he knows the West and the importance of public lands," Bahr said. "Arizona has been well-served by him, particularly on the kinds of issues that the Department of Interior addresses."

California Desert's six million acre question mark

Bill Establishing Landscape Conservation System Fudges on CDCA Inclusion

News Release
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER)

Washington, DC — Legislation slated as the first order of business for the incoming 111th Session of Congress to codify the National Landscape Conservation System inexplicably excludes most of what some call its crown jewel, the California Desert Conservation Area. The real reasons behind this exclusion are a mix of politics and plans for large-scale industrial development of the California desert, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

At issue is the level of protection accorded to more than six millions acres – an area bigger than New Jersey – of the California Desert Conservation Area (CDCA) which includes sections of three major American deserts: the Sonoran, Mojave and Great Basin. Congress is considering giving a statutory charter to the National Landscape Conservation System (NLCS), a network of national monuments, historic trails and conservation areas within the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) created by then-Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt late in the Clinton administration.

CDCA was created by Congress before the advent of the NLCS and has always been considered part of that system. In fact, BLM official maps and fact sheets show CDCA as included within NLCS.

Overruling its California staff, BLM Headquarters quietly decided that CDCA would not be included in the pending codification legislation but has offered no public explanation. Documents obtained by PEER under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) contain this conclusion:

“No, CDCA would not be included in the NLCS under the current pending legislation. BLM has reviewed the legislative history…and found it inconclusive in regard to this question. Our intent is to use this information only upon request.”

PEER has asked for the underlying legal opinions leading to this conclusion but the agency has not responded, and today PEER filed a federal lawsuit to obtain the withheld documents. In the materials released to PEER is this exchange between a BLM official and the head of a multiple use group:

“You told me why the Cal. Desert was excluded from the NLCS legislation…Part of the answer was the huge amount of solar energy installations already in place and the potential for more. Right?”

“Stunning and ecologically important places such as Big Morongo Preserve and Afton Canyon will be left open to development if the California Desert Conservation Area remains on the legislative cutting room floor,” stated California PEER Coordinator Karen Schambach. “The unspoken plan is for corporate conversion of large parts of the CDCA into giant energy farms and transmission corridor superhighways.”

The local congressional representative, Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-CA), reportedly wants to keep most of the CDCA out of the NLCS, while the state’s senior senator, Diane Feinstein, has pledged to have the entire CDCA included. To paper over the difference, the bill managers for the 153-bill omnibus measure containing the NLCS authorization will add a floor amendment stating that “public land within the CDCA is administered by the BLM for conservation purposes” but that language will leave to BLM discretion which lands will actually be included in the NLCS.

“Why does the National Landscape Conservation System need to be dismembered in order to become permanent?” asked PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, noting that the Interior Inspector General is currently investigating alleged collusion between BLM officials and organizations sponsoring the NLCS bill. “The omission of the California desert is no glitch; this is a hidden development agenda cloaked in happy talk about conservation.”

Stop New Federal Land Grab

Britt Weygandt
News Blaze

Congressional leaders say they will ram through an omnibus public lands package in a "lame duck" session of Congress coming up during the week of November 17th. The Roundtable is rallying Westerners to oppose this huge federal land grab.

Take action here right now: http://www.westernroundtable.com/oppose+federal+land+grab.aspx

This 1,000-page package includes more than 150 bills that would:

-- create more than a million acres of wilderness;
-- restrict the development of energy resources on various federal lands;
-- place hundreds of thousands of acres under new or enhanced federal control; and
-- further restrict many forms of use and access to public lands.

Not only that, but this bill would lock in, by statute, the Clinton Administration-inspired "National Landscape Conservation System" (NLCS) within the BLM. The bill would give federal land managers the ability to alter the long-standing multiple use management philosophy of the BLM by elevating the purposes to "conserve, protect, restore" above other purposes for NLCS units.

This could mean agriculture, energy exploration and production and other economic uses could become imperiled on huge swathes of Western public lands. To see the acreages impacted by NLCS in the West, go here: http://docs.westernroundtable.com/public_lands/BKGR_OmnibusLands_REVISED_10-08.pdf.

Please take 60 seconds and send a pre-drafted communication to your elected official here: http://www.westernroundtable.com/oppose+federal+land+grab.aspx

Thank you for helping to stop this very bad legislation.

Britt Weygandt
Western Business Roundtable
bweygandt@westernroundtable.com
www.westernroundtable.com

The Roundtable is a non-profit, 501(c)(6) organization that unites a wide variety of business and industry leaders to work on a bipartisan basis for public policies that promote a common sense balance between economic growth and environmental conservation.

Pro-energy group seeks probe of environmental lobbyists

By Lee Davidson
Deseret News

A pro-energy development group is calling for Congress to investigate possible illegal coordination between an arm of the Interior Department and lobbyists for environmental groups.

Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, announced last week that Interior's inspector general is already conducting its own probe into whether environmental lobbyists improperly coordinated with officials at Interior's National Landscape Conservation System.

But Americans for American Energy President Greg Schnacke said Wednesday that "the congressional oversight process must be brought into play as well."

He added, "The Wilderness Society and the National Wildlife Federation spend millions of dollars pursuing an anti-American energy political agenda. The question we have is how far does this extend and is it more extensive than simply the NLCS?"

Bishop, ranking Republican on the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands, last week called for those NLCS employees being reviewed by the inspector general investigation to relinquish duties until the probe is completed.

Federal law generally prohibits federal employees from using appropriated funds or their official positions to lobby Congress. Americans for American Energy worries that some NLCS officials may have met at Wilderness Society offices to coordinate lobbying strategy and messages with environmental groups.

"You can't tell me this is an isolated incident," Schnacke said. "The political agenda of the NWF and the Wilderness Society is too broad and touches more in the Interior Department than just the NLCS."

He added, "If the (congressional) committees refuse to conduct such oversight (and look into the matter), it will be sending a message to the American people that it intends to turn a blind eye to such activities."

The NLCS was created in 2000 to protect nationally significant landscapes recognized for their cultural, ecological or scientific values, including several national monuments given to the Bureau of Land Management to manage. Among lands it oversees is Utah's Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Americans for American Energy is a Denver-based group that says it is dedicated to promoting greater energy independence for America. Its web site says Utah Rep. Aaron Tilton, R-Springville, is its vice president.

Tilton was defeated at the GOP convention this year. He is an energy consultant looking into building a nuclear power plant in Utah, and was on a House committee that oversees nuclear power. He was criticized for not declaring a conflict of interest until his ties were later publicized by the media.

Of course, the latest probe comes after the Interior Department recently found that officials at its Minerals Management Service engaged in sexual relationships with energy industry representatives, and accepted gifts from them.

DOI IG investigating coordination by BLM and enviro groups

Noelle Straub, E&E Daily reporter
Environment & Energy Newsletter

The Interior inspector general is investigating possible illegal coordination between lobbyists for environmental groups and federal officials of the National Landscape Conservation System, Rep. Rob Bishop said yesterday.

Interior officials informed his office about the investigation into the NLCS, which is a division of the Bureau of Land Management, the Utah Republican said in a statement.

E-mails and other documents show extensive coordination between top NLCS officials and environmental lobbyists, said Bishop, the top Republican on the National Parks, Forests and Public Lands Subcommittee.

The main groups involved appear to be the Wilderness Society and the National Wildlife Federation, a House GOP aide said. At some point NLCS officials had weekly meetings with these and other groups, often at the Wilderness Society's office, to coordinate lobbying strategy and messaging, the aide said.

E-mails show that NLCS officials requested environmental groups to write budget language, the aide added. E-mails also talk about coordinating lobbying efforts, setting up NLCS events, sending out draft memorandums for each other to review and preparing for congressional hearing.

The federal and advocacy officials exchanged resumes and job announcements in their respective organizations and BLM, the aide said. Travel documents are still being collected and reviewed and will be part of the investigation, the aide added.

Federal law generally prohibits federal employees from using appropriated funds or their official positions to lobby Congress.

Kevin Mack, NLCS campaign director with the Wilderness Society, said he was unaware of the investigation. "I don't know what the investigation is about, have not been called by the IG, so I can't say anything more than that," Mack said.

Both his groups work on public lands issues and are in contact with many people related to their work, Mack added. "I don't know what 'there' is there."

NWF spokeswoman Jennifer Jones said the group has not been contacted by the
IG's office.

Interior spokeswoman Tina Kreisher said the department had no comment at this time. An inspector general spokesman could not be reached by press time.

Bishop said the Interior Department should act quickly to halt any improper activities involving advocacy groups and the NLCS. He also called on employees involved in the investigation to step aside from their positions until the inspector general finishes his work.

"The department must insist that any employee involved in violations of the
anti-lobbying law step aside until the inspector general or the Justice Department has reviewed his or her conduct," Bishop said. "Just as the employees of the royalty-in-kind program at MMS learned, we will not tolerate misconduct by public officials."

Bishop was referring to a sex, drugs and financial favors investigation of Minerals Management Service employees recently completed by the Interior inspector general, on which the full committee held a hearing Sept. 18.

Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt established NLCS during the Clinton
administration to grant protections to ecologically and historically valuable lands controlled by BLM.

But Babbitt's designation did not codify the system, meaning a later Interior secretary could dissolve it. When the House approved a bill in April codifying it, Bishop complained the House Rules Committee blocked GOP amendments, including one by him that would have addressed the private property rights he said were threatened by what he called a "vague legislative entity."

SB 3213 to impact access to 32 million acres

The US Senate is considering a bill that could affect your access to 32 million acres of federal land and your rights as a landowner

Senate Bill 3213

By Bob Moffitt
KFBK News

Senate Bill 3213 is an omninibus bill, a compilation of 90 bills. Chuck Kushman is the Executive Director of the American Land Rights Association. He says some are good, but some are a blatant land grab, like the part of the bill that creates the National Landscape Conservation System.

Kushman says the bill also contains language that would give the Army Corps of Engineers the power to tell landowners what they can or cannot do with their property, if there is water of any kind on or underneath that property, which applies to all of us.

Federal Land Grab Update

Dangerous Time In Congress Next 30 Days
Until August 8th Recess

Land Rights Network
American Land Rights Association
Federal Parks & Recreation

• Congress Often Rushes Bad Legislation While You Are Busy With Summer and Vacation Activities.
  
• Your Congressman and both Senators may be home at times during the next month and later and will likely be home after August 8th for the month long Congressional August Recess.
  
• You must make sure you call, fax and e-mail your Congressman and both Senators to get their July to September schedules for when they will be in your area. It is critical that you follow the directions below. Your private property rights are severely threatened.

During the month of July up to approximately August 8th both the House and Senate are expected squeeze in a lot of votes including votes on a number of land grab bills that threaten you. They rush to get bills out before the recess that would come approximately August 8th.

HR 2421 - "Clean Water Restoration Act"

During this time the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee could vote on HR 2421, the Clean Water Restoration Act (Wetlands Corps of Engineers and EPA Land Grab) and it could move swiftly to the full House for a vote.

HR 2421 is the Democrat effort to overturn the Rapanos (2006) and Swancc (2001) Supreme Court Wetlands Decisions favorable to private property owners and seize control of all US watersheds.

HR 2421 would give control over Wetlands and other lands back to the Corps of Engineers and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and make their jurisdiction the same as it was before the Supreme Court limited their jurisdiction.

That means national land use controls. It will give the Corps of Engineers and EPA control over your property.

S3213 - Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2008

The Senate will likely vote before August on S3213 (new Omnibus Lands Bill just introduced), the giant new Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2008.

S3213 includes the dreaded BLM National Landscape Conservation System (NLCS), numerous new Wilderness areas, Heritage Areas and many other Federal lands and parks bills put together as one giant omnibus bill.

Think of it as the Omnibus Federal lands, BLM NLCS and Wilderness Bill, S3213 or just Senate Omnibus Lands Bill. This Omnibus bill includes over 90 bills you have not likely seen.

The NLCS was created Administratively in 2000 by former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt. The NLCS has lain low for eight years until they could get Congress to pass it and make it permanent.

The NLCS will lay a preservationist National Park type regulatory overlay over 26,000,000 acres of BLM land including many National Monuments, Wild and Scenic Rivers, Wilderness Study Areas and much more. It threatens access and use by ranchers, miners, forestry advocates, recreationists and many other Federal land users.

These votes will come while you are busy on vacation or distracted by summer activities. There will be so many bills rushed to a vote that many Members of the House and Senate will not have time to even read them.

That means your friends in the House and Senate that you count on to keep an eye open to protect you could easily allow bills to pass that would threaten you and not be aware of it or have a bill of their own in the Omnibus Bill and not want to touch it. So they look the other way as bad bills pass.

You need to insist that your Senators and Representatives read each bill they vote on and protect you.

I cannot stress too strongly how critical your calls, faxes and e-mails are to your Congressman and both Senators during the coming four weeks opposing the Senate Omnibus Lands Bill (S3213) and HR 2421, the Wetlands Corps of Engineers EPA land grab in the House....

The following bulletin from Federal Parks & Recreation newsletter reports on the giant new Federal Lands Omnibus Bill in the Senate.

From Parks and Recreation Newsletter:

New Omnibus Bill Bigger Than Last One, It Includes NLCS
90-Bill Omnibus Measure Contains NLCS, 10 Heritage Areas and More

Omnibus Bill (S3213) Specifics:

The Senate Energy Committee, having succeeded in pushing a big omnibus bill through Congress in April, is trying again.

The old bill (PL 110-229 of May 8) included only individual measures approved by both the committee and the House, about 50 in total.

This time committee chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) has assembled a bill (S3213) that includes more than 90 individual bills the committee has approved, whether the House has acted or not.

There are controversies. Included in the package is legislation (S1139) to certify the 26 million-acre National Landscape Conservation System (NLCS) managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM.) The Senate Energy Committee approved S1139 May 23, 2007, but the bill has not moved since. The House approved a counterpart NLCS bill (HR 2016) April 9 by a 278-to-140 vote.

Western Republicans opposed the House NLCS bill. Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah) said the bill not only failed to address existing problems in multiple use management of BLM lands in the system, but also could hamper management. He cited such ongoing problems as lack of access for energy development, grazing and other activities. Bishop said the bill could impose Park Service-like restrictions on BLM.

Besides, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) has said she will attempt to expand the system to 32 million acres from 26,000,000 by adding the entire California Desert Conservation Area (CDCA) to the NLCS.

Some four million acres of the CDCA are already in the system but Feinstein would add another six million acres.

Beyond the NLCS, S3213 includes individual bills that would:

• Designate two new National Park System units: Paterson National Historical Park in New Jersey and Thomas Edison National Historical Park in New Jersey,
  
• Authorize additions to nine existing National Park System units,
  
• Designate ten new national heritage areas (NHAs) and authorize studies of two NHAs. The new NHAs would be: Sangre de Cristo National Heritage Area, Colorado; Cache La Poudre River National Heritage Area, Colorado; South Park National Heritage Area, Colorado; Northern Plains National Heritage Area, North Dakota; Baltimore National Heritage Area, Maryland; Freedom's Way National Heritage Area, Massachusetts and N.H.; Mississippi Hills National Heritage Area; Mississippi Delta National Heritage Area; Muscle Shoals National Heritage Area, Alabama; and Santa Cruz Valley National Heritage Area, Arizona,
  
• Designate four national trails: Arizona National Scenic Trail; New England National Scenic Trail; Ice Age Floods National Geologic Trail; and Washington-Rochambeau Revolutionary Route National Historic Trail,
  
• Authorize studies of additions to four National Historic Trails: Oregon National Historic Trail; Pony Express National Historic Trail; California National Historic Trail; And The Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail,
  
• Add three wild and scenic rivers: Fossil Creek, Arizona; Snake River Headwaters, Wyoming; and Taunton River, Massachusetts, and
  
• Designate a Snowy River Cave National Conservation Area of about 3.5 miles of cave passages in Lincoln County, New Mexico.

The Senate Energy Committee said June 27 that the bill runs 759 pages long and includes measures sponsored by Democrats, Republicans and both parties.

The committee puts together the omnibus bills because Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) routinely places holds on individual bills, preventing them from being considered on the Senate floor. When assembled in one omnibus bill, the individual measures create a critical mass and sponsors can obtain the 60 votes needed to break Coburn's holds. Coburn has objected to any legislation that would come with a price tag and require additional federal spending.

But these giant Omnibus Bills are killing you.

Environment a contradiction for Babbitt

Ex-governor's critics question his motives


by Dennis Wagner
The Arizona Republic






Jack Kurtz/The Arizona Republic
Former Governor, Secretary of the Interior and Democratic Presidential candidate Bruce Babbitt hikes the trails in the Phoenix Mountain Preserve.


In nearly 40 years of public service, Bruce Babbitt developed a reputation for defending endangered species, trying to undam rivers and setting aside wilderness areas.

But the onetime Arizona governor and former Interior secretary also has worked as a lobbyist for developers, a lawyer for industry and a speculator in public lands.

Today, though Babbitt is chairman of the World Wildlife Fund, some environmental groups paint him in a different hue of green - the color of money.

The turncoat criticism is so harsh and passionate that Northern Arizona University several months ago erased Babbitt's name from a series of conservation seminars because of opposition from conservation groups.

In some ways, the controversy over Babbitt's environmental record is in sync with paradoxes that have defined much of his storied career.

He grew up in one of Arizona's most prominent ranching families but never rode the range. He majored in geology yet wound up with a Harvard law degree. He is painfully shy as a public figure, with a Jimmy Stewart stammer, yet ran for president.

In a book on Arizona politicians, University of Arizona Professor James W. Johnson characterizes Babbitt as "the perfect combination of Eastern slick and Western hick."

Yet the seeming contradictions of his ecological niche are the most perplexing. How does someone write a book on the importance of preserving open spaces yet advocate housing tracts on pristine California coastal properties where endangered critters live?

Why would Babbitt serve as legal counsel for a ski resort that wanted to spray man-made snow on the San Francisco Peaks in Flagstaff despite objections from Native Americans? Years ago, he had joined tribal members in proclaiming the mountains sacred.

"I still don't understand it," said Sandy Bahr, a Sierra Club Southwest representative. "We and the tribes were all really disappointed . . . a sense of betrayal."

Janine Blaeloch, director of the Western Lands Project, said as Interior secretary, Babbitt oversaw enormous trades of federal property in the name of conservation - deals that Blaeloch describes as public rip-offs.

The sharpest criticism comes from muckraking journalists Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, who wrote in an op-ed piece for the Los Angeles Times: "No better case for cynicism about politics is currently available than the career of Bruce Babbitt."

Babbitt, 69, shrugs off the aspersions as an inevitable part of public life.

"There are going to be critics, and you just can't be spooked by it," he said, sipping coffee after a hike at Piestewa Peak on a visit to the Valley from his Washington, D.C., base.

"I've always had my differences with the orthodox environmental community, which is premised on a view that we are opposed to all development. I've never been in that sphere. I've always been into managed development.

"People want to grab me and say, 'Hey, you're an environmentalist. You're one of us, 100 percent.' Never have been, never will be."

Arizona roots

Reared in Flagstaff, Babbitt was heir to an empire of ranches, trading posts and mining claims. The Babbitt name is a touchstone of Arizona history, tracing back to five Babbitt brothers and their enterprises in the late 19th century. For Bruce Babbitt, a relative of one of the brothers, wilderness was in his blood. He roamed Arizona's forests and deserts to hunt, fish and explore, fascinated with the science and history.

"My commitment to the outdoors was never about ranching," he said. "It was just an instinctive attachment to the landscape."

Babbitt settled on a career in geology, earned his degree at Notre Dame and then accepted a Marshall Scholarship to the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, England.

While working as an intern with a petroleum company in the Andes, Babbitt said, he became more interested in working with the poor than looking for oil. In the mid-1960s, he entered Harvard Law School and wound up marching with civil-rights demonstrators in the South. After graduation, he spent two years doing anti-poverty work with Volunteers in Service to America.

Babbitt said he realized that politics, even more than law, offered remedies for social injustice. He returned to Phoenix and went to work as a lawyer, became politically active and was elected attorney general in 1974 at age 36.

Four years later, after the death of Gov. Wesley Bolin, Babbitt became governor by succession.

He won two subsequent elections, and supporters reel off a list of accomplishments that include creation of the state's Department of Environmental Quality and signing America's first groundwater protection law.

Babbitt said the latter act forever identified him as a conservationist even though his motive, in part, was to ensure that future generations could grow.

"We can easily look at the groundwater code and say it's a developer law," he said. "I never really thought of myself as an environmentalist until my governor years, when people started giving me awards."

Eye on the White House

From his office at the state Capitol, Babbitt gained national attention as co-founder of the Democratic Leadership Council and chairman of the Democratic Governors Association.

The New York Times pointed to him as an emerging leader in "neo-liberalism," which embraced traditional Democratic goals of social justice and civil rights along with conservative limitations on government size.

Babbitt launched a presidential campaign in 1987 and toured the nation. But he never caught on with voters. (His favorite quip: "We were in it right up to the beginning.")

In 1994, when Babbitt was appointed by President Clinton to head the Interior Department, environmental leaders were elated. Sierra Club Southwest spokesman Rob Smith called the selection "very good news for the environment."

Babbitt announced that his theme would be restoration of public lands so "we can create, or re-create, a landscape that was seen by Lewis and Clark, Kit Carson and our forebears." He traveled the nation calling for dams to be torn down. He introduced a forest protection philosophy that, for the first time, recognized wildfire as a natural part of healthy ecosystems. He defended the Endangered Species Act from political attacks and, in his own words, "saved it from extinction."

Industry groups and conservatives assailed Babbitt as a "green barbarian," decrying his efforts to increase mine royalties and grazing fees on public lands.

At the same time, some environmentalists began criticizing federal-land swaps supported by Babbitt that they alleged gave sweetheart terms to developers.

Babbitt said he was working for citizens, not special interests, but got caught in a crossfire between extremists. The federal exchanges ensured protection for wilderness areas, he said, while providing industries with lands for economic development that provided jobs and resources.

He said he learned that environmental purists inevitably fail because they push too far, undermining economic growth and alienating the public. "Green dogma is a ticket to oblivion," he said.

Fred DuVal, a friend for 25 years who served with Babbitt on political campaigns and at Interior, said eco-critics make DuVal heartsick because they are so far off base. Babbitt achieved conservation while others whined or pontificated, but he is so modest he refused to allow any monument to be named for him, Duval said. "It frustrates me because his accomplishments have eroded from public memory so quickly, and they are so profound," he added.

During eight years at the Interior Department, DuVal said, Babbitt helped set aside more wilderness than ever before in U.S. history. He wielded the Endangered Species Act to block damaging development. He worked to create nearly 10 million acres of new national monuments, five in Arizona. He also returned wolves to Yellowstone National Park and shepherded laws protecting the Everglades and other endangered treasures.

"He's certainly an environmentalist," said Mike Gauldin, former spokesman at the Interior Department. "But he's also had to learn how to get things done . . . . Sometimes that involves making concessions around the edges."

Snow Bowl saga

As the Clinton administration was closing, Babbitt received a prestigious national award for creating the National Landscape Conservation System and initiating "a new direction in American conservation history."

Then he joined Latham & Watkins, a Beltway law firm with a Darth Vader reputation among environmentalists. Within weeks, Babbitt was supporting plans for a nuclear-waste dump in Nevada and working with Arizona developers on land-swap deals.

But the Snow Bowl episode is what really crushed conservationists. While heading the Interior Department in 2000, Babbitt had joined Native Americans and conservation groups, including the Sierra Club, in a successful campaign to shut down pumice mining on the alpine peaks overlooking his hometown.

"This mountain is sacred in my religion," Babbitt declared at the time. "The first Franciscan missionaries saw this mountain from the Hopi mesas and named it after the founder of their order, after Saint Francis, who is the patron saint of ecology. What I see here today . . . is purely and simply a sacrilege."

Five years later, Babbitt was in federal court defending the ski resort's plan to cut down trees and spray the slopes with frozen, treated wastewater. Although Babbitt is no longer involved, an opposition Web site still shows his double image with a caption that calls him "the two-faced politician."

Babbitt said he joined Latham & Watkins to earn a living and represented only clients or causes he respected. He denied any betrayal. He defended snowmaking on an existing recreation site in the national forest as an "appropriate use" and said treated wastewater would not desecrate the holy mountain.

But resentment in his hometown remains palpable: This spring, a public furor erupted at Northern Arizona University when plans were announced to offer a "Bruce Babbitt Lecture Series on Western Conservation." Protests ended when the former governor's name was dropped from the title.

An obscure bird

Babbitt acknowledged shifting his position on at least one other issue, leading to accusations of hypocrisy.

While at the Interior Department, he listed the California gnatcatcher as a threatened species and used it to establish a building moratorium across much of Southern California's coast.

After leaving office, however, Babbitt went to work for several companies planning megadevelopments in the area. One of them, Washington Mutual, came up with a $2 billion housing project at Ahmanson Ranch in Ventura County.

Babbitt declared the design a "national model of smart, innovative and environmentally responsible development." He also complained that the Endangered Species Act was too rigid and should be watered down.

Local activist Chad Griffin was so outraged that he told reporters, "Bruce Babbitt still sees green; it's just a different shade of green than he saw as Interior secretary."

Asked to explain, Babbitt said he came to believe that using an obscure subspecies to stop housing developments from Los Angeles to San Diego was a tactical error. Congress would have been so upset and under so much pressure that the Endangered Species Act would have been overturned, he said.

As it turned out, Babbitt said, Ahmanson Ranch had a classic win-win outcome: Outrage over the project prompted California to buy the property, so Washington Mutual made a profit and the public got a new state park.

Babbitt today

Today, Babbitt travels the globe as unpaid chairman for the World Wildlife Fund, the largest conservation organization in the world.

He no longer practices law or works as a lobbyist. He does some consulting.

He visits universities giving speeches about the threat of global warming. He calls for the removal of salmon-killing dams on the Snake River in Washington state. He goes before Congress seeking money for wildlife refuges.

He also was involved in a deal to give the National Park Service a private ranch next to Petrified Forest in return for developable federal land near Buckeye. Asked if the objective was to make money or protect nature, Babbitt shrugged. "Clearly, it is both."

More than anything, Babbitt said, he remains on a mission to press for land-use planning that recognizes the importance of open spaces, especially in Arizona. He cited Tucson as a limited success, metro Phoenix as a sprawling failure.

Meanwhile, Babbitt said he doesn't fret about a legacy.

"There's no need to do a lot of hand-wringing about that," he said. "In the sweep of time, the facts speak for themselves."

CALICO BASIN: Tranquillity lost

Couple selling property near Red Rock to BLM

By KEITH ROGERS
Las Vegas Review-Journal


Twenty-six years ago Gene and Becky Hutchinson bought a small ranch house on more than 2 acres of sandy soil off a gravel road in Calico Basin, away from the hustle and bustle of Las Vegas.
Except for their dogs barking when strangers approach, it has been a peaceful spot at the edge of Red Rock Canyon's scenic sandstone cliffs west of the city and far from its bright lights.

Purchased for a bit more than $100,000, the property has been perfect for the Hutchinsons, who came from Florida to work at jobs supporting Las Vegas' booming convention business.

But as years went by and the city's expansion crept westward, the rural community of Calico Basin lost some of its tranquillity. "This place isn't what it used to be," Gene Hutchinson, a retired union truck driver and Vietnam-era veteran, said Wednesday.

Tourists and rock climbers often camp on the side of the road, leaving behind their bottles and trash.

"I don't mind the climbing and the people coming out here to enjoy the area, but I don't like them leaving their beer bottles," he said.

"When I go someplace and take something, I take it back out with me," he said.

Once in a while, climbers attracted to the picturesque cliffs suffer injuries from falls and seek help at his house, which has the nearest land-line telephone. Even today, cell phone coverage is nonexistent there.

So when the Bureau of Land Management started buying property a few years ago to enhance the environment and aesthetics of nearby Red Spring Picnic Area, the Hutchinsons, too, considered selling their part of paradise.

Last month, the BLM announced it is proposing to pay $1.7 million for the 2.27-acre Hutchinson property in its latest round of planned purchases under the Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act.

Two years ago, the BLM used funding from the act to purchase the 5-acre Garland property near Red Spring for $3.5 million.

The act allows money from the sale of public land around Las Vegas to be used to buy environmentally sensitive lands elsewhere in the state. In all, more than 40 projects are proposed under this round, totaling more than $80.25 million.

The proposed Hutchinson purchase is part of the bureau's plan to buy some of Calico Basin's 60 parcels from willing sellers to enhance habitat for wildlife and benefit the public's use of Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area.

"Eventually they want the whole thing," Gene Hutchinson said Wednesday. "They want mine because we're right next to the park."

The Calico Basin community, which numbers between 75 and 100 people, evolved from land the government made available under the Small Tract Act of 1938 to attract residents to the West near the end of the Great Depression.

Of the 60 parcels, 23 have on them buildings, such as houses and horse barns. At 2.27 acres, the Hutchinson property is the smallest. The largest is 40 acres. That was sold by the BLM to the Girl Scouts in the late 1960s.

All of the other parcels became private holdings as a result of the Small Tract Act, said Bob Taylor, assistant field manager for the National Landscape Conservation System at Red Rock Canyon.

"The intent was to populate the West," he said.

One of Calico Basin's longtime inhabitants, Jake Stone, a cowboy and prospector, died about two years ago. His house and most of the antique equipment and wagon wheels that he kept along the road have been removed. The property's new owner hasn't approached the BLM yet regarding its potential sale, Taylor said.

In the meantime, some newer "dream houses" have been built in the basin and atop a ridge overlooking it, he said. It's unlikely that these properties will be sold. Reliance on well water from a small aquifer has precluded larger developments in the past, he said.

BLM spokeswoman Hillerie Patton said the bureau is trying to purchase any Calico Basin properties that fit with the conservation area's management plan and are in the hands of willing sellers. "As funding becomes available, we will try to make the acquisitions," she said.

The process will proceed slowly, she said, noting the bureau currently is interested in three Calico Basin properties whose owners want to sell.

"We're not looking to boot people out of their homes. We're not trying to do a land grab," Patton said. "By no means are we trying to encourage people to give up their homes to us."

Taylor said purchasing the Hutchinson property makes sense. It is adjacent to the conservation area and would enhance the park's open character.

Before the sale can be completed, the Hutchinsons, he said, will have to raze the house that was built in 1963 and begin restoring the acreage to its natural state. Otherwise, the BLM would have to contract the work out under the government's process.

That would entail purchasing abandoned buildings, and funding isn't available for demolition. Nevertheless, the cost to do that is included, up front, in the sale of the land.

"We just want the raw land," Taylor said.

That means the Hutchinsons will have to remove the septic tank in addition to all the buildings. Taylor said the water well, which is downstream from Red Spring, probably will be retired too.

"We'll restore that wash to its proper, functioning conditions, and bring in native plants," he said.
As it is now, the land provides habitat for the threatened desert tortoise and a state-protected bird, the phainopepla. The black-and-gray crested bird eats berries from mistletoe, a parasite plant found on old growth mesquite trees.

A healthy acacia tree also stands on the property, which sits at an elevation of 3,500 feet.

In the spring, wildflowers turn the landscape into a kaleidoscope of colors.

There are yellow desert marigolds, orange globe mallows and delicate Mariposa lillies. Brilliant fuchsia blooms poke from the top of an occasional hedgehog cactus.

Hutchinson said his wife has mixed emotions about moving, probably to Utah.

And he suggested that other Calico Basin residents will want to stay put.

"A lot of them ain't going to move because they've been here forever," he said.

NLCSA: How your local Representative voted

Inland Valley Daily Bulletin

The House of Representatives voted Wednesday to give legal recognition to a President Clinton-era conservation program that oversees some 27 million acres of federal land mainly in 11 Western states and Alaska.

The vote to write into law the National Landscape Conservation System came after assurances were given to Western and gun-rights lawmakers that the measure would not add new restrictions to current rules on hunting and fishing, energy development or grazing rights on the designated lands.

Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt created the system in 2000 as a means to conserve, protect and restore nationally significant landscapes. Overseen by the Bureau of Land Management, it is made up of more than 800 units, including scenic and historic trails, national conservation areas, national monuments and wild and scenic rivers. It makes up about 10 percent of the land administered by the BLM.

H.R. 2016 passed 278-140

Yes: Reps. Joe Baca, D-San Bernardino and Grace Napolitano, D-Santa Fe Springs.

No: Reps. Ken Calvert, R-Riverside; David Dreier, R-San Dimas; and Gary Miller, R-Diamond Bar.

House passes conservation program

By Aaron Sadler
The Morning News

Over objections from some Western-state lawmakers and gun-rights advocates, the House passed a conservation system that covers more than 26 million acres of federal land, mostly in the West.

The vote was 278-140.

The National Landscape Conservation System Act codifies a program created in 2000 as a way to protect and conserve national historic trails, scenic rivers, wildlife areas and national monuments. The system encompasses about 10 percent of the land overseen by the Bureau of Land Management.

Opponents maintained that the legislation would tighten restrictions on activities on the lands. Amendments to the bill protect grazing rights and ensure states may manage hunting, fishing and trapping on the lands.

Supporters said putting the system into law allows BLM to manage the some 800 units as comprehensive entities and may motivate Congress to provide more money to protect the lands.

Congresswoman blasts conservation measure

By Noah Brenner
Jackson Hole Daily

U.S. Rep. Barbara Cubin, R-Wyo., criticized a bill that would formally recognize and protect wilderness study areas and historic and scenic trails on BLM lands in Wyoming.

The National Landscape Conservation System Act would make permanent the National Landscape Conservation System, which officially recognizes national monuments, conservation areas, wilderness areas, wilderness study areas, wild and scenic rivers, and national scenic and historic trails. The National Landscape Conservation System is in the Bureau of Land Management.

House Resolution 2016 would solidify the National Landscape Conservation System, which was established administratively in 2000 “in order to conserve, protect and restore nationally significant landscapes that have outstanding cultural, ecological and scientific values for the benefit of current and future generations.”

The U.S. House passed the bill Wednesday night. The Senate still must consider the measure.

In Wyoming, the system includes 42 wilderness study areas and five historic or scenic trails, including the Continental Divide National Scenic Trail, which runs along the Wind River and Absaroka ranges near Jackson Hole and into Yellowstone National Park. In addition, the Snake Headwaters Legacy Act under consideration in the U.S. Senate would protect about 400 miles of the Snake River and its tributaries under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act.

Cubin took issue with what she perceived as vague language in the bill because it does not specify exactly what “values” the government is trying to protect, according to Cubin spokeswoman Rachael Seidenschnur.

“Unfortunately, this bill contains no clear definition as to what those values are,” Cubin said in a news release. “This stark omission allows federal land managers to interpret current law rather than basing decisions on sound science. It also gives an additional tool to any environmental trial lawyers unhappy with current land-management decisions in the West.”

BLM spokeswoman Cindy Wertz said her organization has already formulated and implemented management plans for NLCS areas in Wyoming and the legislation would not change those management plans.

NLCSA amended to preserve hunting and fishing

from the National Rifle Association of America
Institute for Legislative Action

Representatives voted overwhelmingly in favor of an NRA-ILA-backed amendment to H.R. 2016, the "National Landscape Conservation System Act." The amendment will preserve hunting and fishing on public lands for the benefit of current and future generations, and protect sportsmen's access for hunting, fishing and recreational shooting on certain public lands. The amendment was adopted by a 416-5 vote.

The amendment provides that:

• Access for hunting, fishing and recreational shooting will be assured on all appropriate National Landscape Conservation System (NLCS) lands; and
  
• States will manage, control or regulate fish and resident wildlife under State law or regulations in any area within the System. Regulations permitting hunting or fishing of fish and resident wildlife within the System shall be, to the extent practicable, consistent with State fish and wildlife laws, regulations and management plans.

"It is important for hunters, anglers, shooters and sportsmen--our nation's foremost conservationists--to continue to have ample lands and access to lands to enjoy America's hunting heritage," said NRA-ILA Executive Director Chris W. Cox. "With the adoption of the amendment offered by Congressman Jason Altmire (D-PA), hunting, shooting and fishing on certain public lands will be protected for current and future generations."

H.R. 2016 originally did not include language to protect hunting, fishing and recreational shooting or ensure continued access for these sporting activities on NLCS lands, but thanks to an amendment submitted by Congressman Altmire, the concerns of NRA-ILA, hunters, and shooters were adequately addressed.

"Conserving America's hunting lands is a priority for the tens of millions who enjoy hunting and shooting recreation each year," concluded Cox. "I applaud those who have taken the steps to further preserve this extraordinary American tradition."

Conservation bill to add protection for mountain land

Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument

Diana Marrero • Washington Bureau
Desert Sun

A popular destination for tourists and local hiking enthusiasts - the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument - could receive extra protection under a bill the House approved Wednesday.

The mountain terrain is among nearly 26 million acres of national monuments, historic trails and wilderness areas out West that could get additional protection under the bill, which now heads to the Senate.

The 278-140 House vote would officially designate the system of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management as the National Landscape Conservation system.

The lands include the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto mountains, the California coastline, a portion of the Grand Canyon in Arizona, the Black Rock Desert of Northern Nevada and the Grand Staircase in Utah.

These "crown jewels," of the West have fallen victim to vandalism, artifact theft, and off-road vehicles that trample plants and other habitats despite their designation as conservation areas by former President Clinton in 2000.

Rep. Mary Bono Mack, R-Palm Springs and co-chair of the National Landscape Conservation System Caucus, said, "Passing this bill is a positive step toward ensuring the protection of some our nation's most unique and valuable lands. … These valuable and culturally significant lands deserve the oversight and permanence that comes with Congressional recognition."

Conservation advocates say the congressional recognition - already given to the national parks and wildlife refuges - would ensure a steadier source of funding for the system.

The Santa Rosa and San Jacinto mountains tower over the Coachella Valley and encompass about 272,000 acres, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

House Endorses Conservation Program

By JIM ABRAMS
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The House voted Wednesday to give legal recognition to a Clinton-era conservation program that oversees some 27 million acres of federal land mainly in 11 Western states and Alaska.

The 278-140 vote to write into law the National Landscape Conservation System came after assurances were given to Western and gun-rights lawmakers that the measure would not add new restrictions to current rules on hunting and fishing, energy development or grazing rights on the designated lands.

Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt created the system in 2000 as a means to conserve, protect and restore nationally significant landscapes. Overseen by the Bureau of Land Management, it is made up of more than 800 units, including scenic and historic trails, national conservation areas, national monuments and wild and scenic rivers. It makes up about 10 percent of the land administered by the BLM.

By establishing the conservation system in statute, Congress would both draw attention to the high conservation value of the lands and prevent a future Interior secretary from abolishing the system administratively.

The Bush administration has indicated support for the bill. NLCS director Elena Daly told Congress last year that the act would "assure that these landscapes of the American spirit would be conserved, protected and restored for the benefit of current and future generations."

To assuage concerns that the bill was an attempt to impose the same restrictions on private use that apply to the national parks system, a provision was included to make clear that nothing in the bill alters current management authority and rules governing individual NLCS units.

That didn't satisfy Republicans on the House Natural Resources Committee, who wrote in a dissenting view that the true purpose of the bill "is to prevent many locally popular, wholesome family recreational opportunities and almost all economic activities from taking place on 26 million acres of BLM land."

Similar legislation is being considered by the Senate. The bill is H.R. 2016.

Major Land Conservation Initiative Passes House

Diverse conservation coalition commends House action

NewsBlaze - Folsom, CA

WASHINGTON - The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation today that formally recognizes 26 million acres of wild and historic lands in the first congressionally designated conservation system in the past 40 years.

"These lands play an increasingly important role in protecting our natural and historic resources," said William H. Meadows, the president of The Wilderness Society, one of 75 conservation, historic preservation, faith-based, recreation, business and place-based friends groups supporting the bill. "We look forward to the Senate taking action on this important legislation."

The National Landscape Conservation System Act, H.R. 2016, formally recognizes and protects the best lands and waters managed by the Bureau of Land Management. The National Landscape Conservation System was administratively created in 2000 to "conserve, protect, and restore these nationally significant landscapes." But without the Congressional stamp of approval provided by this legislation, the Conservation System remained susceptible to being dissolved. The bill ensures that lands within the Conservation System remain a single system which will allow a greater communication within BLM.

The National Landscape Conservation System encompasses many historically and ecologically important areas, including 15 national monuments, 13 national conservation areas, 36 wild and scenic rivers, 148 wilderness areas, 4,264 miles of national scenic and historic trails, and more than 600 wilderness study areas.

"Many of these lands contain man's first imprints on the American landscape in the form of kivas, pueblos and rock art," said Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. "Because they represent our shared heritage, they richly deserve the recognition that this legislation gives them."

Conservation system protecting 26 million acres deserves permanency

The Patriot-News - Harrisburg, PA
EDITORIAL

Whether located in California, Montana or other states, the nation's public lands belong to all Americans.

And all Americans should care about this public landscape that incorporates much of the natural grandeur, historical and cultural sites that are part of the national inheritance.

But not all special places have been set aside as national parks, nor should they be. Many, in fact, are scattered among the 264 million acres administered by the Bureau of Land Management.

In 2000, then-Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt set aside by decree 26 million BLM acres of particular significance to form a National Landscape Conservation System.

Now an effort is under way in Congress, with a vote in the House scheduled for Wednesday, to give the conservation system permanent status.

No additional funding is involved in this legislation, which incorporates more than 800 existing units, including 15 national monuments and 604 wilderness study areas. But what the legislation does do is confirm in statute the special character of these places and ensure that they are treated accordingly.

Many of the units rival national parks in their attributes. But they are, and will continue to be, managed in a way that protects their remote and unblemished character. The system also represents a move away from managing individual public-land units to one that recognizes and encompasses the broader ecosystem and ancient human presence.

But not everyone thinks this is a good idea. There are those who want these areas to be open to exploitation or damaging off-road vehicles, as if access to millions upon millions of other acres isn't enough.

That's why it is important that this legislation be viewed as a national issue, not strictly as a western issue. We urge the Pennsylvania delegation, especially midstate Reps. Tim Holden, D-Schuylkill, and Todd Platts, R-York, to vote to protect this quintessential American landscape for today and for future generations.