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Show MARCH 1997 this is the place Bp SCORECARD Hh Honey [tm home! , | Bogey oO In Park City, ordinances apparls ently only apply to some residents. Take for example Park City’s height ordinance. Over a year ago, the city council passed a law limiting residential building height to 27 feet. But only in the town’s historic district is the ordinance enforced. Everywhere else in Park City, building iryin hard to tel| ; IN is allowed to 33 feet, thanks to a memo occasions, by the dead line On!.. What Lm Voth Where's Junior 7 from Mayor Brad Olch to the building department instructing them to ignore the ordinance. Although this faux pas has been brought to the attention of the city council on numerous 1D get throu theb T iS hectic! de have ce pans Oh, he's rushin to finish his it Son, W if you leave things +o the last minute y they done proper| Y | Ant ae is curiously never dealt with. It appears that at City Hall such things as ordinances mean very little. What is more important, apparently, is with which people you share your cocktails. se ° oe of, oe) PN. ® =A Birdie < Believe it or not, Cannon wants Rep. to make Chris Arches © National Park larger. Is this the same guy who campaigned on the Sagebrush Rebellion rhetoric of taking land back from the feds? Apparently it’s true. Cannon says he has no hidden agenda and wants to add 3,800 acres to Arches — lands that have been proposed as federally designated wilderness. The Lost Spring Canyon area is just north of Delicate Arch and is presently designated as a BLM wilderness study area. Cannon’s proposal includes the upper portions of Salt Wash, Lost Spring Canyon, itself, and several side canyons — some boasting 300-foot red rock walls and several small arches. Although the area has been tapped for permanent wilderness designation, adding it to the park may not be a bad idea. Bogey Q@_ Snowbird is floating new plans > for expansion again. Although the Bird offers great skiing on steep, long slopes known for deep snow, there ought to be limits to how much development Snowbird is allowed. Beyond proposing a lodge on the top of Hidden Peak and ski lifts in Little Cottonwood’s pristine White Pine Canyon, Bird officials now want to expand south into Mineral Basin in American Fork Canyon. Whether this is possible or not depends largely upon the Utah County Planning Commission, which is somewhat befuddled by the proposal. Snowbird’s execs say the Mineral Basin expansion will cause minimal environmental damage. In reality, this proposal will set the stage for further expansions. But unlike Park City area resorts, Snowbird is located on public land in a very fragile environment that already has been pushed to its limits. @ EDITORIAL Deja Vu: Bennet Seeks to Undo Monument Deja Vu. Utah Sen. Bob Bennett has introduced language that would Southern new open Utah's Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument to timber harvesting and mining — the most damaging of all industries to the environment. In doing so, Bennett glibly told news media that his bill would only make President Clinton keep his when ify.” Bennett's words bring a shudder to anyone who has ever enjoyed a nation- al park, national forest or other public land. But further, they impart the of multiple use, he meant timber har- ly the philosophy being espoused by lands in accordance with the principles mining. Not only do those words fly in the face of common sense and logic, but it signals Bennett’s intent to embark on a strategy that would simply undo the monument. Beyond that, it would set a precedent allowing lawmakers, like Bennett, Sen. Orrin Hatch and Rep. Jim Hansen, to negate the 1906 Antiquities Act that allowed the president to des- old Soviet Union. It goes beyond the ignate the monument in the first place. pale. Why When the president declared the passed within the 1.7 million acre designation can be used for grazing, fishing, hunting, hiking and camping. But with a slight of hand that would get him shot in a big stakes poker game, Bennett’s proposed legis- lation goes much further. Now the senator argues that when Clinton said the Secretary of Interior shall manage the PAGE set aside monu- vesting and Christopher Smart notion that the Clinton Administration is somehow comparable to the former dictatorial Communist regime of the monument last September, he said the land would be preserved so that it could be used and enjoyed as it always had been. That is, the lands encom- have the Grand Canyon and Grand Teton to name but a few. Perhaps Sen. Bennett would undo these national treasures as well, opening them up for timber harvest and mining. Nothing is sacred apparently but the almighty dollar. Imagine road building and drilling for gas and oil around Delicate Arch. Imagine timber harvesting in Grand Teton National Park. As ridiculous as that is, it is exact- promises on the use of the monument. The senator said he is using a technique former President Ronald Reagan employed with the former Soviet Union — what he called “trust but ver- presidents ments, including: Arches, Capitol Reef, in the world would anyone Bennett and the Utah political brokers. ; Bennett's proposal power- is deja vu all over again. It brings into focus once more, his disdain for the protection of public lands for all Americans, in favor of opening them up for a few monied special interests to extract and market the resources held within them. This won't be the last time we see Bennett, Hatch, Hansen and Leavitt designate a monument to protect some of the most wild, picturesque land in move with machinations that would diminish Utah’s and America’s trea- the sures. Leavitt's new proposal to create federally designated wilderness on an country and then open it up to mining and timber harvesting and all bring incremental basis is just another way to on the environment? Bennett’s bill is ludicrous But stop the popular move to protect 5.7 million acres of red rock country in the destruction on those its face. industries it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to anyone who has watched the Utah Congressional delegation or Gov. Mike Leavitt battle wilderness over the past three years. One Westerners 2 small have bit always of history: cried foul favor of a much smaller wilderness. So, here we go again. The battle continues with the professional politicians taking the side of big money industries while the people of Utah and America are left to fend for themselves. @ |