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Show 6A Emery County Progress Castle Dale, Utah Tuesday February 26, 2002 Commentary Standing Still No Option in Public Land Issues Why not are?" his shift has been fostered and accelerated by special interest groups, who have little local presence but great influence in Washington T By DENNIS WORWOOD just leave things as they That question has been raised through the years whenever publie land issues were discussed. It is boingasked again as Emery County ponders whether a National Monument is a good way to manage the San Itafucl Swell. Its a fair question, hut may he the wrong question. Perhaps we should begin by asking I low are things on publie land?" Imagine that we are on a sailing ship in mid ocean. No land is in sight, and the water is too deep to drop anchor. To complicate matters, a stiff gale is blowing and the waves are rolling high. In this situation we have two alternatives: Chart a course and attempt to sail, or drift wherever the wind takes us. Standing still is not an option. T his is the dilemma we fueein Emery County. Whether we choose a Monument, some other alternative or simply do nothingat all, things wrill not stay the same. Powerful forces are changing the w ay we use public land. The first force is people. Within a days drive of Emery County are several of the nations fastest including Salt Lake, Denver, Phoenix and Las Vegas. These city folks are venturing out on weekends, and have discovered Emery County. A recent Forest Service survey revealed that an astounding28,0()0 people visited the Cleveland Reservoir - Millers Flat area iH'tween Memorial Day and Lalor Day. Ninety percent of these people eaine from outside Emery County. Visitors from both coasts and foreign lands are coming in numbers. These tourists create economic opportunity, but also have an impact on the land. And the more people, the more conflicts arise between various users. The second force is a growing national awareness of publie land, like distant relatives w ho discovered they inherited the family estate, Americans have learned that they own public land out west. They want to have a say in how these lands are used and managed. In the past, most public land decisions were made at the local level. With growing national interest in these lands, the pendulum hasswmngto the other extreme. The trend is for national policies, laws and directives dictating how public lands will be managed. grow-ingeitie- s, ever-increasi- D.C. Although Emery County enjoys a wonderful working relationship with public land managers at the loeul and state level, w e have yet to discover how to influence national public land policy. Dr. Jeff Durrant expressed our frustrations well in his Feb. 19 Emery County Progress article. We have found a new openness in the Department of Interior under President Rush. It is that openness and concern for local input that make it possible to even consider a Monu- ment at this time. A third force for change is our economy. We are in the sunset years of a coal economy that has been very kind to us. State geologists tell us that we have perhaps 25 years of coal left. What will take its place w hen the coal is gone? And in the short term, how can we diversify our economy to provide a buffer from the roller coaster of the energy market? With nearly 40 percent of our local economy tied to coal, we simply have too many of our eggs in one basket. For the past three decades, we have made our living from the coal beds of the Wasatch Plateau. The San Rafael Swell has been our playground. As the coal dwindles, more of our economic activity, in the form of tourism, will shift to the Swell. Monument designation would definitely be a step in that direction. Are we ready to take that step, and is a Monument the best way to do it? The fourth force for change is looming national designation of public lands, wilderness being foremost. I have no crystal ball to tell me how and when the wilderness debate will end, but the trend is apparent. The Bureau of Land Management completed its inventory of wilderness lands in the early 80s, and recommended that Congress designate 1.8 million acres of wilderness in Utah. That figure was later revised to include the 3.2 million acres of land currently managed as Wilderness Study Areas. More recently, Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt ordered a of BLM land that recognized 5.8 million acres with wilderness character. wilderness advocates conducted their own inventory and drafted their own In the meantime, proposal. In 1989, Representative Wayne Owens introduced the Utah BLM Wilderness Act that would have designated 5.1 million acres of wilderness in Utah. The Bill attracted in the House and 100 none in the Senate. After Mr. Owens unsuccessful bid at the Senate, the bill w as by Representative Maurice Hinehey of New York as Americas Red Rock Wilderness Act. The change in the bills name was significant, as it signaled the intent to shift the debate from Utah to the national level. The Utah effort was being patterned after the Alaska Model, which resulted in the designation of 57 million acres of wilderness in Alaska, despite objections from the states Congressional delegation. The strategy is simple: Make your cause a national issue, meaning that legislators from any state can earn environmental brownie points by supportingit. Under that model, concerns of the affected state are irrelevant. Mr. Hinehey s bill wrould have designated 5.7 million acres of wilderness in Utah, and had 1 16 cosponsors in the House of Representatives. By 1997, the bill had attracted 144 in the House and was introduced for the first time in the Senate with 1 1 At about this time, wilderness advocates conducted another inventory of BLM lands to determine how much wilderness had been lost since 1989. They instead found an additional 3.4 million acres of wilderness-quality land, and drafted a new bill to designate 9.1 million acres of wilderness in Utah. As of May, 2001, in the this bill had 157 House and 15 in the Senate. It now has more Congressional designate portions of the San Rafael River, Green River and Muddy Creek as Wild and Scenic Rivers," w hich could affect access and upstream water rights. The Utah Environmental Congress recently completed a wilderness inventory of Utahs National Forests and are preparing a bill modeled after Americas Red Rock Wilderness Act. They have identified 1.3 million acres in the Fish Lake and Manti LaSal National Forests as potential wilderness. Traditional activities such as Opposed to Monument than the 1980 Alaska wilderness act had w hen it was passed. Acreage and support have steadily increased despite fierce opposition from rural Utahns. Americas Red Rock Wilderness Act would designate 49.5 percent of Emery County as wilderness. It is not my intent to debate the pros and cons of wilderness designation. I simply observe that this proposal would rezone half of Emery County, and we have had no say in the matter. If passed, it is bound to have significant longterm effects. Other legislative proposals are waiting in the wings. In the near future wre will likely see a bill to I am adamantly opposed to creating a national Monument in the San Rafael Swell area. Almost all of my vacation and free time ( at least three or more weeks each year ) is spent in Utah as a motorized user of the BLM lands in this area. This is absolutely barren land with no use except to motorized users. To create a national monument would make it inaccessible and unusable except for roads that would have to be paved and maintained. A national monument makes this area a land of no uses (except as a money pit). - Leroy P Abernathy Wheatland Wyo. Remembering Not to Forget Have you seen those Palm Pilots that seem to be the new in" thing? Apparently they are the equivalent of a memory expansion pack for your own brain, allowingyou to remember things that you would otherwise forget. They sound great to me. I need about three of them. I also need them to be surgically attached to my body, otherwise Ill just leave them somewhere and forget exactly where that somew here might be. The reason I need something like a Palm Pilot is because I have a nasty tendency of trying to go in several different directions at the same time and when I finally do reach my destination I forget exactly what Im there for. My kids like to watch me when I do things like that and then they'll say something along the lines of y oure getting old Dad. While that may be true, I know of thousands of people who are older than I am who seem to remember not only who they are, but what they are supposed to be doing at any given time. The other twn staff members of the Emery County Progress, aware that I am woefully lacking in both short and longterm memory, do their best to help me remember what I am supposed to be doing. There must be a dozen calendars in the office, each one of them listingwhat meeting or appointment is going on when, why and where. The problem with so many calendars is that they have become a form of wallpaper for me. I look at them all the time, but I dont actually see them. Because of that 1 routinely ask people (sometimes even complete strangers) if they have any idea what 1 am supposed to be doing. What makes me wonder about my memory (or the lack thereof) is why does my brain choose to remember certain things and completely disregard other items? For instance, last time I checked I could recite from memory every line of Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss. But I cant remember the door to my house three out of four days I pull out of the driveway, so I have to stop the car and if I've closed go back to check. What alerted me to this memory problem I seem to have developed is a day last week in which I forgot virtually everything that wras scheduled for the day. Because of that I received a call from the office asking me if I remembered that scouts were visiting that afternoon. I did not remember that fact, but after being reminded I distinctly remember having writ ten it on the calendar. Being far from the office my faithful staff covered for their memory-impaire- d coworker and after kicking myself for forgetting yet again, I reminded myself to try harder to remember in the future. But what I didnt realize is that I had not yet forgotten everything for the day. A little later 1 spoke to my daughter and she informed me that her brother had not yet made it home from school. I told her not to worry and immediately after hanging up the phone I began to worry. Because my son is very responsible and if he had some activity going on after school he would have talked to me about it. Ten minutes later I called back and he still hadnt made it home. So I climbed in my car and rushed for home, my mind swirling with terrifying thoughts of what could have become of my son. Just as I was pulling into Orangeville I called my home again and asked my daughter if her brother was home and she said yes, he had just gotten home from his hair appointment. Now the funny thing about that was not only was I the one who made my sons hair appointment, but I had reminded him in no uncertain terms before he went to school to not forget the hair appointment. Of course, I had forgotten completely about that. My children had a good laugh at my expense when I walked in the door. I wish I could say that was the end of my forgetfulness for one day, but it wras not. It wasnt because my daughter had gymnastic classes that evening. I am proud to say that I did not forget about those classes, no sir, but I did forget what time they were held. So when we walked into the gymnastics studio we wondered why there was no one else there. So I asked and was told that no, my daughters gymnastics class did not begih at 6:30, it ended at 6:30. As I walked back out to my car with my daughter shaking her head sadly at her father I looked at her and said rather meekly, No, your dad is not crazy. Im just losing my mind." tetters to the editor should focus on public issues j nther than private personalities or entities. All submissions mud fcs verified prior to publication. The Emery County Progress reserves the right to edit letters not only to satisfy space constraints, but potential liability concerns. 1 . - - J - - a board for recreation, a board for roads and a board for fire. These boards give a recommendation for an at large representative to the board and this recommendation has been followed by the county commission in the past. Since the We have CONFUSED L DAVIS - -- i , ! t (Woru'ood is chairman of the Emery County Publ ic Lands Council.) LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Its All Who You Know By JAMES grazing, motorized access, and predator control are being scrutinized as never before. Thats how things are. Thats w hy things will not stay the same. New questions are raised. What course do w e chart? Will a Monument help us get there? If it wont, what will? This should be our focus in the days and weeks ahead. t current commission has been in office there have been two recommendations made, that I know of, by two different special service district boards to our county commissioners; but the good old boy from Hunting-to- n has his own agenda of w ho should be on these boards and runs our county by micro management. So, he got his way instead of the peoples way because he ignores the boards recommendations and leads the gentleman from Ferron right along ; 1 ! with him. Have you ever wondered why there are so many two to one votes on the commission? Its obvious that the outlying areas and boards are being totally ignored by the good old boy network. Maybe we need to really look at whom we vote for and whether theyre looking out for their own interests or the interests of the public. I think we the people of Emery County (all of the county) should speak out and not let tw o people run us all. Caleen Wilcox Elmo HOMEMADE A Call to Attention By PAULA WELLNITZ Last week we approached the idea of being under tension as being a call to attention to the life experiences we need to be aware of. We began to consider ways to focus on them to make sure they do not negatively effect our relationships. We know that not only does tension cause us problems, other tensions make it possible for us to do what we need to do. If we didnt have that extra energy of attention, many things w ould not get done. We would not do the work we need to do to earn a living, to clean or cook; play a game for the fun release and the challenge whether we win or not; etc. You may also know some people who may be said to love their tensions. If something doesnt happen in their lives that could create tension, they find a way to make it so. They may feel slighted or unjustly treated for no reason. They get angry over nothing. Sadly, these people do not hear with an inner awareness and know the joy of positive attention within. Sometimes we might say such a person has a chip on their shoulder or borrows trouble. As they talk about what they see as bringing tension, it is not to dissipate it, but to feed off the others attention given. Since that person could be me; I need to periodically see if that is so in the way I act. I can then be sure to act for a balanced way of being. To talk about our tension (or by shouting encouragement to our team) is one of the wTays to relieve whatever signs we are aware of in ourselves of intense attention. But talking hopefully will lead to some positive action. That action may or may not be indirectly connected with what caused the feeling of tension. If it is the loss of a job, constructive action would be to look for another job. If one has received violence, the positive action would be to be more creative ' to stop the violence or avoid it or change the situation. We always have something we can do about what brings on our attention, from outside. We will use what we know from our experience. That ; can include what informaexperience tion we get from others. Therefore, we can read to learn other means of healthy livingwith tensions or talk with our friends. A support group can be a help for many We may need to take some of the energy of the tension to push ourselves to join a group. On occasion some of us will need help individually from a counselor. Simply to actively address debilitating tension by any of the above can be a source of tension. However, each movement towards doing so makes it easier to do so next time. Our energy is diverted from negative use toward fear to positive release to face whatever is feared. ; When you do what you find helpful,' . " it will be much more believable to your child who perhaps fears going to school, the dark, another childs actions, etc., that she can deal with herhis tensions and come out OK. . ' |