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Show Bumine Makes Him Burn An Open Letter to the Superintendent Superin-tendent of Bryce Canyon National Park: Because the telephone calls I have made in the past have had no impact and they have not been entered into any record, I am lodging a public complaint so that my concerns may be taken more seriously. Specifically, I am opposed to your policy of controlled burning within the boundaries of Bryce Canyon National Park, clearly a contradiction of values, terms and common sense. You claim that your primary responsibility is protecting pro-tecting the natural resources of the park,-yet you are burning them up! At a recent meeting between you and local people and the owners of Ruby's Inn, you stated that you had only two choices: One, let God burn up the park and two, for you to do it. My question is who asked you to take God's place? When asked why there could be no other options, you, in representing repre-senting the National Park Service, Ser-vice, replied that the fuel loading problem (combustible materials) at Bryce is enormous, and we would have another Yellowstone if you did not burn, and that burning returns the nutrients to the soil. You said also that there is no viable market for the wood products. I do not agree that the fuel load is excessive or unnatural. We have neither the water nor climactic conditions to create a Yellowstone forest or fuel load and, because of the geologic formations of the canyon and the way that God built this place, I question that the same danger exists that existed at Yellowstone. Each national park should be assessed separately. The park has been seriously defaced by your controlled burning burn-ing and live trees, most of which received damage in the burning process are now dying and will now create a greater hazard than before the burn. Manzanita, which you destroyed de-stroyed in your controlled burning, was one of the unique and beautiful beau-tiful attractions of Bryce. If it returns, re-turns, it will take years. There was no explanation given giv-en about how seriously you considered con-sidered some other use for the wood that was destroyed. It could have been donated for pulp, chips for building products or fire wood. anything but burning it up and defacing God's handiwork in the process. An occasional natural forest fire that may or may not happen would be less expensive to the already overtaxed tax payers and a lot cheaper than a man-created man-created ongoing burning project that is only creating more problems prob-lems and more expense. I am an asthmatic and when you burn, you are violating my rights. While the burning is going on, I can not go outside to conduct con-duct my business or even travel to the hospital for medical help without the use of oxygen. Last summer was particularly bad. The winds held the smoke at low altitudes making it very difficult not only for me to breathe but for many of the elderly. How much consideration was given to the health of those who live near the park when your arbitrary decision to burn the park's natural resources resour-ces was made? I understand a bill is being considered that would ban all wood-burning stoves in Garfield, Washington, Kane and Iron Counties. It appears to me that the National Park Service is trying try-ing to control our lives and the total environment around the national parks of southern Utah. What is your position for Bryce Canyon National Park on this bill, given all the talk a few years back about "Integral Vistas"? If clear views for visitors are so important, why would you deliberately delib-erately elect to destroy those experiences ex-periences by the smoke from your controlled burns? Shouldn't the federal government be expected to uphold the same principles it is trying to impose upon U.S. citizens? citi-zens? Garfield County has both benefited ben-efited from and suffered from the tourists that Bryce Canyon National Na-tional Park has brought here. On one hand tourism has helped the county economically, but at the same time, we have lost the foundational industries that have traditionally provided underlying stability and dependable year-round year-round full time jobs because of environmental constraints. In a round-about way, it seems that the National Park Service is trying to do whatever it can (and whatever we will sit still for) to limit the number of people coming to see the parks. It was a real black eye for the government and the National Park (See LETTER On Page 6-A) m. .. Letter From Page 2-A system when the parks were closed a few years back during budget conflicts. Many families from abroad had said they had saved for a lifetime to come to the U.S. and specifically to Bryce Canyon for their vacation and when they got here, the park was closed. Most were very upset and commented that they would never again be able to return. One Japanese family asked if the Government was bankrupt. It put the U.S. in a bad light. It also seems a bit ridiculous to pay people to keep the park closed instead of keeping it open. What good was a layoff of the park employees if they were paid to stay home and not work! At the recent Rubys Inn meeting, meet-ing, it was pointed out that gates are being constructed at BCNP to keep people out, which you said was partly for the safety of park employees and their families.. What ever happened to "We the People"? I thought the federal fed-eral government and its property belonged to us. What right does the federal government or its employees em-ployees have to keep us from using our national parks? In addition to my concerns about the violation of Bryce Canyon Can-yon National Park's overall mission mis-sion to protect its natural resources, resour-ces, the park esthetic values (including (in-cluding the views from the overlooks), and local health issues, is-sues, I have one more important issue. I am one of the local i merchants whose livelihood now depends almost entirely upon the tourism industry essentially the only remaining private industry in Garfield County. My business depends upon the visitors who come to see Bryce Canyon and the surrounding area and is .affected directly by what the park does. What you do translates directly to my bottom line. How do you respond to my concerns? Doug Ahlstrom TroDic |