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Show Comments From Cannon Hearing Continued We continue with public comments com-ments from the Chris Cannon hearing hear-ing held in Escalante on June 2. t ' i i i Larry Ripplinger, Boulder Ripplinger said, "I wrote a little pamphlet called Monument, Is That Your Final Answer. Maybe a few of you have seen it. I just wanted to reiterate what Rick said when he first started. You know, if these areas are being managed so badly, why are they still so beautiful? Why did they have to (See CANNON on page 5-A) CANNON From Front Page have a national monument declared? "Because all these years, it has been maintained with thought and planning and care. I don't see any new signs of desecration or destruction, destruc-tion, so what is the purpose of the monument? "Now, the worse thing to happen to these areas are the recent declaration of monuments as announced an-nounced on national television. Because it brought swarms of people in here expecting a lot of amenities, restrooms and restaurants, restaur-ants, campsites and all of these things. "My son-in-law happens to be the only mechanic in Boulder and you can't believe the amount of people that we have to go down and pull out of the sand right on the roads and the different places the problems have come, because they are not ready for them. This didn't do anything for the benefit of the people, believe me. "Now I just want to read you a little bit of something that I had in my pamphlet, just to remind us all. Karl Marx considered the elimination elimin-ation of private property key to the establishment of a socialist government. govern-ment. There was good reason behind be-hind this premise. If the people had no value left in their property, that value must be in the hands of the government. The terms property rights and property control were synonymous. Property rights were the ability of the individual to exercise control over his property. It's only through the right to control the use of property, that the individuals can make that property produce value or wealth. "If. regulation or law transfers control of one's property to the government, then the ability of the property to produce wealth is also transferred to the government. Marx was right. The elimination of private property is essential is socialism or communism is to supplant a free society. "Now we have to maintain state control over these lands. 'We hired the BLM and the Forest Service to watch over these areas. But that's all it was for. And in the last 50 to 25 years, great strides have been taken to take care of the environment. "Now they have, Congressman Cannon, a new project called the Wildlands Project. Are any of us familiar with that? The Wildlands Project intends to make a corridor down through the middle of the United States, excluding 50 percent" of the area, leaving it only to nature. They're saying that 50 percent of America needs to be 'rewilded.' "We have an archipelago of islands surrounded by wildlands. They want to move us out. And they don't give any regard to custom or culture. They feel their priesthood knows best, so to speak. And I say, we need to put a stop to it and we need to end this now." r ... it: X J Barry Barnson, Escalante - "My name is Barry Barnson. I live in Escalante. I'm a farmer and rancher here. Patrick Diehl talked about the economics and what it's going to do for Escalante. "We've been for four years trying to complete an Environmental Environ-mental Analysis (EA) with some incompetent BLM people. And that's my opinion. And there's no way, under the Federal law that it should take four years to produce an EA. Give us an answer what we're going to do! But during this four years, up here our water right now. We've let more water go by us this year than we've used in two. "But even the waters that we're getting, because we're normally short of water after the first of July. We're taking everything we can get out which is silty water. "I just completed cutting a hundred acres of hay. I can take you up there and take a bale of that hay and drop it on the ground and there will be more dust fall out of that bale of hay. That to me is economics. I figure my crop of hay that I've lost due to that silty water, has cost me approximately $60,000 this year. "I supply all of the hay to the south rim of the Grand Canyon for mules. That 6,500-7,000 bales, I don't know where it will go. And that's economics. I mean, we talk about what the tourism is going to bring us. We've fought this battle for years. Every year we fight it. And I've been on the board of the Irrigation Company. We've had meeting after meeting after meeting with them. They give us a song and dance, we've got to do this, we've got to do that. We go and do it and come back and now they want to take 60 percent of the water that we want to put into this reservoir. Which defeats the purpose of the reservoir to maintain a half mile of a riparian area. Which is, I can't use the words I'd like to, but, it's not right. "And this is where, if we have to deal with these type of people. We should be able to deal with competent people. I mean, we have to pay for engineers, we have to pay for attorneys and everything else to do battle with our own government. And that's not right! And it's, I don't know. I'm frustrated to the point that you know you "It's gone. There's nothing here (See CANNON on page 7-A) CANNON From Page 5-A for us. So your kids leave. They are not afforded the lifestyles we've had before. They don't make farmers far-mers no more. They think they can go pick them up off the street in Salt Lake and you don't. It's born and bred in you. "I attended the graduation last night when they talked about this monument over at Piute High School. And they honored six veterans from World War II. And these gentlemen didn't have the opportunity to complete their education and they afforded me the freedoms that I enjoy today. But not one place in this monument down here, does it afford them same people that give me my freedom, where they can go and enjoy this monument unless they're 20 years old and can walk down with a backpack and look. If they are going to make a monument they'd better make it accessible to each and every person in this country, regardless of their age or ability to walk. And all that's took place so far down there is been a playground for the environmentalists. "One other question. I always felt like our government dealt with the majority of the people, not with the majority of the money. These environmentalists are definitely in the minority in this country. They are not in the majority. And they should be given their just dues of their opinion. But because of their financial backing, they seem to carry a little more weight than the rest of us. "But they've always talked about draining Lake Powell.. It's been 20 years in the electrical industry. Easiest thing in the world to drain Lake Powell. Walk into the bottom of that dam. ..push them three big buttons on them OCBs. And Lake Powell has no longer got water in it. That power shuts down. And let it ride for 30 days. Wherever that power is out, it's out for 30 days. Let this American people find out what that does for us. Then have a meeting with them. You won't have very few environmentalists show up to Lake Powell. Because the outcry of the people is not going to tolerate it no longer." l- - I, . Allen Porter, Escalante "For you that don't know me, I'm Allen Porter, the son of Que Porter and grandson of Parley Pratt Porter. Parley Pratt Porter stayed here his whole life and had nothing. My father moved away for a short time and worked at Hill Field and brought his family back. When I got married I moved away. "Patrick Diehl said there's going to be money here. I want him to know that the kids that I graduated with, those that stayed here, don't have any money. The gentleman that they work for, Stephen Steed, I have sold insurance in Provo for Beneficial Life, I've seen rich people. Stephen is supporting a lot of people that work around here, he is keeping the town going. And he's not rich. "The monument is a standard of our stupidity to the timber, the grazing, the cattlemen and the monument. We need to work together. When we let people move in from California (and we know what situation California is in with their electricity) and we let people move in because they want to escape and they bring their values here to stop the water, to stop the cattle "The monument is a representation repre-sentation for us not standing up for our rights and not fighting together. If we don't start taking a step forward and fighting together, the monument is going to be what is left of Escalante. "Patrick Diehl thinks that a clean lifestyle is where our kids should clean toilets, wait on people at the Frosty Shop, be janitors and take people around and show them the sites. There are guys like Pratt Gates, who know the country and could probably make a lot of money as a guide. There are some of these other cowboys like Myron Carter that could probably take people and show them sites and get paid for it. "But this is not the lifestyle I would rather teach my son how to cowboy or to work at the sawmill, to be a person who gives to society instead of someone who blocks, water or anything, who blocks timber, blocks cattle. Even if some people are trying to come up here to solve this by telling us that we're not smart to do what's best for us. "We're talking about the monument.. .My father is in the hospital with a heart attack right now and wrote me a letter as well as all three Congressmen, the town etc. Orrin Hatch wrote a big letter to my dad, Bennett wrote a big letter, Hansen called my father and talked to him for about an hour and a half. "I got a form letter from your office. I didn't get anything from Cook's office. And the Governor wrote a letter saying maybe it was private land. (Dad wrote him about the Barker and North Creek Lakes. About the Forest Service closing them off and the fact that we need more accessibility and availability to our resources). "We need to have a new battle cry here in Escalante. I hope a hand full are as radical as I am. We need accessibility. Accessibility to the timber, accessibility ,to the grazing rights, accessibility to the mining rights, accessibility to water rights, accessibility to the right kind of life that we need to enjoy and that we want our kids to enjoy." i 1 t',-,; Tony Thayer, Escalante Hi, my name is Tony Thayer and I am new to Escalante. I am glad I have been welcomed by many of you but I am concerned of the economic viability of the community. commun-ity. I drive through Fruita, which is in Capitol Reef National Monument Mon-ument and it's an historic town. It's no longer viable. And even though it sounds good that tourism and service industry jobs are going to bring money into this community. com-munity. I would ask Patrick whether or not you know of the new environmental studies that actually shows that tourism takes more of these sources from a community than they put back in. "And how are we going to have the infrastructure for this kind of growth, these kinds of services, when there is no more water available. Unless we turn around and sell the water that we have. "Escalante is encircled. There isn't much room for growth. The water is tied up, so I don't know how this is going to happen. Presently I'm working for a major resort here, fairly locally, within a 50-mile radius, and tourism is down. And they, employ 600 people. And they are suffering. And we are based on tourism and we have nothing else to give us money, then what is going to happen when people all over the world are broke. And I think that is coming. I don't think that we are going to see good economic times in the future. "I am also concerned about the water rights and I think as American Amer-ican citizens we're getting really discouraged with the government. We don't trust them any more. I read the plan Monument Plan it sounds good, it says water rights aren't going to be changed, grazing rights won't be changed. Take a look at Klammath Falls, Oregon where recently water rights were taken away from people, who fought in WWII, who were guaranteed these water rights to come in and homestead and develop this and now they've taken them away. With the verbiage that a promise is made to be broken. "We don't trust you. So, I feel like we need a little more control. I think the people here have been highly active and I don't see many of their needs being met. It's good to come to these meetings, it's good to be active and involved but we need some kind of response. We need someone that we can trust and depend upon." ' |