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Show HINCKLEY JOURNAL OF POLITICS 2002/2003 Utah Wilderness Wars: A Look at the Historical Background, Present Situation, and Future Possibilities for Public Land in Utah Eric G. Goodrich Utah's vast federal lands provide citizens with incredible beauty, solitude, and recreational opportunities, but they also generate extreme controversy among groups who disagree as to how these lands should be managed. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the arguments for and against wilderness designation have become more emotional, as they have continued to pit local citizens against environmentalists and wilderness advocates. This article gives a history of the wilderness debate, discusses applicable laws regarding the designation of wilderness, and analyzes the current politically charged climate of wilderness and public lands issues. The author analyzes the potential for collaborative solutions between opposing groups in the wilderness debates and draws conclusions about the eventual way in which public land issues will have to be resolved in an environment of perpetual competition between opposing interest groups. INTRODUCTION For years the debate has raged from the rural counties of southern Utah to the floors of the United States Congress over how much of Utah's vast public lands should receive wilderness designation. The debate is complex and diverse. It is the ranchers, miners, hunters, off-roaders, county commissioners, and country bumpkins versus the tree-huggers, flower sniffers, Sierra Club, SUWA, Al Gore, and Robert Redford. It's the Easterners versus the Westerners, liberals versus conservatives, and the cities versus the small towns. It's Senator Hatch (R-UT) versus Senator Durbin (D-IL), Representative Jim Hansen (R-UT) versus Representative Maurice Hinchey (D-NY). What happened to make an obscure state with only three members in the House of Representatives a focal point of national debate on how we should manage our public lands? How can we effectively and fairly manage our public lands? Like the debate, explaining how we got to this point is not simple, nor is it easy to come up with a solution. Each stakeholder comes to the controversy from an entirely different viewpoint and has goals that differ markedly from those of others involved in the debate. Reconciliation between the different sides seems Eric G. Goodrich graduated in 2001 with a B.A. in Political Science and Spanish. He served a Hinckley Internship with United States Senator Orrin Hatch in Spring 2000. Eric currently owns and manages a vinyl fence contracting business and plans to attend law school. The author would like to thank his wife, Heidi, and Ted Wilson for their support. nearly impossible in the current climate. This paper will examine existing law and its subsequent application with regard to wilderness and public land issues. I will especially focus on Revised Statute 2477 of the Mining Act of 1864, the Wilderness Act of 1964, the Federal Lands Policy Management Act (FLPMA) of 1976, and the impact these statutes have had on the way we have dealt with public land issues. I will also discuss the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, formed in 1996 by order of President Clinton. The formation of the monument merits discussion because like wilderness, it drastically changes the way in which the land has traditionally been used. Furthermore, the controversy and bad feelings generated by the Monument have had a significant impact on the political climate of the public lands debate. Finally, this paper will provide insight into the politics of the debate as well as analyze what needs to occur in order for each group to reach a resolution in the impasse we currently observe. I will focus on the three actors who are perceived by the public to be most involved in this debate. They are local government officials, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA), and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Of course, I will discuss other stakeholders, but generally the actions of others regarding the wilderness debate in Utah results from the influence and lobbying efforts of these three organizations. This assertion is based upon my personal observations of the press coverage and public visibility afforded to these players. 33 |