By Chris Stewart
In July 2015, Garfield County was forced to declare a state of
emergency based on rapidly declining school enrollment. Simply put,
their schools are dying because families cannot stay in the county. And
why can’t they stay? Because there are so few jobs capable of sustaining
a family. The situation is destroying a great Western tradition of
ranching, farming and logging, while forcing families to leave their
homes. The result is dying communities and empty schools, with some
children being forced to ride on a school bus for almost two hours.
Since then, some in the media and the environmental
community have resurrected the narrative that Garfield County’s fate —
and that of similar rural counties — is simply a consequence of changing
economic trends: the old economy of ranching, mining and logging giving
way to a tourism-based economy. The narrative isn’t new, but it’s false
and deserves to be challenged. While it is certainly true that towns
like Escalante have for many years been trending toward tourism, it is
NOT true that the move has happened on its own. The situation has
largely been forced upon residents by misguided federal policies,
reminding us once again that federal government has a bad habit of
picking winners and losers in the public lands debate.
In 1996, President Bill Clinton used the Antiquities
Act to lock up nearly 2 million acres of Garfield and Kane Counties. And
it’s worth remembering that Clinton didn’t even have the courage to
announce the monument in Utah — he did it across the border in Arizona.
No wonder the creation of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
was an outrage to rural Utah. Environmental suits had already killed
hundreds of jobs in the logging industry and the monument compounded the
problem by shutting down a planned coal project that represented
hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars for both counties. Twenty years
later the monument remains a tragic case study of the federal
government running roughshod over the wishes of local communities.
Why rehash events of 20 years ago? Aside from the
renewed possibility of another monument designation in southern Utah,
there’s a bigger lesson here. There are long-term consequences when
government decides that one use of land should exclude any other use.
Let’s be clear — I recognize and support the important role that tourism
plays in our rural economy. I am proud of the beauty of Garfield County
and grateful for those who visit there. But I am offended by the idea
that ranchers, miners and loggers can be so casually tossed from the
land they have depended upon for generations. And as an elected
official, it’s maddening when this happens without any input from local
leaders.
Chris Stewart is Utah's 2nd District congressman.
Issues of concern to people who live in the west: property rights, water rights, endangered species, livestock grazing, energy production, wilderness and western agriculture. Plus a few items on western history, western literature and the sport of rodeo... Frank DuBois served as the NM Secretary of Agriculture from 1988 to 2003. DuBois is a former legislative assistant to a U.S. Senator, a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Interior, and is the founder of the DuBois Rodeo Scholarship.
No comments:
Post a Comment