In a Jan. 31 op-ed written in the hyperbolic tone of a Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance fundraising letter, former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt accuses Utah leaders of a "crusade against America's public lands" to the detriment of the outdoor economy.
...Mr. Babbitt perpetuates several myths about Utah's land-transfer effort. Here are the facts:
Utah is working through Congress and the
courts, as provided in the Constitution, to achieve a transfer of
certain public lands.
Utah has no intention to "sell off" public
lands. The Transfer of Public Lands Act provides that only 5 percent of
the proceeds of any land sale would stay with the state; the rest would
go to the federal government, a disincentive to any sale. In a recent
public hearing, the chair of the Utah Commission for the Stewardship of
Public Lands, the group overseeing the transfer effort, said, "Public
lands will be sold off over my dead body."
The act excludes national parks, national monuments, wilderness areas and wildlife refuges from the proposed transfer.
...Control of our public lands by a federal government $18 trillion in debt
threatens these goals. Increasingly, limits on resources force our
federal partners to cut back their management efforts. Our forests are
dying and at growing risk of catastrophic fire. The National Parks
maintenance backlog is overwhelming. Recreational facilities are
deteriorating. Access is increasingly limited in areas important to the
outdoor industry. Scarce federal dollars go to defend against a flood of
lawsuits and, too often, judges, rather than agency professionals, set
public-land policy. The status quo isn't working.
People enjoy Utah's public lands for their character, not because they're federally owned...
James V. Hansen is a former Utah congressman from the 1st Congressional
District. He served as chairman of the Committee on Resources and was a
member of Congress for 22 years.
1 comment:
States have been managing their own lands for years, and quite successfully. Can some explain why they do not have the capacity to do so. Might require a transfer of resources and a marginal expansion of land management bureaucracies at the state level but this is hardly a new activity for states.
Post a Comment