Senator Feinstein asks Obama to bypass Congress to create three desert monuments

Sen. Dianne Feinstein said she has asked President Obama to bypass Congress and create three new national monuments in California, giving federal protection to more than 1 million acres of mountain ranges, sandy expanses and forests lying roughly between Palm Springs and the Nevada border. The terrain encompasses overlapping biological zones that provide habitat for mountain lions, the California desert tortoise, bighorn sheep, fringe-toed lizards and more than 250 species of birds. Two bills introduced by Feinstein over the past six years languished in Congress amid conflicts among off-roaders, hunters, environmentalists, and mining and renewable-energy interests. Unable to gain momentum on her California Desert Conservation and Recreation Act again this year, Feinstein decided to ask Obama to act unilaterally by invoking the Antiquities Act to create the monuments.  Feinstein was encouraged to seek presidential action by conservation groups including The Wildlands Conservancy, the Sierra Club, Defenders of Wildlife, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Mojave Desert Lands Trust and Friends of the Desert Mountains...more