Environmental activism is patriotic, and it’s essential these days because America’s public lands are at grave risk. That was the message of Clayton Daughenbaugh, a Sierra Club staff member from Chicago who spoke to the local arm of the club in Glenwood Springs last week.
“We are experiencing a critical time in the history of the conservation movement for stewardship of (public) land in our country,” he said.
Of concern is efforts by the current federal administration to eliminate measures in place for decades that preserve public lands, he said.
“In the last 100 years the majority of people are in favor of conserving lands. It’s important people be informed, and it’s important that people be active. That’s why I’ve been sent on the road,” Daughenbaugh said. “Any activism on behalf of public lands is a patriotic endeavor.”
Daughenbaugh highlighted public lands at risk in the West, among them the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, Utah’s red rock country and the Roan Plateau.
ANWR is home to a sizable caribou herd and a pristine environment, he said. Drilling for oil there, as appears likely with the passage in the U.S. House last week of the federal energy bill, will provide only a six-month supply of oil, he said.
Closer to home, revival of an archaic mining law has also opened the door for exploitation of Utah’s national parks.
“It will allow the government to claim any place where people walk or cows move as a location for a highway,” he said.
The law, RS 2477, gives county government the ability to put roads through national parks.
Salt Creek in the Needles area of Canyonlands National Park has already been identified as a potential highway, he said.
In addition, 2.5 million acres in Utah designated as wilderness study areas have been withdrawn from federal consideration for oil and gas development.
Here in Garfield County, on the Roan Plateau, 40,000 acres are eligible for wilderness protection, but are now at risk for oil and gas development, he said.
What is most alarming is the systematic effort of the federal government to “emasculate” environmental protection laws.
“The Healthy Forests Initiative purports to protect communities from forest fires, but the money is being spent to cut down the oldest trees,” Daughenbaugh said, and the “Clear Skies Initiative” actually allows more air pollution than it set out to eliminate. “Satan is trying to convince you that it’s in your best interest. Government’s strategy of deception is on going on across the country.”
Most alarming is a new U.S. Forest Service policy on resource management plans that countervenes the National Environmental Protection Act, which mandates public participation in federal land-use decisions.
“The Forest Service has made it so (comments) are categorically excluded from forest management decisions. Public participation is now optional in the national forest system,” he said. “That says they’re taking control of our public lands from us; that’s antidemocratic.”
Under NEPA, public comments “have legal standing in a court of law,” he added.
However, although the Forest Service does have a new policy in place, it does not exclude public comments, said White River National Forest spokeswoman Sue Froeschle. The new rule, called a categorical exclusion, is another alternative in the management of public lands under NEPA.
“You can either go to EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) or EA (Environmental Assessment) or the new rule. A categorical exclusion is applied to certain categories. The forest plan revision would fall into categorical exclusion, but that doesn’t mean you do not have public involvement,” she said.
When the White River revised its forest plan in 2002, the new rule was not in effect, she added.
“As we proceed with amendments to the plan we will be involving the public,” including scoping and legal notices, she said. “We’ll be engaging with our stakeholders.”

Contact Donna Gray: 945-8515, ext. 510
dgray@postindependent.com