Protect wild places

In America, we are losing 6,000 acres of open space every day. Our wild lands are too important to neglect.

Our wild places

• protect watersheds and drinking water

• provide species dependent habitat, critical winter range, big game migration corridors, and habitat for wildlife

• filter and protect the quality of the air we breathe

• absorb carbon dioxide pollution from the atmosphere

• provide recreational opportunities (Wild lands and protected areas support a large segment of the economy. Nationally, outdoor recreation contributes more than $700 billion to the American economy, and supports 6.5 million jobs.)

• offer haven and respite.

Some places are too special to develop and should be protected for us and for future generations. Residential expansion and related infrastructure, road building, industrial development and related activities all diminish the availability of our wild lands. Our wild areas need permanent protection.

Almost all we do and enjoy has a price for admission. Not so, our protected wild lands and special places. Our protected public lands and our private lands with conservation easements protect these values.

Only our lawmakers can act to save our nation's wild lands, our wildlife, migratory routes and wildlife habitat, our watersheds, our places of refuge, our environmental quality — the quality of life we value in the West and in the Roaring Fork Valley.

Several proposed actions in our region support the protection of wild places and wildlife. Please support the efforts of the Thompson Divide Coalition, the Hidden Gems Wilderness proposal, and the Sutey/BLM land exchange project to protect our special places from future development.

Support those who support the protection of our special places.

Dorothea Farris

Carbondale

Shameful decision by commissioners

It was a shameful decision of Garfield County commissioners John Martin and Mike Samson to oppose federal legislation the FRAC Act, which would put the oil and gas industry under the supervision of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Safe Water Drinking Act.

It was very reminiscent of the fight against Rocky Flat nuclear industry in the Reagan years of the 1980s. Of course, we all know now that Rocky Flats was highly polluted, though for years the industry flatly denied any pollution. People downstream were having babies with deformities and farm animals were born with too many limbs and cancers. Protesters were accused of being communists, a ploy to scare a part of the populace into silence. The EPA and the FBI discovered numerous violations of federal anti-pollution laws, including massive contamination of water and soil.

Throughout the remainder of the 1990s and into the 2000s, cleanup of contaminated sites and dismantling of plutonium-contaminated buildings continued. Now they are just worried that plutonium still left underground will migrate to the surface.

So our commissioners Martin and Samson side with the oil and gas industry by saying that there has never been a documented case of contamination. All one has to do is Google “fracking problems” to see the page after page from Pennsylvania to California of hydrocarbon toxin contamination from the gas frac'ing process.

These decisions are the same decisions being made across the world, supporting only economics, while health and safety are not even secondary considerations. We clean up at a great expense later.

So all of you who support these two, drink a glass of Silt or Parachute well water to their health. Don't smell it, don't light a match to it, and don't ask what is in it. Just drink and enjoy, knowing you are sending contaminants all the way to Mexico.

Alice Gustafson

Glenwood Springs

Feds should not intrude into private citizens' lives

Please read Article I Section 8 of the Constitution. It tells us what powers Congress has. They have no others. This is made clear by Amendments 9 and 10.

I also ask you to Google the case, Wickard v. Filburn. It is an example of how the Supreme Court went against the original intent of the Constitution as laid out by the founding fathers. This has been repeated ad infinitum since the 1940s. In turn, these laws, and decisions, have been like spraying a hose on the firewall of protections deliberately placed in the Constitution to ward off a power-hungry government.

Within a week, at least one house of Congress will attempt to add to this trend. Members of the House of Representatives will try to steal more freedom from its citizens in one bill, than has ever been taken in all previous acts of legislation combined.

Many may have voted for the present majority in Congress, but likely would not have had they been told the truth during last year's elections. Anyone remember John Salazar running on a “Public Option Health Care” platform? Neither do I.

I beg each of you to contact Congressman Salazar. Advise him that you're aware that he has no constitutional authority to force you to carry health insurance, nor does he have the right to tax you to pay for someone else's. Once the government has oversight of health insurance, they will have limitless power over our daily lives. They'll be in position to regulate how we eat, exercise, travel, etc. There's nothing that can't be done in the name of health care, and I for one have no interest to see how creative they can become.

The founding fathers would have rejected a government that fined its citizens for choosing not to purchase health insurance. I know because the Constitution they wrote has a theme of protecting the people against governmental intrusion into the private lives of the American people.

I ask you: What's more private than decisions you make regarding your own health and well-being? What answer will Congressman Salazar give?

Bryan Holloway

Glenwood Springs

Thankful that Garfield County didn't join RFTA

RFTA (the Roaring Fork Transportation Authority) has announced it will present Garfield County with a bill for $150,000, which RFTA says must be paid or RFTA will cancel the Grand Hogback bus service in Garfield County (Rifle to Glenwood Springs) effective in April 2010.

The service was contracted for on Dec. 18, 2006, in a contractual agreement between RFTA and Garfield County, and the total cost to Garfield County then was $248,000 for the year 2006.

On Oct. 16, 2008, RFTA and the county amended the 2006 agreement and agreed to $625,000 for the Grand Hogback service for the year 2009. The cost more than doubled in two years.

Notably, there is no signed service agreement requiring Garfield County to pay RFTA any money after Dec. 31, 2009, for the Grand Hogback route. If RFTA defaults on their agreement to provide the Grand Hogback services during 2009, Garfield County can demand repayment of its money. The agreement is a contract.

Moreover, Garfield County should operate its own bus service from Rifle to New Castle and let RFTA continue to provide ridership from there. New Castle is a RFTA member and will always have bus service to points east. Annual cost for Rifle to New Castle bus service could be done for a lot less than what Garfield County is paying RFTA now for the Rifle to Glenwood service, a distance difference of only 12 miles. RFTA never reduces their costs, and until RFTA starts charging their Aspen visitors some fee for more than 1 million free rides they are using annually, this will likely continue.

Garfield County residents would be required to pay whatever RFTA asks for bus service (the “fair share” approach) and at a level of service dictated by RFTA if Garfield County had joined RFTA. All residents in unincorporated Garfield County can thank their spiritual deity of choice that Garfield County did not join and hope that the county commissioners will see the savings value in having their own Garfield County bus system for the Rifle to New Castle route.

Walt Brown

Glenwood Springs

Keep our public land accessible to everyone

As a native born and raised here, and as an avid hunter and sportsman, I've basically grown up on the Flat Tops and surrounding areas. And I'm very concerned and troubled about what I've been hearing about the Hidden Gems Wilderness proposal.

Like most everyone here, I've been hunting, fishing, camping, hiking, 4-wheeling all of our public lands and get great enjoyment and pleasure when I'm up there. I know I'm not the only one who feels that way about them.

I personally think making all the areas this group wants into wilderness is a bad thing.

First, President Teddy Roosevelt signed and made into law our public land system and national forests, for everyone to enjoy and have access to. That's for young, old and handicapped. We all need them to enjoy.

Right now things are set up not only for our generation here and now to use and see, but also for further generations as well. If this turned into wilderness very few will see it, let alone be able to use and enjoy it, not to mention what areas that are left public will end up overused by everyone.

Our state already has two national parks, several national monuments and wilderness areas, including a huge one on the Flat Tops. What we need is public lands. If you love Colorado and our national forests make sure and let these environmentalists know how you feel and more importantly write your congressmen and senators and tell them we all need public lands for recreation and commercial uses.

Our state makes millions each year from our public lands, not just recreational sportsmen and -women but also economically, thousands of men and women make their living working on our public lands that we need. So this new proposal would definitely hurt our economy worse than it already is.

If you love our public lands, please let's keep them just that, public land that's accessible for everyone.

Thank you,

Ricky Lively

New Castle

Biking with wolves

Mr. Ralston says he saw a pack of wolves? In western Colorado? You really think ranchers would let that happen?

Oh, and what a surprise, The Roaring Fork Mountain Bike Association doesn't support Hidden Gems.

Donnie Grange

Glenwood Springs