Increased Tourism Through Monumentizing: Whom Does it Serve? and.. Why Not Withdrawal Instead?

The Center for Western Priorities had  piece in their newsletter that I think is worthy of discussion.

The Dolores River Canyon in southwestern Colorado contains significant historical and Indigenous cultural sites, spectacular geological formations, world-class recreation opportunities, and incredible biodiversity, all in the largest stretch of unprotected public lands in Colorado. A presidential monument designation—which 92 percent of respondents said they support in a Colorado College poll released last month—would help protect this canyon from industrial and extractive development, while increasing economic activity in rural communities along the river corridor.

Contrary to inaccurate claims made by a small contingent of monument opponents, all existing mining, drilling, and grazing rights will continue to exist if the monument is designated. That means anyone who holds a valid mining claim, drilling lease, or grazing right will be able to use the land just as they would have prior to designation. In addition, visitors and local residents would be able to continue engaging in a wide variety of recreation activities, and Tribal members would also be able to continue accessing land inside the monument for cultural, spiritual, and traditional uses and activities.

Finally, a monument designation would likely have a positive economic effect on Mesa and Montrose Counties due to increased tourism. A 2017 report by Headwaters Economics looked at the economic impact of national monuments on seventeen neighboring western communities and found that they all experienced economic growth following the designation of a new national monument. Learn more about the proposed Dolores Canyons National Monument in a new blog post from Center for Western Priorities Communications Manager Kate Groetzinger, and in this short film, part of CWP’s Road to 30: Postcards series.

“Protected” seems to be a code word used by certain interests.  Is standard BLM and FS management not “protected”? On The Smokey Wire, we spend many, many electrons on various facets of protective designations and regulations.  I’d like to substitute for “protected” in this discussion “not protected enough for us” which would encourage them to tell us to learn exactly what the land is to be protected from.  If there is some looming threat out there, what is it?

I’ve seen maps in which Roadless doesn’t count as “protected” because to some folks’ way of thinking, it’s not “permanent.”  In real life, though,  Roadless has stood the test of time.  Using the Antiquities Act to make land management decisions actually may not stand the test of time.

Again, we hear the argument “your access won’t change” but that’s not folks’ experience.  Maybe another option to Monumentizing would be to restrict future mining and oil and gas via a withdrawal.. if that’s really the point. but maybe withdrawals don’t count in meeting the “protected” target.

This is what the FS and BLM are doing with the Thompson Divide:

The USFS and BLM requested 224,713 acres of lands be withdrawn from all forms of entry, appropriation, and disposal under the public land laws, mining laws, and mineral and geothermal leasing laws, subject to valid existing rights

Apparently this is for 20 years, according to the Center for American Progress.

To ensure these values are lasting, in October 2022, the Biden administration announced it would protect the area from new oil and gas drilling. This move, formally known as a “mineral withdrawal,” would take more than 225,000 acres off the table for oil, gas, and mining development, protecting an area long known to be too special to drill.

Just an aside, when I worked on Colorado Roadless, some groups did not want leasing even with NSO stipulations (no surface occupancy), which means that it could be drilled only from structures outside the “protected” area. I asked them why this mattered since there is no environmental impacts to the protected area (other than carbon, but that’s another story). All I can figure is that there is a deeply imbedded form of “oil and gas” hate in some folks, which I would like to understand better. Or perhaps I should say a “domestic oil and gas hate”. Which may remind us a bit of the wood products industry.

But what I think is most interesting is the economic argument. What happened to Edward Abbey’s thinking? I thought that that was part of the western US environmental movement.

“Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.”

― Edward Abbey, The Journey Home: Some Words in Defense of the American West

There is certainly a counterargument from the quality of life perspective.  First, “economic growth” doesn’t help everyone equally.   Trails become more crowded. You can’t find a place to park at the trailhead.  Camping needs to be restricted to campgrounds due to overuse.  Then you have to make reservations through recreation.gov and a large corporation gets its take.  And more than likely you won’t be able to get a reservation at all.  Tourists need housing, they use water and sewage and electricity.  Rentals become too expensive for workers in comparison to tourists.  Life is just not as good for people who live there, especially for those who are at the lower economic rungs.

Let’s go to a Headwaters analysis.

Headwaters Economics, a non-partisan, non-profit economic research institute conducted three studies covering 17 national monuments designated between 1982 and 2001. They have released new numbers for 2017, and those numbers are exciting. According to Headwaters: “…trends in important economic indicators either continued or improved in each of the regions surrounding the 17 national monuments studied. Data for per capita income, a widely accepted measure of prosperity, show that this measurement increased for the studied counties adjacent to every national monument in the years following establishment. This rise in personal wealth is significant, particularly in rural areas where average earnings per job are often declining.”

With all due respect to our Headwaters friends, and given that some of my favorite people are economists,  per capita income may be greater because more well-off people moved there.   Or some people are making more money from tourists. What if we interviewed people (not in the tourism industry) about their quality of life and how it has changed? How is this process different from gentrification in cities, which everyone acknowledges has a good and a bad side?

Anyway, it just seems odd to me that an Admin who cares about the marginalized and lower income folks may be acting in ways that are counter to their interest.  I wonder whether this point of view is expressed in WH discussions about Monumentization.  And if the communities are not as well off, shouldn’t their voices be heard more or less as preferentially as other less-well-off communities?  If Monumentizing is about what Western Priorities says it is.. then why not do a mineral withdrawal? If not, what is it about? Other than meeting someone’s protection targets.

 

People Wary of Monumentizing: Dolores River Version

A tree begins to bloom inside Dolores River Canyon, Apr. 23, 2023, near Bedrock. (Hugh Carey, The Colorado Sun)

Shout-out to Jason Blevins of the Colorado Sun for this story that shows the different local points of view around Monumentizing.

Pond, a former nuclear engineer who now runs an RV park in Naturita, quickly launched a petition at change.org saying the monument designation would cancel all mining in the uranium-rich area, end hunting and cattle grazing and curtail motorized travel.

“I think it absolutely, positively could be a threat,” Pond told The Colorado Sun. “If you look at the history of monument designations over time, more and more restrictions are put in place as more people start coming. We could start losing access. These are public lands me and my family and our neighbors have enjoyed for decades. A lot of local people have a lot of concerns.”

In the first 10 days more than 2,100 signed the online petition, many leaving comments blasting the plan.

Scott Braden, a Western Slope conservation advocate whose Colorado Wildlands Project is among the 13 conservation groups behind the monument proposal, said the petition “is making mischaracterizations about what a monument will or won’t be.”

“It will not end ranching. It will not close Jeep trails. It will not stop hunting. That is simply not what we are proposing,” said Braden, pointing to an online fact sheet he helped assemble to better inform residents about the plan.

This is the old “not in this decision” trick, as we have seen with the BLM Rock Springs draft RMP.. no, strictly speaking, this decision isn’t made in the designation but it narrows the activities allowed in future decisions.  And if the point is not to change activities to “protect” things.. ultimately.. why make BLM and FS folks go to the work of developing a new plan for the Monument.. unless the whole point is to attract more tourists.. and thereby not really “protect” it at all.  Puzzling.

And the ever-popular State of the Rockies poll, (generic and biased questions asked of people who aren’t familiar with the issue, IMHO).

Colorado College’s annual State of the Rockies poll this year asked 436 Colorado residents about protecting existing public lands surrounding 162 miles of the Dolores River to “conserve important wildlife habitat, and safeguard the area’s scenic beauty and support outdoor recreation.” The poll showed 92% of respondents support the protection plan and 6% oppose.

Advocates for the monument last year commissioned the nonprofit research group Conservation Science Partners to identify “biologically rich pockets of unprotected public lands” in Colorado. The group’s report showed the five-county region around the Dolores River as the largest and most biodiverse of the 71 areas identified, with high biodiversity values that support a variety of animals and plants.

Here we go.. unprotected from whom and what, exactly?

Natalie Binder, who has converted a 120-acre former mining camp above the San Miguel River in Naturita into a boutique retreat and artist compound, said even if a national monument increases visitation to the region, “it will not change the remoteness of these lands.”

“A monument is not the magic wand, nor does it come without some complexities,” she said. “However, we are rooted in supporting efforts that allow us to bring more people together, provide opportunities for more people and open our doors with kindness to all travelers who are passing through looking for something a little different.

It does sound a bit like.. more people are wanted, at least by some.

Pond said a shutdown on new mines would not work for the communities along the Uravan Mineral Belt, a 210-square-mile geological zone that has produced more yellowcake uranium and radium than any other region in the country. But there hasn’t been any hardrock mining in the 2,100-resident West End community for several decades and the coal-fired power plant in Nucla closed in 2020 and was demolished. There are hundreds of dormant mines in the area needing remediation.

But the price of uranium is up, over $100 a pound for the first time since 2007. There is a buzz in the West End communities of Bedrock, Naturita, Nucla and Paradox around a mining revival, Pond said.

What I think is missing from that part of this piece is:  there seems to be a nuclear energy renaissance going on around the world, including this COP28 statement:

At COP28, Countries Launch Declaration to Triple Nuclear Energy Capacity by 2050, Recognizing the Key Role of Nuclear Energy in Reaching Net Zero

Logically that would require more uranium mining.  And as we know, some Tribes don’t want it, so.. wouldn’t we want to think about that before Monumentizing? As to polls, here’s another one (granted it was Australia)

An exclusive Newspoll conducted for The Australian shows 55 per cent of all Australian voters supported the idea of small modular nuclear reactors as a replacement technology for coal-fired power.  But support was highest among 18 to 34-year-olds – the demographic most concerned about climate change – with 65 per cent saying they would approve of such a proposal.

If I were involved in that discussion, I’d ask the proponents exactly what they are looking to “protect” from.. industrial scale recreation? Moabization?  and then have the discussion move on from there. Because right now, it looks to me (to link to our previous discussion on targets) that certain groups, those with a heavy influence on certain politicals, have a “protection acres”… target.  And in pursuit of that target, perhaps they don’t actually care what “protection” means exactly.  And these local people in the article do care about the specifics.   So, given that.. what is the right process to involve local people in Monumentizing?

When Monumentizing Goes Wrong?: The Case of Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument

This is related to yesterday’s post..Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks is considered to be a co-managed federal unit between the Cochiti Pueblo and the BLM. It’s been closed for three years.

Here’s a story from KRQE News 13.  The story starts out with how difficult it was to find anything out about the closure and when it might be reopened:

The National Monument was closed to the public in the 2020 pandemic shutdown and it remains closed today. Why? KRQE News 13 went digging for answers.

For months, emails and phone calls requesting interviews with the state’s Tourism Department, the Bureau of Land Management, the Secretary of the Interior’s Office, Congresswoman Teresa Leger Fernandez, and Senator Martin Heinrich were answered with replies such as, “We will not be providing a comment or participating in this story at this time.”

Cochiti Pueblo leaders also declined to comment. The BLM updated the statement on its website on April 28, during the weeks of KRQE’s requests for information. Finally, the BLM agreed to chat via Zoom.

“BLM has been meeting regularly with the Pueblo,” said Jamie Garcia, an outdoor recreation planner with the BLM. “We have been in discussions about what reopening looks like.”

This isn’t very transparent.  Conceivably it could have been possible to give that answer sooner. One wonders if the co-management aspect may have made it more difficult to arrive at one answer that could be communicated.

On to the Monumentization aspect:

A ‘Double-Edged’ Sword

Garcia said they’re addressing long-standing issues including over-visitation, staffing needs, and resource protection, alongside Pueblo de Cochiti. “We’ve had such high recreation use and we want to make sure that we are taking a step back and really looking at that big picture item there, and seeing how we can move forward in a more sustainable and responsible way,” Garcia told KRQE News 13.

The Cochiti Pueblo remains closed citing Covid-19 restrictions, blocking road access to the national monument which sits on BLM land. As part of the presidential proclamation, the site is managed by the BLM in “close cooperation and partnership” with the Pueblo.

“I suspect that the designation of the National Monument was a double-edged sword,” said Dr. Smith. “On one hand, it provides resources and legal protections for preservation. But once someone sees a national monument on a map, it’s close to Interstate 25, it’s close to the Albuquerque-Rio Rancho-Santa Fe metropolitan areas — then that just becomes a magnet to draw more people,” Smith explained.

DR. GARY SMITH, UNM PROFESSOR

There’s a calculus here.. do more resources show up in enough quantities to deal with the enhanced visitation from Monumentizing? What, I wonder, was the Monument protected from?

Data published in a government-issued 2020 science plan shows visitation levels each year since the monument designation. In 2000, Tent Rocks recorded 14,674 visitors.

In 2001, that jumped to 25,000 annual visitors with the presidential proclamation. And since then, visitation has soared to more than 100,000 people a year before the covid shutdown.

(Tent Rocks Visitations by Fiscal Year )

“But even before the pandemic, I recall seeing activity discussions between the BLM and Cochiti trying to think about how to handle the large crowds, that it was having a detrimental impact on the landscape that they were joint stewards to preserve,” explained Smith.

During Spring Break 2018, KRQE News 13 reported on the massive line of cars waiting to enter Tent Rocks National Monument. Visitors were waiting 90 minutes just to park their vehicles.

“In the past few weeks, they’ve been over-capacity,” said Danita Burns during that Spring Break surge in 2018. “People from Australia, people that are coming in from Japan. It’s quite the destination now,” she said.

Monuments can attract tourists from outside the area.. this may be good for some in local communities, but lead to problems of overcrowding and reduction of the experience for locals and wildlife.

According to the pre-2020 data report, “Current visitation is nearly three times the original planned capacity,” which was designed to hold about 50,000 visitors annually. That’s been a concern for those working at the site.

Dr. Gary Smith with UNM students at Tent Rocks in 1992.

Timed ticketing, fee increases

So, will visits to the monument move to timed ticketing? Garcia says an online reservation system along with a fee increase has been proposed.

“We have not implemented anything yet, but it is something we would like to do, make sure that we can keep up with growing costs of supplies and demand,” Garcia told KRQE News 13.

Meanwhile, locals are still seeing advertisements for Tent Rocks, and still waiting for the monument to reopen. “Oh, I’ll look forward to going back again, for sure,” said Smith.

Dr. Smith said his colleagues and friends have been messaging him, asking for updates about the monument. “Do you think Tent Rocks will open this spring? How long can they keep it closed? You know, so it’s – everyone wants to know,” Smith said.

The Bureau of Land Management says it will update plans for Tent Rocks on its website, but they have yet to provide a timeline on when the national monument will reopen. Part of that depends on when the pueblo decides to open its gates to the public once again.

It seems to me that Monumentizing, in some cases,  is like many politically symbolic activities.  Someone announces something that sounds good and makes a splash… then leave the same old folks with the same pots of dollars and competing priorities to actually carry it out.

Over the Weekend – Blue Mtn. blues, Flathead secrets and monumental benefits

I guess this is a bookend to Sharon’s “Friday News Roundup.”

 

BLUE MOUNTAINS

I recently provided an update on the status of the Blue Mountains forest plan revisions here.   And here’s a little more detail on that, especially on the question of “access.”  (This term gets used for a couple of different things, and this one is about closing roads on national forests rather than creating access across private property to reach public lands.)

One group says its leading the charge to fight for what they call “original rights” is Forest Access for All.  “We defend the rights that we’ve had since Oregon was a territory, free reign where we go and utilize the forests which are public lands,” says Bill Harvey, a group member and former Baker County Commissioner. “A couple decades ago the Forest Service began closing off sections of the forest and that’s when Forest Access for All was formed.” Harvey says his group’s particular ire is at the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest (WWNF), which he claims “have closed thousands of miles of roads in the forest the last twenty years.”

The group also has other “conflicts” with the Forest Service include the need for  more vegetation management, economic benefits of (motorized) recreation, and better public engagement.

“By law right now, we have an open forest. They will admit it, everybody admits it, and it’s in the books, I’ve seen it a million times. It is an open access forest,” says Harvey. “Why in God’s name would we want to give that up? Nothing benefits us to give up our rights that we have currently. We’re not asking for more rights, we’re asking for the existing rights to stay in place.

I’m going to disagree with him on this one, and I hope the Forest Service does, too (although it looks like they could have done a better job of setting the locals straight on this before now).  In 2005, Subpart B of the Travel Management Rule changed the culture of motor vehicle use on roads, trails, and areas from “Open unless closed” to a system of designated routes.  As for why?  The goal was to reduce resource damage from unmanaged motor vehicle use off that road system.

 

FLATHEAD

Newly revealed emails show that the Flathead National Forest under then supervisor Kurt Steele looked to keep a proposal of a tram up Columbia Mountain from public view for more than year prior to it being first proposed.

Does this sound familiar?  It sounds to me like the “Holland Lake Model” that got the forest supervisor a “promotion” to forest planning.  In this case the Forest properly rejected the proposal as inconsistent with its forest plan (thank you forest plan!).  But it does suggest a pattern of incentives and behavior that may be broader than the Flathead National Forest.

“The process where the public comes into play is when it becomes the NEPA process,” Flathead Forest spokesperson Kira Powell said about the emails.

“Bringing you into the conversation about this potential project on the Flathead NF because it’s coming from investors who apparently have the financial resources to build a tramway, meaning they likely have political savvy also … wrote Keith Lannom, who was deputy regional forester for Region 1 at the time …”

This account offers a window into the role of “political savvy” in Forest Service decision-making.

 

ORGAN MOUNTAINS – DESERT PEAKS NATIONAL MONUMENT

Since President Barack Obama created the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument in 2014, visitation has tripled and the national monument has spurred economic growth in the Las Cruces area as well as other communities near the national monument, according to a new report.

According to this overview, the report looks at the various factors that made this particular monument so successful, including its location relative to population centers and the uses it caters to.  Also local community support.

“We have always recognized that the establishment of the monument was due in large part to the grassroots effort at the local community organizations and individuals,” Melanie Barnes, the state BLM director, said. “And due to this engaged and proud community, the monument has seen an increase in visitation.”

She said the BLM is working on a resource management plan that will address land use and resource protection. The public scoping period for that plan recently ended.

 

House of Representatives v. BLM – monuments and the public lands rule

Grand Staircase – “visitutah.com” (Larry C. Price)

Dismissal of a lawsuit against President Biden’s proclamation restoring the boundaries of the Grand Staircase and Bears Ears national monuments allows the NEPA process to develop a management plan for these areas to proceed unhindered.  Biden ordered the BLM to work on replacing the Trump Administration’s resource management plan, and the BLM published its draft RMP on August 11 for public comment.

BLM may proceed unhindered, that is unless Congress decides to hinder them.  The FY2024 Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Bill the House Appropriations Committee passed in July, which the full House of Representatives is expected to vote on in September, includes a rider that would require the BLM to manage the Grand Staircase NM in accordance with the plan finalized after Trump reduced the monument.

Which is the better planning process – RMPs based on public involvement through NEPA or RMPs based on appropriations riders?

The bill would also deny funding to implement the BLM’s public lands rule (a popular topic with many posts here from Sharon).  Another bill would force BLM to withdraw the rule (without considering all those public comments).

Kya Marienfeld, wild lands attorney for SUWA, called the Utah congressional delegation’s lack of support for the state’s public lands disappointing but adds that opposition is offset by more enlightened members of Congress who actively support the Grand Staircase and other public lands.

Appropriation riders seem to be kind of crap-shoot in the turmoil of budget negotiations, so I have no idea what the betting line would be on President Biden signing off on this one.  The “more enlightened members of Congress” may have more of an influence on defeating the withdrawal proposal.  Is that a bad thing?

 

 

Why Monuments and Not National Conservation Areas? More Monument-al Reflections

A few quotes and reflections about Monuments. In some sense, they seem more about politicians getting credit from supportive groups, rather than good things happening on the ground. And those experienced with BLM processes please correct me if I’ve gotten some things wrong.

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First of all, there’s kind of a philosophical question about “protection.” If there are the many wondrous things talked about, say, in a Monument proclamation, then existing laws and regulations must have already protected them, so no biggy, really. To protect archeological sites on far-ranging areas like 1.1 mill acres, you probably need more law enforcement. The same groups that work so hard on Monuments (I’m talking big NGOs) could easily fund those kinds of collaborative efforts.

So if we go by the rhetoric, then there are unspecific future things that could be proposed, that we need to keep from happening before they are proposed, because we can’t trust existing statutes, regulations and processes to protect the environment. And the environment in this place is more important than elsewhere, for various reasons.

So what is this desire to Monumentize really about? For the Prez, it could just be politics as usual, rewarding friends with a frisson of punishing enemies (Utah is right next door to this one). But that’s not entirely it.

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I ran across an article in the Wall Street Journal about a rich person named Elaine Wynn in Las Vegas and the Basin and Range National Monument. This story is about Congress, but the principle’s the same..important ($) people want Monuments.

She has remade herself as a world-level art collector and a force in public art, supporting the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and using her influence to help create a national monument designation to protect land around Michael Heizer’s City—a 1.25-mile-long earthwork sculpture in Nevada. She has taken her work in Nevada education to the national level: She is chairman of Communities in Schools, which provides resources to disadvantaged children. It recently received a surprise $133 million gift from MacKenzie Scott, Jeff Bezos’s ex-wife.
***
Michael Govan, director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, says Wynn was a key figure in the 2015 creation of Basin and Range National Monument, which protects the 704,000 acres surrounding Heizer’s City. President Barack Obama approved the designation. “When [Elaine] started making calls to Congress,” Govan says, “somehow I was received in a different way.”

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Let’s also look at this op-ed from the Durango Herald by an outdoor businessperson from last Friday.

“There is a new community-led movement for the president to designate the Dolores River Canyon Country as a national monument, which would open new avenues for local economic growth, increase resources to thoughtfully manage these wildlands and deepen the quality of life in our community. We believe that a landscape-scale national monument would open the door to better management and conservation, and provide additional resources to land managers to accommodate for sustainable recreation and continued access.”

Hmm. “New avenues for local economic growth”- what does that mean exactly? More people coming to town? But the area is overcrowded already. And as we’ve seen with the San Gabriels, a Monument does not necessarily come with more funding attached. I don’t know about “deepening the quality of life” but in other parts of Colorado, more people does not actually deepen the quality of life. And again, the author says “provide additional resources to land managers.”

I see several problems with this thinking. 1. More growth and people is not necessarily better, not if it leads to housing problems, etc. 2. Monuments need Monument plans, which distracts managers from.. actually managing (and reopen disagreements, which doesn’t necessarily “deepen the quality of life” at least not for the people involved). 3. Even if they did get additional resources, would the new number of bodies outstrip the new resources? and 4. Even if they did get more resources, as new Monuments pop up everywhere, they will be competing with each other and who is to say that a Dolores River Monument would beat out Chimney Rock, Brown’s Canyon, or Canyon of the Ancients, or Bears’ Ears or ..

Another interesting part of the op-ed is this..

Senators Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper are leading the way to protect the Dolores River Canyon County, and have introduced legislation to designate a National Conservation Area to protect nearly 68,000 acres of the river corridor through Ponderosa Gorge. We are very supportive of this legislation and urge the senators to do anything they can to ensure it becomes law. However, the legislation does not encompass the entirety of the watershed, and politics in Congress are so uncertain that there may not be a viable path for the bill to become law.

If you take a look at the bill, it tends to have the same feel as a Monument; it is in fact very detailed about what’s in and what’s out. It has a FACA committee to be established within 180 days.. good luck with that! It’s got motorized travel only on existing routes, no new temp or permanent roads except for public health and safety, yes to grazing, but withdrawals from future minerals (401b). Uranium crops up again..

(1) IN GENERAL.—Nothing in this title affects valid leases or lease tracts existing on the date of enactment of this Act issued under the uranium leasing program of the Department of Energy within the boundaries of the Conservation Area.

UPDATE: BASED ON CORRECTION FROM TSW READERS

So there are National Conservation Areas.  Congress gets NCAs, the Prez gets Monuments.  One can imagine if political friends of an Admin want this kind of thing, it’s much easier to get.. just a stroke of a pen (OK, so obviously they do talk to some people in advance).   But of course, as with NCA’s, first they make the decision about what’s in and out, and then have public comment and an EIS on any decision space left. Which kind of leaves the impression.. yes, NEPA is superimportant, as is public involvement, including marginalized communities.. but not for really important decisions.

It seems like an advantage of Monuments that they can do some Service-First-y things with the FS; whereas I don’t know how they handle FS land in and around NCAs.

But anyway, for now, just for the BLM, we have a variety of conservation designations – Monuments, ACECs, NCAs, Wilderness, and WSAs. Perhaps other citizens find this to be needlessly confusing? And there’s more encouragement of ACECs in the proposed BLM public lands rule.

If I were elected President (a candidate of the Good Governance Party), I’d ask the Secretaries to make a table of all the existing protected area designations on the Forest Service and BLM. The table would include what activities are allowed and which not, with maps. For each specific area, I’d ask how much funding went to work within those areas. Then I think Admins and Congress would have a better picture of the whole array of land restrictions, and where the bucks actually get to the ground. I’d also think that some of these designations could be fitted into simplified bands across the FS and BLM as to what activities are in and out, to increase public understanding of, and perhaps make it easier to enforce, the rules designed to protect from impacts.

BNIK Monument: Protected Only From Future Mining Claims? A Look at What Will Continue on the Monument

Note: this post has been updated to reflect corrections on the mineral leasing vs. locatable question supplied by a member of the TSW community.

Having read through the Proclamation, my impressions were that 1) there’s a lot of human roads, powerlines, and other human development within the Monument, 2) not much is going to change except for some things about new minerals*, and 3) there’s a lot more planning and advisory groups and and public involvement. Which will keep agency folks likely tied up from doing the fuels and prescribed burning funded by Congress and managing recreation pressure. With reduced numbers of people and difficulty hiring- on the other hand, I didn’t see a required plan timeline (maybe I missed it). And it often takes two years to get all the FACA paperwork done, which would potentially take us past the beginning of the next Admin. It might have been simpler to say “hey FS and BLM, you’re doing a swell job at protecting things, we’re just going to order no new mineral leasing..”. But perhaps there’s no legal way to do that kind of surgical intervention focused on what appears to be the real target.

*update-“Uranium is not a leasable mineral under the Mineral Leasing Act. It is locatable under the Mining Law of 1872. So DOI is closing off the land to entry under the Mining Law to stop uranium development. Those holding mining claims will likely be required to go through a validity determination to determine if they have a commercially viable mine under the tests established by that process. It’s possible that the withdrawal from all forms of entry under public land law could prohibit wind and solar facilities that are permitted under FLPMA title V ROW. They are only allowed to use public land for wind and solar if they obtain a ROW permit under FLPMA the public land law statute. All the existing infrastructure is a FLPMA Valid Existing Right and protected by Fifth Amendment, FLPMA and terms of proclamation.”

“History: 1. Clinton designated a number of BLM monuments at the end and when Bush administration arrived they were left with the planning that does go through NEPA.
2. Obama’s 20 year withdrawal of this same area was challenged by NMA (National Mining Association) unsuccessfully in AZ and Ninth Circuit. NMA v. Zinke [Salazar] (2017) arguing the Secretary lacked withdrawal authority among other reasons. The litigation started in 2011 over the NEPA prepared for the withdrawal by Salazar.”

And going back to the previous post, remember that to the GAP 1 and 2 types, the whole Monument is now more Protected (roads and all) than a Forest Service Roadless Area, or even than it was two weeks ago.

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Interesting story by Bobby Magill in Bloomberg Law..

The monument will help the US atone for forcibly removing tribes from parts of the Grand Canyon when Congress declared it a national park more than a century ago, a senior White House official said, speaking to reporters Monday on condition of anonymity.

Hmm.. helping “atone”.  Why not just give the Park back to the Tribes directly?

Anyway..

The monument will help address past injustices and protect lands that many tribes refer to as their ancestral home, the official said. The land around the Grand Canyon shouldn’t be open to new mining claims, the official said. Mining companies are interested in the area to help boost a domestic uranium industry they see as key to bolstering emissions-free nuclear energy. Environmental and tribal groups worry uranium mining will contaminate water flowing through tribal land and harm the Grand Canyon.

But the monument isn’t expected to block Energy Fuels Inc. from mining for uranium at its existing Pinyon Plain Mine, which will be within the monument about 13 miles south of the Grand Canyon.
Some Mining Continues
The company’s rights to uranium and high-grade copper deposits at Pinyon Plain have been affirmed by federal courts, Energy Fuels Vice President Curtis Moore said. Even with the monument designation, the company is preparing for production to begin sometime within the next two years, he said. The company has other uranium prospects in the area, and if the monument threatens any valid existing rights to those minerals, “we’d probably have to pursue a takings challenge,” Moore said.

“It just doesn’t seem like great policy to be locking up our best uranium deposits,” Moore said, calling them “carbon killers” because they provide fuel for nuclear power plants. All valid existing rights to minerals within the monument, including uranium, will be preserved, White House officials said. The monument affects only future mining claims.

Back to the Declaration:

 All Federal lands and interests in lands within the boundaries of the monument are hereby appropriated and withdrawn from all forms of entry, location, selection, sale, or other disposition under the public land laws or laws applicable to the Forest Service, other than by exchange that furthers the protective purposes of the monument; from location, entry, and patent under the mining laws; and from disposition under all laws relating to mineral and geothermal leasing.

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Public Involvement, some Service-Firstiness and Joint Planning

The Secretaries shall provide for maximum public involvement in the development of the management plan, as well as consultation with federally recognized Tribal Nations and conferral with State and local governments.  In preparing the management plan, the Secretaries shal1 take into account, to the maximum extent practicable, maintaining the undeveloped character of the lands within the monument; minimizing impacts from surface-disturbing activities; providing appropriate access for livestock grazing, recreation, hunting, fishing, dispersed camping, wildlife management, and scientific research; and emphasizing the retention of natural quiet, dark night skies and scenic attributes of the landscape.  In the development and implementation of the management plan, the Secretaries shall maximize opportunities, pursuant to applicable legal authorities, for shared resources, operational efficiency, and cooperation, and shall, to the maximum extent practicable, carefully incorporate the Indigenous Knowledge or special expertise offered by Tribal Nations and work with Tribal Nations to appropriately protect that knowledge.

I wonder if they need alternatives and an EIS ? “The Important People made all the Important Decisions without involving you, but you folks directly impacted are allowed to color within the lines we’ve drawn” -kind of demoralizing, I would think.

Tribal Nation Co-Stewardship

Lots of Secretaries’ “exploring” this and that language. again it sounds like standard policy under the 2021 Joint Secretarial Order number 3403. But maybe there are differences, perhaps knowledgeable people can point them out?

 The Secretaries shall explore opportunities for Tribal Nations to participate in co-stewardship of the monument; explore entering into cooperative agreements or, pursuant to the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act, 25 U.S.C. 5301 et seq., contracts with Tribes or Tribal organizations to perform administrative or management functions within the monument; and explore providing technical and financial assistance to improve the capacity of Tribal Nations to develop, enter into, and carry out activities under such cooperative agreements or contracts.  The Secretaries shall further explore opportunities for funding agreements with Tribal Nations relating to the management and protection of traditional cultural properties and other culturally significant programming associated with the monument.

The Secretaries shall consider appropriate mechanisms to provide for temporary closures to the general public of specific portions of the monument to protect the privacy of cultural, religious, and gathering activities of members of Tribal Nations.

There’s a Tribal Commission to give input on the plan and management of the Monument.  There’s also a FACA Committee with a RAC-like list of the usual suspects.

 The advisory committee shall consist of a fair and balanced representation of interested stakeholders, including the Arizona Game and Fish Department; other State agencies and local governments; Tribal Nations; recreational users; conservation organizations; wildlife, hunting, and fishing organizations; the scientific community; the ranching community; business owners; and the general public in the region.

The Monument Already Has Lots of Human Structures  and Those Things Can Be Expanded and  New Ones Built

Nothing in this proclamation shall be construed to preclude the renewal or assignment of, or interfere with the operation, maintenance, replacement, modification, upgrade, or access to, existing or previously approved flood control, utility, pipeline, and telecommunications sites or facilities; roads or highway corridors; seismic monitoring facilities; wildlife management structures; or water infrastructure, including wildlife water developments or water district facilities, within the boundaries of existing or previously approved authorizations within the monument. Existing or previously approved flood control, utility, pipeline, telecommunications, and seismic monitoring facilities; roads or highway corridors; wildlife management structures; and water infrastructure, including wildlife water developments or water district facilities, may be expanded, and new facilities of such kind may be constructed, to the extent consistent with the proper care and management of the objects identified above and subject to the Secretaries’ authorities, other applicable law, and the provisions of this proclamation related to roads and trails.

Transportation Planning

For purposes of protecting and restoring the objects identified above, the Secretaries shall prepare a transportation plan that designates the roads and trails on which motorized and non-motorized mechanized vehicle use, including mountain biking, will be allowed.  The transportation plan shall include management decisions, including road closures and travel restrictions consistent with applicable law, necessary to protect the objects identified in this proclamation.  Except for emergency purposes, authorized administrative purposes, wildlife management conducted by the Arizona Game and Fish Department, and the retrieval of legally harvested elk and bison, which are otherwise consistent with applicable law, motorized vehicle use in the monument may be permitted only on roads and trails documented as existing in BLM and Forest Service route inventories that exist as of the date of this proclamation.  Any additional roads or trails designated for motorized vehicle use must be designated only for public safety needs or the protection of the objects identified above.

It’s not clear to me if temp roads for fuel treatments would be OK..”public safety” “protection of species (species being an object identified above)?” But those wouldn’t be system roads so.. and here’s more on veg management:

The Secretaries may carry out vegetative management treatments within the monument to the extent consistent with the proper care and management of the objects identified above, with a focus on addressing ecological restoration; wildlife connectivity; or the risk of wildfire, insect infestation, invasive species, or disease that would endanger the objects identified in this proclamation or imperil public safety.  Nothing in this proclamation shall be construed to alter the authority of any party with respect to the use of prescribed fire within the monument.

Grazing and Fire Suppression

Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to prohibit grazing pursuant to existing leases or permits within the monument, or the renewal or assignment of such leases or permits, which the BLM and Forest Service shall continue to manage pursuant to their respective laws, regulations, and policies.

Nothing in this proclamation shall be construed to alter the authority or responsibility of any party with respect to emergency response activities within the monument, including wildland fire response.

Military Uses and Fish and Wildlife

 Nothing in this proclamation shall preclude low-level overflights of military aircraft, flight testing or evaluation, the designation of new units of special use airspace, the use or establishment of military flight training routes, or low-level overflights and landings for wildlife management conducted by the Arizona Game and Fish Department over the lands reserved by this proclamation.  Nothing in this proclamation shall preclude air or ground access to existing or new electronic tracking communications sites associated with special use airspace and military training routes.

Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to enlarge or diminish the jurisdiction or authority of the State of Arizona with respect to fish and wildlife management, including hunting and fishing, on the lands reserved by this proclamation, or to affect the State’s access to the monument for wildlife management, including access prior to and during the development of the management and transportation plans provided for above.  The Secretaries shall seek to develop and implement science-based habitat and ecological restoration projects within the monument and shall seek to collaborate with the State of Arizona on wildlife management within the monument, including through the development of new, or the continuation of existing, memoranda of understanding with the Arizona Game and Fish Department.

 

Does Monumentizing Really “Protect”? And Various Admin and Other Groups’ Thoughts on 30 x 30

 

This is the CEQ USDA DOI and Commerce joint write-up on how to achieve 30 x 30

 

I am going to go out on a limb here..I think the way some groups in tight with the Admin, or possibly the Admin itself (can’t easily tell), have chosen to classify federal lands for “counting” in 30 x 30 is messed up and potentially meaningless. To get started,  I think it’s important to define terms.   I’m going to capitalize Protection when I mean “protected areas as defined by various entities, that is, GAP 1 and 2, for the 30×30 effort.” In the next post, we’ll look at what’s in and what’s out based on the recent Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni — Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument (BNIK NM) declaration.  It seems to me mostly like BAU for the BLM and FS, but requiring another planning process :(.  I’m not sure that most of the reporters read the declaration itself and not just the press release.

The Center for American Progress (CAP) is a very powerful political entity and here are their policy recommendations.. it sounds like a laundry list of what the Biden Admin has been doing recently.

In a November 2022 report from its series on executive action to address the nature crisis, CAP took a deeper look at some of the most powerful conservation tools available to President Biden. In particular, the report identifies the top eight most impactful opportunities for near-term executive action. These include opportunities to designate new protected areas; expand national wildlife refuges; exclude sensitive and sacred places from drilling and mining; and establish national rules to guide conservation of U.S. Bureau of Management lands and the country’s oldest federally owned forests. In another publication from the same series, CAP highlights specific community and Tribally-led proposals for national monuments and marine sanctuaries already primed for executive action, from the proposed Avi Kwa Ame National Monument in Nevada to the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary in California. Enacting these recommendations will deliver real conservation benefits and should be prioritized.

They also indicated that to them, talking about “what counts” is beside the point.

However, heated arguments about “what counts” can miss the much bigger point behind this national “30×30” conservation goal. The ambitious 30×30 target can, and really must, be an inclusive call to action—a promise to jointly address the climate and biodiversity crises by accelerating the pace at which the country is protecting nature.

As a scientist,  I see two problems with CAP’s formulation. First, if you are indeed thinking about climate and biodiversity, then to make progress you would absolutely need to define what you want specifically, and various risks, and identify tradeoffs.  Second is that, of course, just Protecting something does not actually address both climate and biodiversity.  Not a burned tree nor a cheatgrass seed cares much about lines on maps (back to the BLM sage grouse habitat paper).

A simple example is this Oregon Public Broadcasting story about the Bootleg Fire and carbon credits (which is a good article to read anyway).  If you take out the cap’n’trade carbon credits part of the story, you have “adios, carbon we thought we had” from the area.  You can say that somehow this wouldn’t have happened if it had been in a Protected area, or somehow wouldn’t have had negative effects on biodiversity and carbon simply by drawing a line! How cool is that? But not actually real in terms of biology.

So the question that CAP raised is actually pretty important.. what’s in and out for 30 x 30? Defenders of Wildlife, for example, and the State of California, think it should only include Gap 1 and 2 acres.

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I couldn’t find a place where the Biden Admin says what counts to them  toward 30 x 30.  I did find that CEQ, Interior, USDA and Commerce wrote an interesting paper on how to achieve 30 x30 that leads with “Pursue a collaborative and inclusive approach to conservation” (see table of contents above).  There were also statements by the Admin about how working lands should count.

The interesting thing about using Gap 1 and 2, as per Defenders and others, is that, say Forest Service Roadless Areas are not included, as they are not “permanent,”  but places like the San Gabriel National Monument are included as Protected.  Having worked for years on Roadless, they seem pretty permanent to me.  I’m sure if you tried to measure “intactness” they would beat the SG National Monument or even parts of Yellowstone (Gap 1) by a mile.   It seems like a serious general flaw that these definitions consider recreation-even industrial scale- as no barrier to Protection. And in GAP1 all you need is a “management plan” to maintain a natural state.. not actually a.. “natural state” whatever that is.

Which as far as I’m concerned from any biological point of view, is pretty meaningless.  So let’s move on to the new National Monument.

Here’s a link to the Monument Proclamation- now remember that all these acres were managed by BLM and the Forest Service under their multiple- use mandate.  But GAP- wise, just the President’s signature on a piece of paper transforms them into Protected.

There’s lots of verbiage about how declaring the area a Monument will “address the legacy of dispossession and exclusion” but the actual actions in the Monument sound like BLM and FS current policy.

Conserving lands that stretch beyond Grand Canyon National Park through an abiding partnership between the United States and the region’s Tribal Nations will ensure that current and future generations can learn from and experience the compelling and abundant historic and scientific objects found there, and will also serve as an important next step in understanding and addressing past injustices.

Then they make the case for historic and scientific significance that they need to make for the Antiquities Act and to argue that 1.1 mill acres is the least amount of acres necessary  I do see this as heading to the Supreme Court if some people with lawyers care enough.

If you read through the paragraphs, it sounds like the BLM and the FS have been doing a swell job. You could also get the impression that almost any area could equally qualify with historic habitation by Native people, early Euro-American history, biodiversity and scientific interest. Here’s an example:

Protecting the areas to the northeast, northwest, and south of the Grand Canyon will preserve an important spiritual, cultural, prehistoric, and historic legacy; maintain a diverse array of natural and scientific resources; and help ensure that the prehistoric, historic, and scientific value of the areas endures for the benefit of all Americans.  As described above, the areas contain numerous objects of historic and scientific interest, and they provide exceptional outdoor recreational opportunities, including hiking, hunting, fishing, biking, horseback riding, backpacking, scenic driving, and wildlife-viewing, all of which are important to the travel- and tourism-based economy of the region.

Yup, sounds like the point is to keep protecting what the BLM and FS already protected..

Next post:  let’s see what is going to continue, and what will change, at BNIK NM.

 

Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni Grand Canyon National Monument:1.1 Mill Acres of Not-Mining?

Exact size and boundaries of monument are not yet known.
Source: Bureau of Land Management

As for me, to know that with a flick of a pen the President can undo the painful and laborious work of RMPs and Forest Plans, it would not encourage me to spend volunteer hours working on them.  For employees, it reminds me of my old expression about planning.. “the pay’s the same” and “if you’re not the lead mule, the scenery never changes.” But maybe that’s just me.

The WaPo has an interesting story on the  Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni Grand Canyon National Monument (proposed with so far unknown boundaries).

Federal officials have started telling tribal and environmental groups to be available for a potential Grand Canyon announcement early next week, which would fall during Biden’s travel, said four of the people, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an announcement not yet public.

Who needs those pesky old maps.. or talking to people in the area in some kind of public process?

“No decisions have been made,” White House spokesman Abdullah Hasan said in an email. “But I can tell you that President Biden has conserved more land and water in his first year than any president since JFK, and his climate protection record is unmatched.”
Apparently there are Important People and Groups who think that Biden hasn’t done enough things they want, so we can expect a flurry of “things those groups want” prior to the election.  Again, as  a volunteer, commenting on the FS MOG ANPR, the BLM public lands rule,  reducing royalties for solar and wind, the CEQ NEPA regs, more regs for oil and gas.. it’s a lot.
The way that the WaPo describes it, it’s all about uranium and Tribes that don’t want it.

Advocates have been lobbying for a monument designation in part to honor long-standing Native American connections to the Grand Canyon. For the Havasupai Tribe, Baaj Nwaavjo means “where tribes roam,” and for the Hopi Tribe, I’tah Kukveni means “our ancestral footprints.” Other tribes, including the Hualapai, which means “people of the tall pines,” also have advocated the designation.

“This monument will show that we are beginning to protect the lands of the world,” Dianna Sue WhiteDove Uqualla, a Havasupai Tribal Council member, said in a July statement anticipating the decision and provided by a coalition of monument advocates.

This is one of those areas in which it looks like low-carbon energy sources runs into the 30×30 idea, as well as Tribal spiritual values.  But we might be able to figure out who’s really holding the cards by comparing the Biden Admin position across different projects.  Anyway, here’s the industry position:

Industry officials said they will explore ways to fight the decision. They said it would lock up some of the country’s highest-grade uranium deposits at a time when such fuel would be useful to the country’s clean energy and geopolitical goals. Russia provides more than 20 percent of U.S. nuclear fuel, and Congress is actively exploring new laws to boost U.S. uranium production and enrichment in response to Moscow’s war on Ukraine.

In an email, Curtis Moore, senior vice president of marketing and corporate development for Energy Fuels — one of the few uranium miners with operations in the United States — blasted the decision as making “zero sense.”

He said it contradicts several of the administration’s stated policies, including “supporting clean energy production and punishing Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.”

Monument advocates have said only 1.3 percent of U.S. uranium reserves are in the Grand Canyon region.

That’s not my question.. mine would be “why do you need 1.1 mill acres to say “no uranium mining here”?”  Maybe that will come out in the announcement.

The announcement would help kick off an effort to promote Biden’s climate agenda, including progress from last year’s major climate-spending law, the Inflation Reduction Act. Biden is planning a three-state tour, with other stops in New Mexico and Utah, to talk about billions of dollars of investment that the law has prompted manufacturing companies to commit to making equipment that produces cleaner energy.

Arizona has become a major focus for Biden and other Democrats as they have gained ground politically in the state. The state has been one of the biggest beneficiaries of their big spending bills, with more than $8 billion in planned investment in a giant battery factory and other manufacturing developments, especially near Phoenix, according to the advocacy group Climate Power, which tracks such announcements.

In case you’re curious, here’s what the Biden Admin Energy Department had to say about the IRA and nuclear

Momentum is building for U.S. nuclear energy and the investments and tax incentives included in IRA guarantee a commitment to nuclear energy that will continue well throughout the nation’s journey to net-zero.

Wouldn’t a serious climate policy identify areas where renewables and mining are to occur? Otherwise it seems a bit like a leaf fluttering on random political winds.

For example, Tribes and environmental advocates tried to block the Thacker Pass lithium mine, also land considered to be sacred.  The Biden Admin was on the side of the mine. I guess we’re left to think that some Tribes are more important than others, some ENGOs are more important than others, or some States are more important than others based on some kind of political calculus.

Monumentizing Doesn’t Magically Produce More Funding: San Gabriel Version

There’s an interesting LA Times article on the San Gabriel National Monument.  It’s easy for a Prez to designate something.. it’s easy to to claim that it’s now under “permanent protection”.. not so easy to have enough money to manage visitors..

Nine years after President Obama upgraded the region to monument status — an act intended to foster a cleaner and safer wilderness — park officials and volunteers have been struggling to cope with the consequences of surging visitation, particularly in summertime.

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But how exactly would making a Monument itself make something cleaner and safer?  And it’s not a Wilderness (granted I don’t exactly know what the reporter meant by wilderness). Maybe the Angeles needed more funding, not a Monument designation. I wonder how often this kind of “magically more money” thinking is involved in Monumentizing.

Refuse has been a health concern in the area since 2000, when the California Regional Water Quality Control Board ordered the Forest Service to reduce trash levels in the East Fork to zero within three years.

In response, rangers and volunteers were stationed at popular picnic sites to direct visitors to roadside trash bins and provide them with information about environmental issues and litter laws. They also posted “No Littering” signs printed in English and Spanish.

That strategy was abandoned a few years later because of budget cuts.

Now, there is renewed talk of devising strategies to limit visitors and instruct them on how to be better stewards of the environment.

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The flood of ill-behaved tourists isn’t the only reason for the area’s problems. Implementation of a management plan for the East Fork, finalized in 2019, was stalled by COVID-19 and a lawsuit.

“We desperately need an East Fork stewardship plan that is adequately funded and staffed,” said Isaac Brown, a senior scientist at Stillwater Sciences, a consulting firm specializing in restoring rivers and floodplains.

The Forest Service has long complained of high turnover rates in management, chronic budget cuts, and being unable to pay wages high enough to attract sufficient numbers of “forestry technicians” to remove all the trash that accumulates each day along the East Fork. Pay for such positions in Angeles National Forest start at about $43,600 a year, officials said.

Most of the Forest Service’s budget is set aside for wildfire protection, as well as repairing campgrounds, roads and infrastructure damaged by torrential rains earlier this year, officials said.

Some critics see a connection between chronic overcrowding and the promotional efforts of large nonprofits that seek to increase access to the monument. Critics say the organizations have failed to take into account the toll on wildlife and habitat.

A discarded BBQ grill rests atop a heap of trash beside a river.
Piles of trash have not only blighted the landscape in San Gabriel Mountains National Monument, they have also raised contamination concerns for one of the region’s largest watersheds.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)

Belen Bernal, executive director of Nature for All, a coalition of environmental and community groups that has long campaigned for more parks and safe outdoor opportunities in one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United States, agrees — up to a point.

“It’s true that we are looking at increased access,” Bernal said. “But during the summer months it’s a whole different ball game. This is a management issue.

“We’re not entirely happy about the situation in the monument. Just a year away from its 10th anniversary, it still doesn’t have enough restrooms, dumpsters or even a visitor center.”