Utah, the BLM and Uintah County Plan to Desecrate Sego or East Canyon, Utah - 2019

 

Utah, the BLM and Uintah County Plan to Desecrate Sego or East Canyon, Utah

The ancient site known as Sego Canyon is an easy day trip from Moab, Utah. The name "Sego Canyon Petroglyphs" is a bit confusing because the main panels of petroglyphs and pictographs are actually located in Thompson Canyon. From Thompson Springs, Utah, take Utah Highway 94 North, which becomes BLM 159 (Thompson Canyon Road). Accessible with any automobile, the gravel road will lead you to the unpaved parking area adjacent to the “Sego Canyon Rock Art” site, as Google Maps identifies it. You may access the main panels from the parking area at 39°01'05.3"N 109°42'37.2"W.

Sego Canyon itself begins north of Thompson Springs as a fork of Thompson Canyon. Unless you prepare ahead for off-road recovery and dry camping in the wilderness, do not drive any farther up Sego Canyon. In many places, it either crosses the streambed or utilizes the streambed as its roadway. There are no fresh water sources and the road is subject to flash flooding. The trail dead-ends at a defunct mining site, along the southern border of the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation.

In the year 2014, the sanctity and solitude of Sego Canyon faced imminent demise. For eleven thousand years or more, most early human visitors either painted or carved their visions into the walls of Sego Canyon. The result was a series of interesting and illustrative panels unsurpassed in all of the American West. Undaunted by its sacred and serene beauty, the Grand County Council planned to put a stop to all of that.

At that time, all three options in the long-term usage plan for Grand County Public Lands called for a fifteen mile long, one or two mile wide transportation corridor straight up Sego Canyon. Commonly called the “Hydrocarbon Highway”, this newly paved and widened road would serve a Mecca of tar sands mines planned on property controlled by State of Utah School and Institutional Lands Commission (SITLA). Unless SITLA and Grand County agreed upon this blatant industrialization of the desert, they would have no access to the tar sand deposits that lay beyond the rim of the Book Cliffs.

Public outcry, both in this blog and throughout the country shamed the Grand County Council into abandoning their reckless plan. Even so, less than five years later, the Grand County Council has revived its draconian plan. After the embarrassment engendered by their callous and uncaring plan finally receded in local memory, several agencies charged with protecting our ancient heritage sites again wish to desecrate them. As the price of crude oil continues to rise, tar sands will become ever more competitive in the marketplace. As prices now rise in 2019, even the local Native American tribe hopes to make the Hydrocarbon Highway plan a reality.

Under the current administration, former Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke laid waste to nearby Bears Ears National Monument. At its inception in 2016, Bears Ears consisted of 1.35 million acres. After Zinke had his way with it, only 201,876 acres remained under full federal protection. After disgraceful manipulation of both federal lands, and the budget of his agency, in January 2019, “Slinky Zinke” slithered away into a hoped for obscurity.

Yet, like The Terminator, of movie fame, Zinke reemerged from his lair in April 2019. This time, he was a newly minted executive and board member of Nevada based U.S. Gold Corp. Their tag line is, “World-Class Projects in Mining Friendly, U.S. Jurisdictions”. Zinke's compensation package included salary and stock valued at more than $100,000 and “expenses” of $120,000 per year. After draining his federal budget to support a lavish and questionable jet-setting lifestyle, Zinke can now spend at a similar rate in the private sector. Although forbidden from lobbying his former agency, U.S. Gold Corp. CEO Edward Karr cited Zinke’s “excellent relationship” and “in-depth knowledge of the governmental regulatory and permitting process for mining and exploration companies”. These relationships and knowledge with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Interior Department were included as justifications for his hiring.

Succeeding Zinke in April of 2019, David Bernhardt joined the current administration as its new Secretary of the Interior. After working within the Department of Interior for many years, Bernhardt had more recently served as a lobbyist for the extraction industries. During his tenure as a lobbyist, Bernhardt's clients included Halliburton, Cobalt International Energy, Samson Resources, and the Independent Petroleum Association of America.
In other words, Bernhardt is fully in the pocket of Old Energy, as represented by oil, gas and most of all, the “Clean Coal” industry. Get ready for Mr. Bernhardt to push for full-scale development of tar sands in the State of Utah. Although Zinke cannot lobby his former federal agency, there are no restrictions on his lobbying the State of Utah School and Institutional Lands Commission (SITLA).

SITLA owns thousands of acres of potential tar sand mining claims just north of Sego Canyon. If Bernhardt and the likes of Zinke find a way to collaborate tacitly on the extraction of “black gold” from the Sego Canyon tar sands, you can bet that they will. The residents of Grand County, Uintah County and the public at large must remain vigilant. If not, the priceless artifacts and ancient artwork within the Sego Canyon Rock Art site could be defiled.

The rock art images that look down from the walls of Thompson Canyon predate the construction of the Notre Dame Cathedral, which recently burned in Paris. With scientists’ inability to date the earliest pictographs at Sego Canyon, those drawings may predate all human history, including the pyramids of Egypt. No one knows for sure. Anyone who has stood and marveled at the unique beauty of Sego Canyon knows that a paved tar sands haul road would forever alter and destroy this ancient and sacred site.

Who are the people or spirits represented in Sego Canyon? Over the millennia, several types of rock art appeared on the canyon walls, each representing a successive human culture. Some experts claim evidence of human habitation in Sego Canyon dating back to the Archaic Period (6,000 – 2,000 BC). Elsewhere, at the Calico Early Man Site, near Yermo, California, human made material extracted from beneath 100,000-year-old alluvial deposits include a "rock ring". The ring dates back to 135,000 years by thermoluminescence (TL), about 200,000 years by uranium-series analysis, and about 197,000 years by surface beryllium-10 dating. Since there are no adequate ways to use carbon or other dating methods on the earliest Sego Canyon pictographs, their age is indeterminate. For human safety and protection from vandalism, the BLM recently closed Calico Early Man Site to the public. Until adequate funding magically appears, the site will remain off limits to all.

Beginning in an undetermined and ancient age, what we call Barrier Canyon Style rock art panels appeared in Sego Canyon. The Barrier Canyon Style included both pictographs (painted) and petroglyphs (pecked) into the rock surface. Some appear faded and darkened with age, while others have a fresher look and appear similar to red ochre paintings of more recent vintage. The dark, faded and therefore most ancient pictographs often have subtle facial expressions and the appearance of clothing or robes.

In one image, on the far left side of a larger panel is a dark figure, emerging from a grass field. Much like an ancient Sumerian Anunnaki (436,000 BC – 3,700 BC), he wears a dark robe and a spiked or pointed helmet. Obscured by age and weathering, his shoulders and countenance depict him moving forward and to his right. Although small in scale, he represents an apparently giant figure. Scanning down to where his arms might be, he appears to have his hands resting on the shoulders of a much smaller and more humanlike figure.

The smaller figure, superimposed on the lower half of this “Anunnaki Warrior” appears to be walking straight out and into the foreground. He has dark, curly hair and wears a biblical-style flowing robe. Some writings reference the “black headed ones” whom the Anunnaki once ruled. Legend has it that the Anunnaki ruled Gaia, our Mother Earth throughout prehistory. Tired of laboring for the scant amount of gold available on Earth, the Anunnaki developed a slave class, later known as humankind. As gods on Earth, they may have experimented with genetic engineering, including the recombination of their own DNA with that of “Early Man”.

So here, on the walls of Sego Canyon, we have a pictographic suggestion of an Anunnaki god “birthing” Adam into the Garden of Eden. Above the very panel depicting this immaculate birth, are two huge portraits, carved in the stone of the canyon wall. On the left, in profile, is Mother Nature, as represented by a Nubian woman. To her right, intertwined and looking into her face is the classical, white bearded Yahweh, or the “Face of God”. Here, the contrast of a dark and a white face mimics the Anunnaki “Black Knight” and his progeny Adam, a white man with black hair.

As depicted, Yahweh and Mother Nature are in love both with each other and with All that Is. The Anunnaki god, depicted beneath the divine couple, appears to release Adam into what we now know as our own world. After genetic manipulation and creation of humans as a slave class, the Anunnaki lost their final battle in the Pleiadian or the Orion Wars, around 2,000 BC. Upon banishment from Earth, the Anunnaki absconded with Earth’s available gold and returned to their place of origin at Niburu, a brown dwarf planet (or star system) with a highly elliptical orbit around our Sun.

Niburu, also known as “Planet X”, “Planet Nine” or “Nemesis” continues to threaten Earth, as we know it. Niburu has a periodicity that is still in question. Depending on your preferred information source, Niburu returns for a near-Earth dash every 3,600 or 11,000 years. As pictured by scientists and mystics alike, Niburu exists as a huge dark ball of superheated tar. Periodically, as it passes close to the Earth, Niburu is prone to ejecting great swaths of semi-molten petroleum. Old Testament Biblical accounts of fire and brimstone raining from the sky attest to this phenomenon.

As children, we learned a myth about the origins of terrestrial petroleum deposits. Although that myth is widely believed, the petroleum deposits in our Earth did not come from dinosaurs grazing in ancient swampland. Eleven thousand years ago, or at some multiple of that time span, Niburu spewed untold amounts of boiling tar on to the upper reaches of Sego Canyon. As happened in the Bible Lands, so too did the Sego Canyon "Lake of Fire" cool and mix with the desert sands, solidifying and becoming the tar sands, oil and natural gas deposits that we know today. The original "Moabites" were a West-Semitic culture, which flourished in the Ninth Century BCE, or about 11,000 years ago. That time span would coincide with three 3,600 year circuits of Niburu or one major circuit at around 10,800 years.

Remember, the Anunnaki sought to enslave humankind and extract gold for their wealth and pleasure. Old Energy mavens such as Ryan Zinke, David Bernhardt, Edward Karr and the Uintah County Council have their sights set on places like Sego Canyon or East Canyon. Our current day “Anunnaki Wannabes” seek the black gold locked in the tar sands of Sego Canyon. If their self-serving ways prevail, they will build their “Hydrocarbon Highway” straight through Sego Canyon. If so, the ancient depictions of Mother Nature, Yahweh and the Spirit of the Ancients found there and nowhere else shall vanish from the Earth.

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By James McGillis at 04:28 PM | | Comments (0) | Link

BLM/SITLA - Subterfuge and Obfuscation Exposed in Parcel-32 Land Exchange - 2014

 

BLM/SITLA - Subterfuge and Obfuscation Exposed in Parcel-32 Land Exchange

Early in his first term, President Obama signed into law the Utah Recreational Land Exchange Act (URLEA) of 2009. Its full title was, “To direct the exchange of certain land in Grand, San Juan, and Uintah Counties, Utah, and for other purposes.” At that time, few people realized that the phrase, “and for other purposes” would subvert the publicly avowed intention of that bill.

 

See a U.S. Army Black Ops visit to Parcel 32, Moab, Utah

If you read the official Library of Congress Summary of the enabling legislation, its wording is straightforward. It authorizes an exchange of federal lands for state owned lands within certain Utah Counties: 8/5/2009 - Public Law [Summary].

As the official summary states, the state and federal parcels exchanged were to be of equal value. Oddly, there is no mention of “recreational lands” in the official summary. Later, on an official web page, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) touted the supposed “conservation and recreation value” of the URLEA. On that web page, BLM stated the following: “The BLM will acquire 58-parcels with high conservation and recreation value, totaling 25,034 acres, primarily in Grand County. These parcels will expand the BLM backcountry with world class recreation sites like Corona Arch and Morning Glory Arch. This exchange will improve the quantity and quality of recreational experiences for visitors to public lands and waters managed by the BLM. The State will acquire 34-parcels with high mineral development potential, totaling 35,516 acres, primarily in Uintah County. The state expects development of these high potential parcels to boost public school funding across Utah”.

On that BLM/URLEA web page, conversion of Exchange Parcel 32 to “light industrial use in future” received no mention. As URLEA became law in May 2014, the fate of those 352-acres was in direct contradiction to BLM’s “story line” about saving arches and promoting recreation within Grand County. Instead, prime open land in Grand County transferred to the State of Utah via its School and Institutional Lands Trust Administration (SITLA). At just over $2000 per acre, SITLA received industrial land at cow pasture prices.

In its “Protest Dismissed” document, BLM dismissed my protest of Parcel 32 valuation as “grazing land”. To quote that document, it stated, “The EA disclosed the current and future anticipated use of Federal Lands by SITLA. The uses identified for (Parcel 32) include: Current/grazing and wildlife habitat; Future/continued grazing use for intermediate term; possible light industrial use in future.” Without citing any corroborating appraisal documents, BLM stated that their process took "future potential development into account". If BLM appraised the industrial future of Parcel 32 against any comparable parcels in Grand County, where are those parcels located? According to my recent searches, there are no undeveloped industrial parcels for sale in Grand County, let alone a 352-acre parcel intertwined with its regional airport.

In its “Protest Dismissed” document, BLM writes that, “Environmental Assessment No. DOI-BLM-UT-9100-2013-001-EA (EA), completed in March 2013 (emphasis mine) in support of the exchange action, disclosed mineral leasing and development as the projected (sic) on many of the parcels the SITLA would acquire. The “EA”, made available for public review and comment via BLM’s Electronic Bulletin Board (EBB) in April 2013, addressed the potential impacts to resources associated with mineral development, and did not disclose any significant impacts associated with the proposed exchange.”

On Page 8 of BLM’s "Decision Record Signed", in "Section B. Land Use Conformance", it specifically states that "parcel 32 (Moab) located in the Labyrinth Rims/Gemini Bridges SRMA" was "identified for retention In Federal ownership in (its) respective RMP". Later in the same paragraph, BLM employs obfuscatory 'double-speak', saying that Parcel 32 and two other parcels were included in the exchange because, "BLM determined that a planning amendment was unnecessary as the URLEA explicitly directs the BLM to exchange certain Federal lands, provided the exchange meets certain conditions". In that sentence we learn that BLM was required to meet certain explicit conditions for a unilateral conversion of Parcel 32 from its current protected status as federal grazing land and antelope habitat to future light industrial use. Nowhere else in the Decision Record Signed, the Environmental Assessment or the Exchange Agreement do we learn why "URLEA explicitly directs the BLM" to include Parcel 32 in the exchange or which of "certain conditions" were met. Whenever BLM uses the word "certain" twice in one sentence, we should be told what those certainties are.

The BLM EBB web page referenced in BLM’s “Protest Dismissed” document contains several conflicting data points. Referencing BLM’s reasons for denying my protest one at a time, here are the facts:

1. Contrary to BLM’s dismissal, the “EA” was not “completed in March 2013”. In fact, the “public review/commentary period” did not start until 4/22/13. In fact, the EBB web page states; “4/01/2013: Environmental Assessment Being Prepared [BLM]”. Elsewhere on the same page, it states; “12/30/2013: EA Completed [BLM]”.

2. Farther on in its dismissal, BLM claims that the “EA”, as posted on the BLM EBB in April 2013; “addressed the potential impacts to resources associated with mineral (emphasis mine) development”. Concluding, the "EA" “did not disclose any significant impacts associated with the proposed exchange”.

3. The BLM document titled "Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI)" was unavailable to the public in April 2013 and was not published until February 2014. In its “Protest Dismissed” document, BLM indicates that full disclosure of all relevant documents to my protest were completed and published not later than April 2013. Clearly, with the February 2014 publication of the FONSI, such is not the case.

4. As referenced on the BLM EBB web page, the much vaunted “EA” was not completed until; “12/30/2013: EA Completed [BLM]”. Nine months prior to the publication of the “EA”, did BLM already know that it would “not disclose any significant impacts associated with the proposed exchange”? If the reader click’s the link to the final “EA” document at the bottom of the BLM EBB web page, the resulting Environmental Assessment is dated September 2013.

5. The crux of the issue is; when, where and in what form was the Environmental Assessment released to the public? Was it in April 2013, as BLM suggests in its “Protest Dismissed” document”? Was it in September 2013, as the published “final EA document” indicates? Or was it completed on December 30, 2013, as the Electronic Bulletin Board page indicates? Any way you look at it, the content and publication date(s) of the Environmental Assessment represent a moving target.

In the conclusion of its “Protest Dismissed” document, BLM states, “A protestor bears the burden of establishing that the BLM premised a decision on a clear error of law, error of material fact, or failure to consider a substantial environmental question of material significance. The protestor has not met this burden in this instance”.

Although I cannot claim that BLM has committed a “clear error of law”, its inaccuracy and the conflicting publication dates associated with the “EA” represent a multifarious “error of material fact”.

Other factual errors include limiting the scope of BLM’s environmental assessment to “the potential impacts to resources associated with mineral development”. In so doing, I believe that BLM discounted the future industrialization value of Parcel 32. Nowhere else in Grand County is there a major parcel self-certified for future industrial use. If unilaterally converting 352-acres of open land to “future light industrial use” at Canyonlands Field does not qualify as having potential environmental impact, what does?

Do not forget the bargain price of just over $2000 per acre that SITLA exchanged for unique and now pre-sanctioned industrial land. As of this writing, the Grand County Council plans to use the final URLEA “Exchange Agreement” as the basis for future resource and land use planning. As such, BLM’s designation of “future light industrial use” on Parcel 32 may well create its own self-fulfilling prophecy.

By law, the URLEA was to be an “exchange of equal value”. Only time will tell what profit SITLA will make from the sale of Parcel 32. My guess is that it will be many multiples of the $780,000 value that they exchanged. As SITLA plans for the sale of Parcel 32 into the private sector, I hope that it will be more transparent with its procedures than BLM was during the URLEA process.

As for the Grand County Council, its current makeup is stacked in favor of every possible form of mineral and industrial development. In May 2014, when the Exchange Agreement became federal law, the Grand County Council found its perfect foil. In July 2014, the council refused to disavow a planned “Hydrocarbon Highway” through the ancient and sacred sites at Sego Canyon. In its quest to pave Sego Canyon and to rezone Parcel 32 from “grazing” to “light industrial”, the Grand County Council now cites “federal law” as its legal precedent.

When SITLA does sell Parcel 32, I expect a bidding war between energy companies and Grand County developers. In the over hyped legal agreement that BLM and SITLA called a “Recreational Land Exchange”, the phrase “and for other purposes” in that law will soon create a New Industrial Desert on Parcel 32 at Canyonlands Field near Moab, Utah. As the old saying goes, you cannot judge a book by its cover. In the case of the Utah Recreational and Exchange Act of 2009 (URLEA), the exchange of Parcel 32 was in direct contradiction to the name and spirit, if not the letter of that law. If BLM and SITLA wish to maintain any claim to being stewards of the land, both must disavow such subterfuge in the future.

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By James McGillis at 05:47 PM | | Comments (0) | Link

Grand County, Utah Public Lands Plan Fails to Address Watershed Issues - 2014

 

Grand County, Utah Public Lands Plan Fails to Address Watershed Issues

According to a recent press release, the Grand County Council intends to hear comments on three alternative proposals for “long-term designations of public lands” in Grand County, Utah on April 23, 2014, with their “final” decision expected sometime after May 2, 2014.

Embedded in all three Grand County alternative plans are the Utah Recreational Land Exchange Act (URLEA) exchange parcels. All three Grand County proposed plans treat the URLEA as settled law. Despite its lack of legal acceptance, Grand County plans to use URLEA as the backbone for its own land use designations.

As specified in my written protests to BLM, articles here and at MoabGas.com, I strongly disagree with the proposed “reverse land swaps” in Grand County. I call it a reverse land swap whenever the Utah School and Institutional Land Trust (SITLA) will receive land and mineral rights within Grand County. Such transfer of Grand County BLM land to SITLA encourages fossil fuel exploitation in Grand County, all under the guise of a “Recreational Land Exchange”.

If the BLM and Grand County Council make their land use decisions based on URLEA’s current “Exchange Agreement”, I will consider that neither BLM nor the public had an opportunity to hear my voice. Before Grand County enshrines URLEA in its land use documents, BLM should share my written protests with the Grand County Council. Until my written protests are accepted or rejected, they are germane to Grand County’s long-term land use decisions.

On March 25, 2014, BLM closed its acceptance of written protests to URLEA. Before that date, I submitted two written protests to BLM. According to Ms. Joy Wehking of the BLM in Salt Lake City, mine were the only written protests received. The BLM protest period lasted forty-five days. On May 1, 2014, my written protests will be more than forty-five days old. A forty-five day protest period should also be the maximum time it takes BLM to answer my written protests. Fair for one is fair for all.

On April 15, 2014, I addressed Joy Wehking with my concerns about not receiving a reply from BLM regarding my written protests. This was her answer: “Because the decision for the Utah Recreational Land Exchange that you protested was signed by the BLM Utah State Director, your protest must be reviewed and responded to by the BLM's Washington Office. They have been provided with the relevant information and will be sending you a written response to your protest. As to when this may occur, I do not know".

From my previous articles, we know that the URLEA parcel exchange is flawed. For example, Parcel 32, adjacent to Canyonlands Field received a “grazing land” appraisal. Upon completion of the “reverse swap” conveyance, SITLA is on record with BLM that they plan to sell that parcel and its mineral rights to the private sector. If that happens, Moab visitors will likely find a petrochemical production and distribution facility intertwined with and dwarfing the Moab Airport.

The Grand County Council, which never saw a steer or an old energy extractionist that it does not like should start posting signs welcoming visitors to “Moab – The New Industrial Desert”.

For the past few years, Grand County resident Kiley Miller has kept her email contacts informed about assaults on the environment in Grand County. In her latest email (below), she lays out the stakes for all to see. The Grand County Council Public Lands Working Committee, recently proposed three alternatives for the future of public lands in Grand County. When the Grand County Council, loaded with “wild westers” appoints a committee to create land use plans, we can all expect the worst.

As Kiley miller said, “We expected bad, but this is far worse”.

Background: On April 9, 2014, the Grand County Council Public Lands Working Committee identified three alternatives, along with maps, for long-term designations of public lands in Grand County. A public meeting is scheduled for 6 pm Wednesday April 23, 2014 at the Grand Center to present the maps and to take public comments; the Grand County Council will accept written comments on the proposal until May 2, 2014.

Even the best alternative (Alternative #3) proposed by the Working Committee would roll back environmental protection in Grand County. Members of the County Council need to hear from you; the County must “GO BEYOND #3” and strenuously improve the Working Committee’s proposal.

All the alternatives ignored the public input that the county received. Of the 182 letters received by the Council from Grand County residents and business owners, nearly 90% favored strong wilderness and public lands protection.

And yet, the County’s best alternative (Alternative #3): Protects just over half (58%, or 484,446 acres) of the proposed wilderness in Grand County -- and then riddles that “protected wilderness” with ORV routes. The Working Committee decided that places like Porcupine Rim, Mary Jane Canyon, Fisher Towers, Goldbar Rim, the Dome Plateau, and most of Labyrinth, including Mineral, Hell Roaring, Spring, and Tenmile canyons, were unworthy of wilderness protection.
•  Would punch a hole through the heart of the Book Cliffs -- one of the largest remaining roadless areas in the lower 48 states -- to build a “Hydrocarbon Highway” for fossil fuels extraction. The county proposes a mile-wide “transportation corridor” (proposed as 2 miles wide in the other alternatives) to ship fossil fuels from the Uinta Basin and proposed tar sands mining in the Book Cliffs to dreamed-of refineries in Green River, or to the railway.
•  Leaves open to oil and gas drilling the entire view shed east of Arches National Park, including the world-famous view from Delicate Arch. The Working Committee rejected proposed wilderness areas east of Arches. This is the same area that caused a national uproar and sent Tim DeChristopher to prison when, in its the waning days, the George W. Bush Administration sold the famous 77 oil and gas leases. Under the county’s best proposal, leasing and drilling in that region may follow.
•  Allows oil and gas drilling and potash mining on the rim of Labyrinth Canyon (upstream from Spring Canyon). The lack of real protection in the greater Labyrinth Canyon area in all three proposals is a glaring and curious omission.
•  Supports continued off road vehicle abuse and offers zero concessions on ORV routes designated in the Bush-era BLM travel plan -- even though the planning of those routes likely failed to follow the law. The county would codify the BLM’s Bush-era route designations even though a federal judge recently set aside a nearly identical travel plan in the Richfield BLM office for failure to comply with legal mandates to protect archaeology, riparian areas and other natural resources. It is just a matter of time before the Court overturns the challenged Moab travel plan.
•  Fails to protect Moab’s watershed. There is no wilderness proposed for the La Sal Mountains on US Forest Service land. Destructive cattle grazing will continue.
•  Limits the use of the Antiquities Act in Grand County -- the same act that was used by three different Presidents to protect what is now Arches National Park.

Alternatives 1 & 2 are even worse. Both would impose a 2-mile wide transportation corridor for the Hydrocarbon Highway through the heart of the Book Cliffs. This is wide enough to build an entire city within the corridor. Alternatives 1 & 2 provide even less protection for Grand County’s proposed wilderness and less protection from oil & gas and potash development.

What you can do:

The Grand County Council needs to hear from you!
1. Please, call your council members at (435) 259-1342 and let them know they need to improve Alternative 3. This should be the beginning of the discussion in Grand County, not the end.
2. Attend the public meeting Wednesday, April 23rd at 6 pm at the Grand Center.
3. Send a letter to the Grand County Council before May 2nd:
Grand County Council
125 E Center Street
Moab, UT 84532

Also, send a copy of your letter to:
Mr. Fred Ferguson
Legislative Director, Rep. Rob Bishop
123 Cannon HOB
Washington, DC 20515

Thank you, Kiley Miller and the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) for the above information.

Moab and Grand County, Utah now stand at a crossroad. On the old energy side of the road, sit the ranchers, miners and mineral extractors. On the new energy side of the road, sit outdoors people, environmentalists, botanists, photographers… and even a few Jeep owners, such as myself. If you care about the future of Moab, and are a “citizen” of this world, let the officials listed above know how you feel. Otherwise, do not be surprised when the industrial desert drowns out any serenity still present in Grand County, Utah.

Email James McGillis

 

 

By James McGillis at 04:54 PM | | Comments (0) | Link

 

 

Utah's SITLA/BLM Land Swap Does Not Benefit the People or the Land

This section Courtesy KCPW News,  July 09, 2009

"U.S. House Unanimously Approves SITLA Land Swap", by Elizabeth Ziegler

(KCPW News)  The U.S. House of Representatives unanimously approved a land swap with the Utah School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration (SITLA) yesterday.  If approved by the Senate, it will authorize a patchwork assortment of more than 40,000 acres of SITLA lands to be transferred to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in exchange for a similar amount of land in the oil and gas-rich Uintah Basin.  However, Congressman Jim Matheson, who sponsored the legislation, says it does more than that.

 

"It acknowledged that there's recreational value to this area right along the Colorado River corridor and taking that out of potential development had value," Matheson says.  "And in return, the state got some oil and gas properties for that type of development instead."

SITLA believes oil and gas development on the Uintah Basin land could add tens of millions of dollars to the school trust fund.  A portion of the interest from the fund is distributed to Utah schools each year.

 

Matheson says this is the first time that recreational value was taken into consideration for such a federal land swap.  The value of public land has traditionally been based on the value of potential development or resource extraction.  He believes the bill will set a precedent for future legislation.  Liz Thomas with the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance in Moab hopes it will.

 

"We do hope it can serve as a model because this land exchange bill, honestly, it's been years in the making and it was in the end supported by pretty much all sides," Thomas says.  "And that's pretty unheard of."

Thomas says the land swap would represent a significant step toward protecting many scenic areas around Moab, including one of the largest red rock formations in the region, Corona Arch. - (End of KCPW Story)

 

July 2009 Author's Note: On a higher level, it is sad to see that we shall concentrate our destructive and extractive forces in one area.  If we were Uintah Basin Native Americans, we might think that this is not such a good idea.

 

Look south to Black Mesa, Arizona, near Navajo National Monument and you will find the best-hidden strip mine in the West.  Utilizing the Black Mesa and Lake Powell (Electric) Railroad, the aptly named Black Mesa provides relatively dirty western coal to the Navajo Generating Station, which overlooks Lake Powell and the Glen Canyon Dam.  

 

Today, there is a growing consensus that the dam itself was an unnecessary environmental tragedy.  During the increasingly hot summers, the oversubscribed Colorado River cannot supply enough water to spin a sufficient number of turbines at Glen Canyon Dam to meet peak electric power demand.  At such times, additional coal-smoke haze issues forth from the tall stacks of the Navajo Generating Station.  These smoke signals send a message of environmental degradation to each of the Four Corners states.  Fickle winds roundabout the canyons of the Colorado Plateau may contribute to such far-flung phenomena as Uintah Basin’s summer haze

 

Compromising our environment in favor of increased old-energy extraction and production will only hasten the day of our demise.  Each new scar that we place upon the land has local, regional and worldwide environmental consequences.  With this knowledge to guide us, can we still afford to create new environmental ghettos; overdeveloped, over-extracted, overgrazed and prone to 1930s-style dust storms? 

 

Ask the current residents of Giza, Egypt if they would support a new round of pyramid building in their once-lush valley.  In ancient times, over-development there initiated what we now call the Sahara Desert.  Yes, current dwellers of the desert southwest, it can happen here.

 

January 2012 Author's Note: According to The Salt Lake Tribune newspaper, "Utah is weary of waiting for federal funds to complete a heralded swap of recreational lands near Moab in exchange for energy swaths in the Uintah Basin, so state school trust officials plan to start paying appraisers themselves to seal the deal."

 

(Some) Environmentalists like the swap, and worked for its passage in Congress, because it protects “remarkable places along the Colorado River,” said Bill Hedden, executive director of the Grand Canyon Trust.

“The schoolkids come out ahead and the natural places come out ahead,” Hedden said. “It’s a great exchange.”

 

I wonder if the Native American school kids living among natural gas wells and breathing polluted air in the Uintah Basin will be as sanguine.

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By James McGillis at 11:44 PM | Environment | Comments (0) | Link

Grand County, Utah Public Lands Plan Fails to Address Watershed Issues - 2014

Grand County, Utah Public Lands Plan Fails to Address Watershed Issues

According to a recent press release, the Grand County Council intends to hear comments on three alternative proposals for “long-term designations of public lands” in Grand County, Utah on April 23, 2014, with their “final” decision expected sometime after May 2, 2014.

Embedded in all three Grand County alternative plans are the Utah Recreational Land Exchange Act (URLEA) exchange parcels. All three Grand County proposed plans treat the URLEA as settled law. Despite its lack of legal acceptance, Grand County plans to use URLEA as the backbone for its own land use designations.

As specified in my written protests to BLM, articles here and at MoabGas.com, I strongly disagree with the proposed “reverse land swaps” in Grand County. I call it a reverse land swap whenever the Utah School and Institutional Land Trust (SITLA) will receive land and mineral rights within Grand County. Such transfer of Grand County BLM land to SITLA encourages fossil fuel exploitation in Grand County, all under the guise of a “Recreational Land Exchange”.

If the BLM and Grand County Council make their land use decisions based on URLEA’s current “Exchange Agreement”, I will consider that neither BLM nor the public had an opportunity to hear my voice. Before Grand County enshrines URLEA in its land use documents, BLM should share my written protests with the Grand County Council. Until my written protests are accepted or rejected, they are germane to Grand County’s long-term land use decisions.

On March 25, 2014, BLM closed its acceptance of written protests to URLEA. Before that date, I submitted two written protests to BLM. According to Ms. Joy Wehking of the BLM in Salt Lake City, mine were the only written protests received. The BLM protest period lasted forty-five days. On May 1, 2014, my written protests will be more than forty-five days old. A forty-five day protest period should also be the maximum time it takes BLM to answer my written protests. Fair for one is fair for all.

On April 15, 2014, I addressed Joy Wehking with my concerns about not receiving a reply from BLM regarding my written protests. This was her answer: “Because the decision for the Utah Recreational Land Exchange that you protested was signed by the BLM Utah State Director, your protest must be reviewed and responded to by the BLM's Washington Office. They have been provided with the relevant information and will be sending you a written response to your protest. As to when this may occur, I do not know".

From my previous articles, we know that the URLEA parcel exchange is flawed. For example, Parcel 32, adjacent to Canyonlands Field received a “grazing land” appraisal. Upon completion of the “reverse swap” conveyance, SITLA is on record with BLM that they plan to sell that parcel and its mineral rights to the private sector. If that happens, Moab visitors will likely find a petrochemical production and distribution facility intertwined with and dwarfing the Moab Airport.

The Grand County Council, which never saw a steer or an old energy extractionist that it does not like should start posting signs welcoming visitors to “Moab – The New Industrial Desert”.

For the past few years, Grand County resident Kiley Miller has kept her email contacts informed about assaults on the environment in Grand County. In her latest email (below), she lays out the stakes for all to see. The Grand County Council Public Lands Working Committee, recently proposed three alternatives for the future of public lands in Grand County. When the Grand County Council, loaded with “wild westers” appoints a committee to create land use plans, we can all expect the worst.

As Kiley miller said, “We expected bad, but this is far worse”.

Background: On April 9, 2014, the Grand County Council Public Lands Working Committee identified three alternatives, along with maps, for long-term designations of public lands in Grand County. A public meeting is scheduled for 6 pm Wednesday April 23, 2014 at the Grand Center to present the maps and to take public comments; the Grand County Council will accept written comments on the proposal until May 2, 2014.

Even the best alternative (Alternative #3) proposed by the Working Committee would roll back environmental protection in Grand County. Members of the County Council need to hear from you; the County must “GO BEYOND #3” and strenuously improve the Working Committee’s proposal.

All the alternatives ignored the public input that the county received. Of the 182 letters received by the Council from Grand County residents and business owners, nearly 90% favored strong wilderness and public lands protection.

And yet, the County’s best alternative (Alternative #3): Protects just over half (58%, or 484,446 acres) of the proposed wilderness in Grand County -- and then riddles that “protected wilderness” with ORV routes. The Working Committee decided that places like Porcupine Rim, Mary Jane Canyon, Fisher Towers, Goldbar Rim, the Dome Plateau, and most of Labyrinth, including Mineral, Hell Roaring, Spring, and Tenmile canyons, were unworthy of wilderness protection.
•  Would punch a hole through the heart of the Book Cliffs -- one of the largest remaining roadless areas in the lower 48 states -- to build a “Hydrocarbon Highway” for fossil fuels extraction. The county proposes a mile-wide “transportation corridor” (proposed as 2 miles wide in the other alternatives) to ship fossil fuels from the Uinta Basin and proposed tar sands mining in the Book Cliffs to dreamed-of refineries in Green River, or to the railway.
•  Leaves open to oil and gas drilling the entire view shed east of Arches National Park, including the world-famous view from Delicate Arch. The Working Committee rejected proposed wilderness areas east of Arches. This is the same area that caused a national uproar and sent Tim DeChristopher to prison when, in its the waning days, the George W. Bush Administration sold the famous 77 oil and gas leases. Under the county’s best proposal, leasing and drilling in that region may follow.
•  Allows oil and gas drilling and potash mining on the rim of Labyrinth Canyon (upstream from Spring Canyon). The lack of real protection in the greater Labyrinth Canyon area in all three proposals is a glaring and curious omission.
•  Supports continued off road vehicle abuse and offers zero concessions on ORV routes designated in the Bush-era BLM travel plan -- even though the planning of those routes likely failed to follow the law. The county would codify the BLM’s Bush-era route designations even though a federal judge recently set aside a nearly identical travel plan in the Richfield BLM office for failure to comply with legal mandates to protect archaeology, riparian areas and other natural resources. It is just a matter of time before the Court overturns the challenged Moab travel plan.
•  Fails to protect Moab’s watershed. There is no wilderness proposed for the La Sal Mountains on US Forest Service land. Destructive cattle grazing will continue.
•  Limits the use of the Antiquities Act in Grand County -- the same act that was used by three different Presidents to protect what is now Arches National Park.

Alternatives 1 & 2 are even worse. Both would impose a 2-mile wide transportation corridor for the Hydrocarbon Highway through the heart of the Book Cliffs. This is wide enough to build an entire city within the corridor. Alternatives 1 & 2 provide even less protection for Grand County’s proposed wilderness and less protection from oil & gas and potash development.

What you can do:

The Grand County Council needs to hear from you!
1. Please, call your council members at (435) 259-1342 and let them know they need to improve Alternative 3. This should be the beginning of the discussion in Grand County, not the end.
2. Attend the public meeting Wednesday, April 23rd at 6 pm at the Grand Center.
3. Send a letter to the Grand County Council before May 2nd:
Grand County Council
125 E Center Street
Moab, UT 84532

Also, send a copy of your letter to:
Mr. Fred Ferguson
Legislative Director, Rep. Rob Bishop
123 Cannon HOB
Washington, DC 20515

Thank you, Kiley Miller and the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) for the above information.

Moab and Grand County, Utah now stand at a crossroad. On the old energy side of the road, sit the ranchers, miners and mineral extractors. On the new energy side of the road, sit outdoors people, environmentalists, botanists, photographers… and even a few Jeep owners, such as myself. If you care about the future of Moab, and are a “citizen” of this world, let the officials listed above know how you feel. Otherwise, do not be surprised when the industrial desert drowns out any serenity still present in Grand County, Utah.

Email James McGillis