In covering wilderness campaigns, HCN has invited us
to party with Nevada “wilderness warriors” (HCN, 3/3/03: Wild
Card); watch a rancher in Owyhee County, Idaho, kill a rattlesnake
(HCN, 12/8/03: Riding the middle path); and learn the personal
philosophies of the central players in Idaho’s Boulder-White
Clouds proposal (HCN, 11/22/04: Conservationist in a Conservative
Land). The stories offer testimonials to “common ground” found
between conservationists and their traditional foes, and
painstakingly describe the calculations of a new breed of
wilderness negotiators. But in choosing to personalize the story,
you largely fail to discuss what is at stake for the public lands.
The new proposals mark a huge shift in wilderness
protection strategy and carry far-reaching implications. In the new
paradigm, wilderness is “paid for” through the sacrifice (sale,
trade, disposal) of other, supposedly less desirable public lands;
relinquishment of federal water rights; myriad development schemes;
and new mechanisms for local control over federal lands. To speed
land giveaways and development, the new bills waive environmental
laws that activists — including the wilderness groups —
are fighting to uphold elsewhere.
Whenever “we” go along
with a waiver of this or that formerly precious environmental
statute; whenever we go along with the disposal of just a bit more
public land as a quid pro quo to save aesthetically superior
wilderness; whenever we engage in backslapping with politicians
like Rep. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, and Rep. James Gibbons, R-Nev., we
are sanctioning more of the same and helping them raise the
threshold (and political price) for public lands protection. We are
undermining our own goals — or at least the goals that we
used to share before rampant pragmatism took over.
Janine
Blaeloch
Seattle, Washington
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline ‘Paying for wilderness’ undermines environmental goals.
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