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Never mind.
A Huntsman administration official said Friday that Utah's new governor has no intention of pressing for a reduction in size of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, contrary to word earlier this week that indicated the state was seeking boundary changes.
The comments raised alarm among environmental and outdoor recreation groups, and forced the governor to do some damage control.
The dueling messages sprung out of a decision the state made this week to ask the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for permission to file a friend-of-the-court brief in a lawsuit challenging the creation of the monument in 1996 by then-President Clinton. The suit, filed by the Denver-based Mountain States Legal Federation, argues that Clinton exceeded his authority under the Antiquities Act of 1906 and calls for the monument to be set aside.
Deputy Attorney General Mark Ward said Tuesday that the state had no interest in challenging the legitimacy of the monument, but hoped to raise an issue over "whether the president reserved too much land for the purposes of the monument."
But Mike Lee, general counsel to Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., called that position premature.
"We hadn't hammered out the details quite yet," he said, adding that the state now is interested only in seeking judicial review of the scope of presidential powers in creating national monuments.
"We're not asking to reduce the size of the monument," said Lee. "We're just saying that this is an important legal consideration, especially in a state like Utah, where 70 percent of the land is owned by the federal government. We have no horse in this race, but we are concerned about precedent, and how this case developed."
Nevertheless, the downsizing proposal position caused an uproar, and Huntsman found himself Friday meeting with Outdoor Industry Association President Frank Hugelmeyer, whose organization brings the lucrative Outdoor Retailer convention to Salt Lake City twice a year.
The Outdoor Retailers, who deliver 35,000 visitors and $32 million dollars to Utah annually, threatened to pull their convention from the state in 2003 after former Gov. Michael Leavitt and Interior Secretary Gale Norton signed a "no more wilderness" settlement in 2003, freezing the state's wilderness study inventory at 3.2 million acres and taking another potential 6 million acres out of play. Leavitt and the group eventually made amends, and the Outdoor Retailers signed a new contract last year to keep the convention in Salt Lake City through 2009.
Huntsman, who is scheduled to address the convention on Jan. 29 when it convenes at the Salt Palace, assured Hugelmeyer that the state has no interest in shrinking the monument. Hugelmeyer, who flew in from Denver for the meeting, went home satisfied.
"The Outdoor Industry Association was given a personal assurance that the administration will not recommend or support the reduction of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument," he said. "We are satisfied that the governor is committed to continuing a mutually productive dialogue with the outdoor industry."
Not everyone believes the state has clarified its position on the monument. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) which intervened in the Mountain States lawsuit on the side of the federal government, considers Utah's attempt to file a friend-of-the-court brief a de facto endorsement of the plaintiff's bid to dismantle the monument.
"If the state wants to rehash how the monument came about and wants to change the Antiquities Act, it needs to be going to Congress. It's really beyond the scope of what the court will look at," said SUWA attorney Steve Bloch. "The courts have consistently refused to get involved in the political machinations of the creation of these monuments. They're frequently been controversial, like this one. But in every instance, the court has upheld the monument."
SUWA has also questioned the state's ability to involve itself in the lawsuit. Utah, through its School Institutional and Trust Lands agency, joined the Mountain States suit in 1997.
But it withdrew following a large land exchange with the federal government in 1998 that included 177,000 acres in the monument. As part of the deal, Utah agreed it would seek no further claims in the matter.
Utah general counsel Lee says the friend-of-the-court brief allows the state to be heard, but does not make it a party in the suit.