This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Washington • While celebrating the creation of Canyonlands National Park on its 50-year anniversary, Republican members of Congress from Utah urged President Barack Obama and Interior Secretary Sally Jewell in a letter Thursday not to expand the park and to let state and local leaders decide on how to protect the area around it.
Sens. Orrin Hatch and Mike Lee and Reps. Rob Bishop, Jason Chaffetz and Chris Stewart say Canyonlands is a jewel and standing on its cliffs enjoying the vistas "puts life in perspective," but urged Obama and Jewell against using executive authority to name its surrounding landscapes as a national monument.
The Republicans don't specifically mention the effort to name some 1.8 million acres around the national park as the Greater Canyonlands National Monument, but they say Obama should not interfere with an already-in-progress effort to designate some parts as wilderness and open others for development.
The president has said he will use his power under the 1906 Antiquities Act to designate more national monuments, although he hasn't specified where. Among the prospects urged by environmentalists is the scenic, and possibly oil-filled, areas around the southeastern Utah park. Canyonlands was named a national park by Congress on Sept. 12, 1964.
"This week citizens of Utah and friends from around the country are celebrating an important anniversary in our beautiful state, the 50th anniversary of the creation of Canyonlands National Park," the delegation says in the letter. "Canyonlands is one of the 'Mighty Five' national parks in Utah and something we are proud of."
That said, though, the delegation doesn't want federal protection expanded.
"What better way to celebrate the anniversary of the Canyonlands National Park than by bringing certainty to an area that hasn't had any for a half century," the Republican members say in the letter. "We would be most grateful for your support of our ongoing process to protect the land surrounding Canyonlands National Park."
The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance has pushed the White House to use its unilateral power to designate a monument to prevent oil drilling in the area. The group says it's working with the delegation on the public-lands initiative led by Bishop, but that unless the delegation can offer rational legislation with significant wilderness protection, there may be little choice but to seek presidential designation of a new monument.
"The fact they're sending a letter acknowledging the importance of Canyonlands shows we've come a long way from Utah politicians fretting that Canyonlands should be cut up for building stone," says Jen Ujifusa, SUWA's legislative director. "But the reality is Utah politicians' preference for the lands around the park is to crisscross them with bogus [road] claims using taxpayer money, and to try to seize the land from the federal government. That's a plan that doesn't fly with the American public."