New Wilderness Bills Focus Spotlight on Stewardship

— By TinaMarie Ekker

There has been a longstanding and inaccurate perception that wilderness protection is a dichotomous process, with campaigns to designate new Wilderness and stewardship of existing Wilderness viewed as two separate and sometimes competing issues. In truth, these two steps to wilderness protection are inextricably linked. This linkage was recently highlighted in the language and provisions included in several new wilderness bills, sparking widespread discussion regarding the implications for the future stewardship of these and other wildernesses in the National Wilderness Preservation System.

Two proposed Wilderness bills in Idaho have recently drawn attention in terms of what their provisions might mean for Wilderness and for public lands in general. One, the Owyhee Initiative (OI), seeks to designate new Wilderness on BLM-administered lands in southwest Idaho. The other bill, which seeks Wilderness designation for the Boulder-White Cloud Mountains (B-WC) in central Idaho, is also in the early stages of negotiation. Several newspapers in Idaho and the Salt Lake Tribune have run multiple articles this summer reporting on the provisions that these two potential bills may contain.

Participants in the OI and B-WC negotiations have primarily been Idaho's congressional representatives, county commissioners, ranchers, motorized recreation interests, and some conservation group leaders in Idaho.

In early July, 37 conservation organizations from 15 states signed onto a letter circulated by conservationists in Idaho, Oregon, and Washington raising questions about future Wilderness stewardship of the Owyhee and Boulder-White Clouds. The letter was sent to the executive director and board of directors of The Wilderness Society, Sierra Club, and Idaho Conservation League, the three organizations that have participated in discussions of the bills. The letter voiced concern about a number of provisions in the draft bills, including proposals to transfer public lands into private ownership in exchange for gaining Wilderness designation.

Wilderness Watch and other stewardship activists are concerned that some of the provisions could continue to affect these Wildernesses long after their designation. For example, one especially troubling provision would create an oversight Board of Directors composed of ranchers, county commissioners, and a few conservationists. This Board would oversee most aspects of BLM management of the area. It would select scientists to serve as a Scientific Review Team overseeing all BLM grazing management decisions in the Owyhee region. Ranching interests indicate this provision is an absolute must in order to gain their support for the bill as the ranchers are confident they can control the membership of the review team and because the process can paralyze BLM's ability to take quick action when needed. The letter conservationists sent to the board of TWS, Sierra Club, and ICL voiced concerns about creating this oversight board:

(A)side from makeup of the Board and Review Team, what this proposal creates is a situation where the committees gain some de facto management authority but offer no accountability to the public. While their role ostensibly would only be "advisory," the reality is that such boards have access to information and opportunities for input well before the public does… the creation of special-interest boards with de facto authority only moves land management further beyond the reach of the public.

These concerns were echoed in a letter to the OI negotiators from the statewide environmental representive serving on a similar advisory board for the new Steens Mountain Wilderness in Oregon:
From the perspective of having served on the Steens Mountain Advisory Council (SMAC) for the last 18 months… I urge OI negotiators to steer clear of many of the innovations introduced by the Steens act (sic), and to look upon the Board of Directors, Owyhee Advisory Council, Science Review Process, and Conservation Research Center with much trepidation… Quite frankly, we are struggling to hold on to many aspects of the Steens Act that our side fought for… The SMAC has been the primary weapon used by locals in this assault…. We are faced with the prospect of ending up with a Wilderness in name only….

In addition to the review boards and oversight committees, the letter highlighted other concerns such as special provisions allowing ranchers to routinely drive in new wilderness and another provision that would transfer an unspecified amount of public land into private ownership for any local rancher willing to retire some or all of their public lands grazing permit.

It was uncertain whether similar provisions might be included in legislation for the B-WC. However, it is certain that The Nature Conservancy has been working closely with rural Custer County to identify at least 16,000 acres of undeveloped public land (possibly including land within the Sawtooth National Recreation Area) that would be given in gratis to the county and large land owners as an economic boost to county tax coffers. Much of the land would be sold for development such as summer homes. In exchange for not opposing this give-away of public lands, the conservation community would get Wilderness designation for at least a portion of the Boulder-White Clouds.

In response to the concerns raised by the broader conservation community, the Idaho Conservation League's board of directors sent a 9-page letter to Senator Simpson (R-ID) regarding the B-WC negotiations, stating that "This letter summarizes an extensive discussion at our July 11-13, 2003, Idaho Conservation League Board meeting." The letter emphasizes support for a large, contiguous Boulder-White Clouds Wilderness not fragmented by "cherry-stemmed" jeep tracks or corridors left open to ATV's and snowmobiles. Although the letter makes no reference to the OI, it does take the following firm stands for the B-WC:

We support the purchase of grazing allotments in the East Fork of the Salmon River area and development of conservation easements. We do not support land trades or transfers to accomplish this goal, and we are confident they are not necessary.

We oppose inclusion of the conveyance of public land for later private sale as an element to your proposal…. America’s public lands are a national birthright. The public lands within Idaho’s borders are also good for Idaho… In the last month, many other organizations and individuals inside and outside of Idaho, representing conservation, recreation, fishing and hunting interests have contacted us in opposition to this concept. We agree with them…. We believe direct appropriations are a far more effective way to achieve economic enhancement goals, and conservation groups including ours are far more likely to be able to support them.

Good for ICL! Given the direct linkage between the provisions that get written into new Wilderness bills and the public's ability to assure these areas will be managed as real Wilderness, it is extremely heartening to see stewardship concerns raised and addressed in the early stages of new Wilderness legislation. We are hopeful that the public discussion in Idaho represents the beginning of greater coordination and cooperation on efforts to designate new Wilderness and efforts to protect those areas after they are designated. It is essential that the conservation community work more closely together if we are to achieve a truly protected National Wilderness Preservation System.

— By David Stalling

In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.
Thomas JeffersonSeveral friends refer to my wilderness ideals as "elitist" and "purist." One of them thinks mountain bikes should be allowed in wilderness, therefore boosting the number of people who might support wilderness. Another says my stubborn opposition to "seemingly benign actions" such as letting mountain climbers leave permanent anchors within wilderness turns too many people against the very concept of wilderness—hence, they’re not likely to support the creation of new wilderness. Yet another friend tells me that focusing on "trivial issues" such as keeping helicopter landing pads and permanent structures out of wilderness is a waste of valuable time and effort which would be better spent on "more important" battles. Compromise a little, they say, and we’ll have more people, more clout, more money.

But will we still have wilderness?

Some of it, of course, we’ve brought upon ourselves. We environmentalists love to jump on the Chamber-of Commerce bandwagon and tout the recreational and economic values of wilderness. People will come. They’ll spend money. They’ll buy lots of gear. It’s good for the economy. We partner with the boot and tent makers and help promote maps, trail guides, freeze-dried bananas and light-weight cappuccino makers. Subaru tells us that those who "get it" drive quietly to the trailhead in an Outback, and you can always hire a guide to make your trip easier and more convenient. Somewhere in the mire of raising funds, building partnerships and drumming up support, we lose sight of the object; we either forget, or choose to ignore, that wilderness is not just for people.

The very concept of wilderness designation derived from concern that most all other public lands were managed under Gifford Pinchot’s doctrine of the "greatest good for the greatest number of people." This is precisely what makes the Wilderness Act so remarkable: for an historical moment, we Americans humbly cast aside the utilitarian notion that all things exist for us. In a relatively few, small places, we actually decided that some land ought to retain its primeval character and influence, without permanent improvements or human habitation, to be protected and managed so as to preserve its natural conditions. As Gary Snyder puts it in The Practice of the Wild:

"These are the shrines saved from all the land that was once known and lived on by the original people, the little bits left as they were, the last little places where intrinsic nature totally wails, blooms, nests, glints away."

And it only makes up about 4 percent of the land of the continental United States. Is that really too much to ask?

Apparently, it’s a tough concept for some to grasp. Why else would the Forest Service propose to construct 129 Helicopter landing sites in Alaska wilderness to allow "people with limited time or physical ability easy access to some extremely remote Wilderness settings," to make it possible "for a greater number of visitors to easily enjoy more remote wilderness locations." The greatest good for the greatest number.

Wilderness management should more aptly be called people management, with the general idea of restricting people’s actions so as to reduce impacts and keep wilderness wild. There are already trails, signs, campsites, fire rings, lakes stocked with trout, damns, cattle grazing, structures, outfitting, use of mechanical tools, and other prevalent signs of people aplenty, either grandfathered into some wilderness or deemed necessary for social, cultural and recreational reasons. All of it diminishes wildness; we certainly don’t need more. Those responsible for wilderness stewardship could do worse than follow the advice of Michael Frome, from his book Battle for the Wilderness:

"The administrator’s responsibility should not be to outfitters and tourists, but to wilderness, free of economics and commercial considerations. The common goal of the visitor and the administrator should be to insure that future generations will know and enjoy the same degree of solitude that past generations have known and the same sense that nature, rather than humankind, prevails."

But homocentric utilitarianism is deeply ingrained in the human psyche. A business mentality prevails among federal land managers (and, increasingly so, among conservation and environmental groups) that people are customers, that their every desire and whim must be served. If opinion polls reveal that 58.6 percent of respondents want more loop trails, picnic tables, lean-tos, stocked lakes and helicopter landing pads then, by golly, that’s what they’ll get, Wilderness Act be damned. Leadership—providing people with purpose, direction and motivation, explaining to people what is right, persuading them to follow,—is sadly lacking, replaced instead by policies of compromise and appeasement. Those who get in the way on matters of principle are dismissed as extremists, purists and elitists.

I don’t accept the argument that demanding strict adherence to the Wilderness Act will erode support for wilderness. What sense does it make to gain more support for wilderness by destroying the very qualities that make a place wilderness? People supported wilderness when the Wilderness Act worked its way from grassroots conception through the halls of Congress and on to the President’s desk. I’m confident people still do. For those who don’t, we should try to gain their support by explaining what wilderness is and why it’s important—not by compromising our principles and making wilderness less wild. Wilderness is not a style that comes and goes with the seasons. Wilderness is a mater of principle. On that, we should stand like a rock.

Are there more important battles? Perhaps. But I can’t think of any.

David Stalling lives in Missoula, Montana, with his wife, Chris, and 3-year-old son, Cory. He spends most of his spare time roaming and defending Montana’s wild places.

— By Bill Worf

"Minimum tool. The least intrusive tool, equipment, device, force, regulation, or practice determined to be necessary to accomplish an essential task, that will also achieve the wilderness management objective."
— FWS Draft Wilderness Stewardship Policy, 2001

I hear tales of increasing frustration from harried Wilderness managers that the Wilderness Act’s mandate that they strive to forgo the use of modern equipment, structures, and installations is just plain "silly". Some feel the Act’s guidelines are intended for visitors, not managers. Others sincerely believe modern equipment would reduce costs and provide a better experience for visitors.

It is disturbing to hear these opinions from the mouths of those entrusted with the preservation of our National Wilderness Preservation System. One would hope that as trained professionals, Wilderness managers would enjoy an in-depth understanding of spirit and intent of the Wilderness Act. Unfortunately, this is increasingly rare. For example, the topic of this column came to mind when the National Park Service (NPS) recently released internal "agreements" allowing managers to regularly employ otherwise prohibited management practices (motorized equipment, structures and installations) in over 700,000 acres of Sequoia/Kings Canyon Wilderness in California. The NPS will employ these means without analyzing their effects on Wilderness individually, collectively or cumulatively.

As a former Forest Supervisor and Ranger, I can understand some of the frustrations of Wilderness managers. Faced with limited money and time, some managers believe that modern equipment would allow them to get in fast, do the job, and get on with the next job. They argue that the impacts on visitor experience could be minimized by working during low-use periods. Overall, they honor their mandate to preserve wilderness character as long as it is "reasonable, practical and flexible" (words that appear nowhere in the Act or its legislative history).

I championed these arguments when a six-person Forest Service task force gathered in 1964 to draft policies for implementing the Wilderness Act. Many people were anxious to offer advice on how the management job could best be accomplished. The Director of the Forest Service Equipment Development Center presented a project to develop a "silent chain-saw". Engineers offered to design rustic administrative cabins that could be constructed outside the Wilderness and hauled in with choppers in mid-winter when no one was around. The cabins would be stocked with supplies and tucked into unobtrusive locations. Proponents pointed to reduced impact from administrative packstock and increased safety for personnel.

These were very seductive arguments - they made sense to me and I argued for them. However, discussions with members of Congress and their staff, (all whom had participated in the eight years of debate that culminated in the Wilderness Act), convinced us that the prohibitions against
motorized equipment and structures had little to do with noise or aesthetics. The primary reason for the prohibitions in Section 4(c) of the Act is to restrain the ease and efficiency with which man can "occupy and modify" the land. They strive to preserve the traditional skills employed by our ancestors, who lived and traveled through the wilderness that once covered America from sea to sea.

The argument that the use of traditional stewardship methods greatly increases project costs does not hold water. In 1970, an Irrigation Company asked permission to use motorized equipment to complete needed work on the Canyon Lake dam in the Selway/Bitterroot Wilderness. A contractor bid the job at $5,730.00 with power equipment and $7,574.00 using traditional tools. Soon after, Forest Supervisor Orville Daniels offered to put together a Forest Service crew to do the work without using motors. The crew did the job for $5,200.00, including the 35% overhead costs.

In 1985 the Environmental Protection Agency asked Forest Service Chief Max Peterson’s permission to use helicopters in various Wildernesses to complete a study of acidity in about 450 lakes. Chief Peterson countered with an offer to have Forest Service workers collect the samples using non-motorized travel. The job was completed on time, under budget, and without a single lost time accident.

In 1964, Congress made a profound decision to secure for the American people for all time a reminder of our wilderness heritage - a bit of the long ago that still exists. These are places where nature has a free reign and where people, including stewards, must travel and live with the equipment used by our pioneer ancestors. In my humble opinion, there is nothing silly about it!

In early June, Alaskan legislators sent a letter to Assistant Interior Secretary Craig Manson protesting the proposed Denali Backcountry Plan. The Legislators complain that the Park’s preferred alternative, which already opens 46% of the Denali backcountry to snowmachine use, unfairly restricts motorized access based on an "undefined aesthetic value"- namely the tenants of wilderness character. Though the legislators’ acknowledge that motorized access is restricted under the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) where it is detrimental to Wilderness resources, they uphold that solitude and wilderness character constitute "feelings", not resources.

In addition, the legislators’ letter fails to note the distinction between the type of access allowed by ANILCA and the type they are working to facilitate. For while ANILCA permits limited motorized access to traditional activities in Wilderness, it does not allow open access for recreational uses.

In response to the legislators’ tirade, Wilderness Watch drafted a letter to the editor that appeared in the Anchorage Daily News and Fairbanks Daily News Miner. The letter reads as follows:

In their letter objecting to the proposed Denali backcountry plan, state legislators reveal their limited understanding of wilderness. Outraged that the plan might limit recreational motorized access to the wilderness, the legislators’ letter manipulates the intent and purpose of wilderness, and wilderness legislation, to suit their own agendas.

The letter focuses its vitriol on access restrictions that the authors complain are "based on immaterial aesthetic values, such as solitude." However, the wilderness character that ANILCA and the Wilderness Act strive to protect is not limited to the physical aspects of wilderness, such as the plants, animals, and geology, but encompasses equally important, less-tangible aspects, including solitude, adventure, and risk. As Howard Zahniser, author of the Wilderness Act wrote: "We deeply need the humility to know ourselves as the dependent members of a great community of life…Without the gadgets, the inventions…without these distractions, to know wilderness is to know profound humility, to recognize one’s littleness, to sense dependence and interdependence, indebtedness, and responsibility."

Congress recognized wilderness as a resource and unmotorized solitude as an integral part of that resource. Though ANILCA permits limited motorized access to traditional activities in wilderness, it does not allow open access for recreational uses. Sadly, it appears that the legislators would rather appease a few than protect one of the public’s most magnificent wildernesses – despite the fact that in southcentral Alaska alone 32.7 million acres out of a total of 34.4 million acres, over 95% of the state and federal lands, are open to recreational snowmachine use. (ADNR report 1996).

The definition of wilderness character and the delegation’s inability to comprehend it are best summed up in a passage from Wallace Stegner’s Wilderness Letter: "What I want to speak for is not so much the wilderness uses, valuable as those are, but the wilderness idea, which is a resource in itself. Being an intangible and spiritual resource, it will seem mystical to the practical-minded – but then anything that cannot be moved by a bulldozer is likely to seem mystical to them."

Respectfully,
Fran Mauer, Representative
Wilderness Watch, Alaska Chapter