Better Model for Governing

In January of 2011 Senator Heller, then a congressman for Nevada’s 2^nd congressional district, wrote an article for the Field and Stream magazine titled Wilderness Does Not Equal Effective Wildlife Management. This is an outstanding letter and I commend Senator Heller for laying his views out on the table. The outdoor recreation community is in need of a Senator who will support common sense management initiatives on public lands here in Nevada. I believe that this is a perfect opportunity for Senator Heller to make his stance on Gold Butte known and be our representative.

I would like to build on the concepts that Heller’s letter in Field and Stream offer and put those principles into practice right here in our own state.  In his letter, Senator Heller talks about the impact that Federal land management policies have on a community.  Policy that is created in Washington reduces the local community’s ability to be involved in the process. Policy should be developed and implemented on a community level not written and mandated in Washington.  We need to take the Washington politics out of public lands management and allow the communities and the agencies that were established to manage our public lands do just that.

Senator Heller seems to encourage this type of management from his statement in the letter in Field and Stream, “Maintaining healthy ecosystems and wildlife populations is not a simple or easy task. This task becomes more complicated when land management decisions are taken out of the hands of state wildlife officials, local communities, and stakeholders who know the area best.”

Gold Butte doesn’t need further bureaucratic overhead from Washington. The current management tools are in place to properly manage Gold Butte right now. Local community stewardship, in partner with the local agencies, is the type of management that I would hope our representatives in Washington would promote. In a quote from Senator Heller’s letter I believe he agrees, “a transparent public process that includes input from local officials, communities, and stakeholders is a better model for governing.” We are entitled to the transparent public process that Senator Heller talked about. There should be no shortcuts and no quick wins in public lands management.

I will be calling on Senator Heller to not support any new federal designation at Gold Butte but instead support the local communities and the agencies in their continued effort to design a management plan that protects both our natural resources and our access to public lands.

Heller's letter in Field and Stream can be found here:

http://www.fieldandstream.com/blogs/hunting/2011/01/guest-post-wilderness-does-not-equal-effective-wildlife-management

What Has Changed

Wednesday August 31^st Stan Hardy, Elise McAllister and I had the opportunity to sit down with Congressman Joe Heck at Sugars Home Plate. Our conversation focused on public land issues within Nevada’s 3^rd Congressional District and specifically Gold Butte.

As we sat down and started to discuss the issues facing our public lands congressman Heck stopped me and said, “Dustin I remember going out to gold butte with you last year. We spent a lot of time in the truck going over the history of Gold Butte and the current political issues.” Cutting right to the chase, Congressman Heck pointedly asked me, “Dustin, what has changed since we last met out at Gold Butte?”

My initial reaction to this question was, well nothing, it’s the same ol’ story. Our congressional representatives are being targeted by outside special interests that are on yet another desperate trophy hunt. However as I thought about that question, my initial thoughts were only a small piece of that story. This oversimplification is a disservice to the agencies and the volunteers who have worked be involved and continue the service that keeps Gold Butte protected.

Politically, yes it is the same ol’ fight.  However politics is not what provides sustainable solutions for public lands management. Rather the politics muddy the waters and detract from accomplishing tangible objectives. It is the people and agencies who care for Gold Butte that make Gold Butte a success. Over the last year considerable progress has been made on many fronts that contribute to Gold Buttes developing success story. For example:

• According to the Local BLM office volunteer activities are increasing
• Completion of BLM Management Plans providing enhanced protection specific to Gold Butte
• Reduction in site impacts due to Roads Designation Plan
• Continued progress of MSHCP agency projects
• Completion of the Roads Monitoring Project at Gold Butte

Parties pandering to politicians for bureaucratic designations are a hindrance to the effort, not a contribution. The local communities and the local BLM office working together to create an environment where people can recreate responsibly, while the cultural and natural resources are protected and enjoyed, is a win for all legitimate participants. Full commitment by the agencies and all parties involved in public lands stewardship, to the management plans that are currently in place for Gold Butte, will provide the protection that many are calling for. Things are changing out at Gold Butte. They are changing in a positive direction for both protection and access, falling short of only added costs and redundant bureaucracy.

I would like to thank Congressman Joe Heck for taking the time to come out to Moapa Valley and giving us the opportunity to meet with him as our representative in Washington DC. 

Wilderness as a Trophy

Originally Printed in the Moapa Valley Progress August 24, 2011

I vividly remember my first deer hunt. I got a little forked horn, nothing spectacular in comparison but it was my first deer and so a great success in my rite of passage.

I remember sitting around the fire with my old man that night. The silhouette of my hanging deer drawn on the cedar trees by the flickering light of our camp fire on a cold autumn night told of the day’s earlier event.

I remember the twinge of disappointment I felt at not bringing home that trophy buck yet still proud at the day’s success.

As we crouched over the Dutch oven, eating the choice cuts out of the cast iron with our knives, I asked my father of his first hunt and if he was able to bring home a trophy buck. His answer and the simple lesson taught within have stuck with me over the years.

He said to me, “Ya know a lot of things have changed since then. It wasn’t the big commercialized enterprise that it is now. If we hunted then it was because we were hungry. We didn’t hunt so we could put a mount on the wall to showcase our trophy, we hunted because we needed meat on the table during the long winter months.”

He reflected that no, he didn’t specifically remember the first deer he brought down. But he remembered many cold fall mornings on back of a horse glassing the country side, knowing grandma was home waiting for him and depending on the days success.

I have thought about that night a lot over the years, listening to my father talk of how the simple act of bringing down a deer has evolved over the years, even within the short time from one generation to the next. However, the sport of trophy hunting isn’t exclusive to big game hunting. This progression, or regression depending on your stance, has also taken place in the hunt for Wilderness.

When the “Wilderness Act” was put forth and passed in 1964, I suppose that it was founded on a legitimate reason to protect some of those remaining places where man is visitor.

However much like my father’s story, the original intent has transformed throughout the years. It has evolved from protecting wilderness into manufacturing Wilderness. The objective for which Wilderness was created has fatefully deviated from its original course and intent.

The hunt for Wilderness has become more about the trophy than it has about the ideals for which it was created. People have made it their livelihood to become hired guns that hunt for Wilderness.

These people or groups have had their sights set on Gold Butte for many years. Whether it is for personal gain or for their own satisfaction and glorification, the trophy hunt for new Wilderness that has ravaged the west needs to stop.

No doubt Gold Butte is an amazing piece of our country but a bureaucratic label that has been demeaned and reinvented over the years to fit a narrow special interest agenda is not what will protect it for future generations. Special interest groups who pander to the emotions and simplify the debate down to ‘save it or destroy it’ degrade all interested parties and promote the partisan rancor that plagues our political system.

Wilderness will not save Gold Butte.

As William Cronon has written in his article The Trouble with Wilderness, “The time has come to rethink wilderness. We live in an urban-industrialized civilization but at the same time pretend to ourselves that our real home is in the wilderness. Wilderness is not quite what it seems.”

I am not advocating that there be no protection for Gold Butte and I point out that this is not the case. Gold Butte is currently protected as an Area of Critical Environmental Concern.

The continual solicitation to manufacture more Wilderness within the region of Gold Butte is nothing more than a special interest trophy hunt with their agenda at heart and not what is best for our public lands.

Building a Base

What a long strange trip it’s been, traveling the politically rutted road of public lands policy surrounding Gold Butte. However, along the way I have seen some great sights and have learned a few good lessons.

It was little more than a year ago, that I was meeting with our congressional delegation on a regular basis. It was in those meetings that I was told point blank that the Gold Butte NCA and Wilderness proposal was a done deal. It was only in May of 2010 that the Clark County Commission passed their naïve and disingenuous resolution, reworked at the eleventh hour, in support of this same plan. We met with candidates running for office at every level of government, we met with Washington bureaucrats, lobbyists, local mayors, county commissioners and all manner of elected officials. Through it all, in spite of the odds, we were able to hold out through the election cycle of 2010 and the resulting lame duck session and fight off yet another inept and heavy-handed proposal.

 

Why was it that these politically privileged plans never made it out of the dark recesses of the chambers of those political elite? It was because of you. It was because when phone calls needed to be made, when letters needed to be written and a show of hands at a meeting was needed, you were ready to rise up.  I have seen what a coalition of communities coming together, fighting for something they believe in, can accomplish politically. It is bigger, better and stronger than any halfhearted special interest group could hope to buy or manufacture. 

It is my goal with this blog to provide a place where like-minded people can find information on current events and have a place where ideas can be shared that help promote local stewardship for our public lands. I would hope that the efforts of this blog have helped build the base of community support for issues surrounding public lands at Gold Butte. However, I need your help, in building an even larger community base to support Gold Butte. I need help in sharing our message to the community that cares about Gold Butte. The time will come again that we will need to fend off yet another special interest proposal that is trying to cash in on hundreds of thousands of acres to add to their trophy chest.  We need to stand ready as a community to yet again block the next unreasonable proposal.

I am not asking for money, I won’t spam you with emails or Facebook posts, I am not even asking you to come to any meetings, but I do need your help. 

http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Save-Gold-Butte/107781355916775

Please share the link to the Save Gold Butte Facebook page to your Facebook friends and invite them to “Like” this page. Share the link to Save Gold Butte to your blogger friends and suggest they follow the blog with their blogger account. Help me build the base of community support for Gold Butte and keep our public lands accessible for everyone to enjoy.

Local Wilderness Discussions

The scoping meetings for the Lime Canyon and Jumbo Springs wilderness areas were held a few weeks ago. I was able to attend the meeting held in Overton. The meeting was not very well attended however the discussion that we had was constructive, and I believe, informative for both sides (the community and the BLM). The discussion focused on how to manage wilderness areas both in a broad sense and also specific components that would impact the wilderness within the Gold Butte region.

The wilderness that is found within Gold Butte is for the most part undeveloped and primitive. I know this seems common sense or logical even so, it was on these simple facts that I built the basis of my suggestion for future management for these areas. We don’t need big gouty signage cluttering the landscape pointing out the way. We don’t need interpretive signage for the visitor to be told what he or she is seeing. We don’t need fences telling us which side of the road or canyon is wilderness and which isn’t. We don’t need a big red delineation on the map calling visitors attention to these places.  If we have to have wilderness, if it has to be drawn on a map so we “know” what it is, then we ought to let it be what we want it to be, wilderness.

Different sub topics like managing weeds, habitat, water sources and fire control were also discussed within the meeting.  However, most of those conversations came back to the overarching theme of managing the entire region or landscape instead of a small subset within that region. The community members who were in attendance seemed to agree that trying to manage a 4,000 acre swath of country within a 350,000 acre complex was of little worth at best and a poor utilization of government  resources when talking about weed control or habitat conservation. The whole complex needs to be managed as a single unit. To try and manage a 4,000 acre piece while leaving the remainder vulnerable because it doesn’t have a bureaucratic title is ridiculous.

This is only a brief overview of what was discussed at the Overton scoping meeting. There were two other meetings held both in Bunkerville and Mesquite. I was a little disappointed at the attendance of the Overton meeting. These meetings are both a great opportunity for the community to get to know our BLM staff and also for the community to express their thoughts and feelings about local land management. It is these meetings were we can hold our BLM staff accountable for local land management practices. If we don’t take the time to tell them how we would like to see it managed by the time you grab your pitchfork and light your torch it is probably too late to do any good.

The Moapa Valley Progress covered this meeting along with the other community meetings. Please take the time read their article and get a more well-rounded assessment of the community meetings:

http://mvprogress.com/2011/07/06/blm-seeks-public-input-on-management-of-wilderness/

Lime Canyon & Jumbo Springs Wilderness

The BLM is holding three public scoping meetings to soliciting input for two of the wilderness areas within Gold Butte. Some possible talking points for these meetings are things such as weed treatment for invasive species and developing interpretive information to educate the visiting public about the resources and history in the area. Keep in mind that these are existing Wilderness Areas so all the comments and suggestions have to be within the realm of the wilderness guidelines; which are to maintain the wilderness characteristics of the area. This is a very narrow scope to say the least. So comments like “it shouldn't be wilderness,” though possibly therapeutic, will not do much good at these meetings.

Bunkerville Community Center June 27, 2011 6 PM

Overton Community Center June 28, 2011 6 PM

Mesquite City hall June 29, 2011 6 PM

Gold Butte History - Salt Mine

In a continuing effort to increase the content, and with any luck awareness of the rich history woven in the landscape of Gold Butte, I have posted a short excerpt from a study that was done on the mineral deposits in the potential reservoir site now known as Lake Mead. The specific site referenced in this excerpt is a salt mine owned and operated by Daniel Bonelli.

If a list were to be compiled of the significant characters that contributed to the historical patchwork that has evolved into Gold Butte, Daniel Bonelli would have a vivid and colorful block. Bonelli helped lay the foundation for future settlement in this area.

Look for more history of Daniel Bonelli in coming posts at http://goldbuttehistory.blogspot.com/