This transcript was auto-generated and may contain errors.
Kate Groetzinger
Welcome to The Landscape, your podcast about America’s parks and public lands. I’m Kate Groetzinger with the Center for Western Priorities, and we are live tonight coming to you from Fisher Brewing in Salt Lake City. Before we kick this discussion off, I want to take a moment to celebrate a recent victory. As many of you know, Senator Mike Lee tried to sell off millions of acres of public land to developers in the big bad budget bill that passed Congress last month. He ended up pulling that provision from the bill thanks to massive bipartisan pushback. I know many of the people in this room called and wrote letters to his office, so I just want to say thank you. Make some noise for yourselves. Our voices do matter, and we have to keep using them. We’re headed to Grand Junction tomorrow, as Erika mentioned, to host another one of these. So if you have friends there, please tell them to show up to Gemini Brewing. We’ll be there tomorrow night. And if you’re listening to this, then it’s already tomorrow. And come see us tonight. Also, follow along on our Instagram. We’ve got tons of content we’re going to post on there about why public lands matter. and how they’re struggling right now. And with that, I will introduce our panel. Erika Pollard is the Southwest Region Campaign Director for the National Parks Conservation Association, which advocates for America’s national parks, monuments, and historic sites, of which we have 13 here in Utah, I think, if Google’s right. Welcome, Erika. Thank you. Oh, I’m sorry. Okay. Scott Braden is the executive director of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, which fights to protect and defend Utah’s Red Rock wilderness. Scott, we’re excited to have you here tonight. Davina Smith represents the Navajo Nation on the Bears Ears Intertribal Coalition. She’s also a board member of Grand Staircase-Escalante Partners and a former state legislative candidate. And she works with NPCA, so she’s a busy lady. Thanks for making some time for us.
Davina Smith
Thank you.
Kate Groetzinger
And Doug Tolman is the Senior Policy Associate at Save Our Canyons, a group dedicated to defending the Wasatch Front’s national forests. Doug, welcome to the landscape. All right, Erika, let’s start with you. What is the situation in our national parks right now? We’ve seen a lot of headlines in the news about them being short-staffed. What are you hearing from folks on the ground who work in these parks?
Erika Pollard
Well, right now we are really seeing an all-out assault on our national parks and our national park system like we’ve never seen before. I think, you know, some people think, oh, it’s a national park, it’s protected, we don’t need to worry about it. But I can tell you right now that our national parks are being threatened in a way that our other public lands are. Since this new administration came in, they’ve really been in an all-out staffing crisis. They’ve lost over 5,000 employees since January. That’s about 25%. Almost a quarter of their workforce is just gone. And that’s on top of what had already been a 20% reduction in staffing the previous decade. So, none of those staffing cuts that have happened were done strategically at all to ensure that the basic functions of our park service stayed intact and they could kind of accomplish their mission. We know that the people who have been pushed out have been the backbone of these national parks. They’re the people who clear the trails, who, you know, educate the visitors, who are cleaning the restrooms. We also know that it’s people who have spent decades of their careers, and there’s a tremendous amount of expertise and institutional knowledge that’s just gone and will take years to build back up. We also know that there’s still talk about a reduction in force. This is something that’s been looming over the Park Service for months now. it’s possible that maybe a thousand more jobs could be lost if they decide to do a reduction in force. And what we’re hearing is that they would be targeting kind of regional and national offices for the Park Service. These are people who do a lot of work behind the scenes to make sure that the system keeps running. It’s people that help parks with planning and water quality and air quality concerns. So where does that leave the parks right now in terms of staff and what visitors are experiencing? Well, that extensive loss of permanent staff means that the people who are left are really being stretched thin. For people going to the parks right now, it might look like everything is fine, but we know it’s not. the administration is basically forcing the parks to keep their visitor services open uninterrupted. So it’s kind of creating this facade that everything’s fine. But we know in the background there are really gaping holes with their staff. So you’ve got staff who are filling, you know, three to four different jobs above and beyond what they were actually hired to do. We’ve got, you know, biologists and historians who are helping to run visitor centers. We have rotating restroom closures because there aren’t enough people to clean them. We have fee booths that are unstaffed during really busy times of the day, like early morning when it’s so hot in Utah and people want to go early. They might not have somebody at the entrance booth. And we know that cultural resource protection and restoration projects are being delayed as are scientific research and monitoring being delayed. The seasonals are helping to plug the holes right now, but that’s going to drop off in the fall. And there’s still some uncertainty around whether or not the parks are going to be able to rehire seasonals next year. So the morale is pretty low. I would say there’s kind of this uncertainty that’s just hanging over the agency. As more and more of this work that people do behind the scenes gets delayed, we know that there are going to be more and more impacts to the cultural and natural resources and that visitor experience. So this isn’t just about what’s happening in the parks this summer, but it’s about some of the long-term damage that these decisions are going to have on the entire park system that could take decades to undo.
Kate Groetzinger
Well, we know it wasn’t just the Park Service that lost staffing. The Forest Service had a huge cut in staffing earlier this year, as well as the Bureau of Land Management. Doug, Scott, what are you guys hearing from folks who work in those agencies about funding or staffing reductions?
Doug Tolman
Well, I would say we’re confused. We’re not hearing much. Every time I call one of my contacts at any of the ranger districts, I make my way up to the region level. Silence. They’re not able to talk about it. There are some top-down directives. So when we’re trying to figure out how many staff we’ve lost, we’re not even able to get accurate numbers. So best anecdotal evidence, just from folks working on the ground, is in our local ranger district, we’ve lost somewhere between 20% and 30% of our regular staff. the ones who are long time, know what they’re doing, have been working in this district and know this forest and the problems it faces. And then upwards of 60, 70, 80 percent of seasonal staff who are the ones out there actually doing the trail work. And that doesn’t only impact trails, that impacts fuels, that impacts invasive species. And then we’re starting to see counties and local municipalities having to step in to clean bathrooms. So it’s, you know, we’re losing something. We’re losing something really significant. And we’re also confused because we don’t even know how to figure out how much we’re losing in the Forest Service.
Scott Braden
Scott, what are you hearing? You know, I think it’s really similar to what we’re hearing from Doug and Erika on Bureau of Land Management lands. You know, in Utah, for those that aren’t aware, the BLM manages about 22 million acres of public lands. And, you know, we’re famous for the mighty five national parks and the other 13 units that were talked about in the Park Service. BLM lands are often the connective tissue that really connects all of these iconic landscapes on the Colorado Plateau and especially here in Utah. And so, you know, my group, SUA, were interested in protecting those lands. And so we propose, you know, about a third of them, 8 million acres for wilderness protection in America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act. And that’s how we kind of organize and think about how we’re going to prioritize protection for ecosystems. With regard to the reductions, though, and the cuts in the budget, BLM lands have also been suffering under this. A lot of people took the forced retirement. And it’s, again, a little opaque as to what is happening inside the land management agencies. But it’s my belief that these efforts at cutting the budget and cutting the workers and ruining the morale within these agencies is a cynical effort to make public lands management in America fail. And that is a justification for those who would seek to seize and sell off and privatize those public lands. So it’s also just bad for the land, for all the reasons that my fellow panelists have been pointing out. The bathrooms that go uncleaned, the lack of law enforcement to protect cultural resources, the lack of resources to manage recreation, and the other uses people have for public lands. Those needs are going basically unmet. So it’s terrible for the land, and it shows. It’s also bad for people. It’s degrading the experience of visitors to public lands. It is really a disservice to tribes and indigenous people who are public land managers are entrusted the care of these cultural landscapes. And it’s also just demonstrates a lack of compassion for the dedicated staffers of these public lands agencies who are being treated incredibly poorly.
Kate Groetzinger
So let’s talk about some of those cultural resources and one of our sort of, you know, crown jewel landscapes in Utah, Bears Ears National Monument. Davina, the Biden administration worked on a historic resource management plan for the monument in collaboration with the Bears Ears tribes. Did that plan go into effect? And do you know what’s happening on the ground in Bears Ears right now?
Davina Smith
First of all, I have to say that that management plan was something we had prayed for when we just thought of an idea of, tribes, we need to come together, protect Bears Ears. What do we need to do? And years later, we have a resource monument management plan. And I can say, yes, it’s moving forward. And, you know, working with agencies such as BLM, Forest Service, we’ve become like a family, in a sense to say. And, and of course, those two years of sitting down and, and going every detail information that implemented our indigenous knowledge and ecological knowledge was something that I know agencies, it took time for them to understand. But in that process, there was that healing portion. And then to come to find out that some of those staffs were not going to be there, It definitely, it was sad in a sense to say, it was like a grieving portion because we got close. Finally, there’s an agency under the Department of Interior where we know the history of that historical trauma. We were beginning that healing part. And as many probably have heard when we talk about barriers, it’s a place of healing. So this discussion and that implementation is, of course, moving forward in that respect of healing. So, yeah, I think now it’s agencies with anything that is being built or being constructed or reconstructed or if there’s any talks of trails, agencies definitely consult with the tribes in what is the best to implement in those areas.
Kate Groetzinger
That’s great. I’m glad to hear that the plan is still in place despite, you know, a potential reduction in the monument, which hasn’t come yet. But I want to talk about some attacks on another important monument that was shrunk by Trump last time, Grand Staircase. What are you hearing? Well, sorry, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase. What are you guys hearing, if anything, Scott, you too, about plans to reduce those monuments? I think we’ve all just been waiting.
Scott Braden
I think we are all waiting. And who knows how long we’ll be waiting. In the meantime, though, not to be outdone, the House of Representatives has proposed a bill that would limit funding to the Trump era plan to basically overwrite the collaborative plan that Davina was just discussing. And so if that were to take place, it would be an effective reduction of that monument by other means.
Kate Groetzinger
So are you talking about Grand Staircase or Bears Ears?
Scott Braden
Sorry, Grand Staircase in that instance.
Kate Groetzinger
Davina, how about you?
Davina Smith
Well, also, we just recently, the Grand Staircase Intertribal Coalition was also created. So we have tribes definitely, yes, despite that this is happening, they’re still moving forward. We’re not waiting. We still have projects to implement, programs to discuss. And then also just working with each tribe. We have Grand Canyon Trust and Grand Staircase partners that are working closely. with the coalition of Grand Staircase. So yeah, we’re still moving. And I think the most important thing is that Grand Staircase just was quite massive. And I think the one thing that is so beautiful is that now tribes are coming to visit these landscapes and fill another portion of healing and being able to be a part of those discussions that pertain to Grand Staircase and revisiting. These were ancestral lands. So we have, you know, you have Pueblo out there or Ute Mountain Ute and Navajo. It’s, you know, revisiting and remembering the discussions of our ancestors. So that portion is very powerful for us. And that’s what keeps us moving.
Kate Groetzinger
Davina, can you say a little bit more about what tribal land management means? Like what, what does it mean when we say that the plan was created with the tribes on the ground? What are some examples of that?
Davina Smith
You know, for one, and I’m only going to speak on behalf of my tribe, you know, we, gosh, Bears Ears and Grand Staircase are for us a place of like a grocery store or a medicine cabinet. For me, my stories of my people also come from those areas in terms of seeking refuge. We talk about when a long walk, when my Navajo people were being rounded up. And when we heard of that, we fled to Bears Ears. We fled to Grand Staircase. My grandfather was a Hogan builder, so he would harvest the wood from Bears Ears. And my grandmother was a Navajo weaver and an herbalist, so she talked about the plants and medicines in that area. So my story, among many other of the tribes where there’s layers of rich history, we infuse that in the land management plan carefully because, you know, I represent over 400,000 of my people. So that’s a lot. And that’s a lot to put on your shoulder. So my responsibility is to make sure that our Navajo team, and it’s not only I represent the coalition, we have the Bears Ears Commission as well, but we also have our subcommittee members on our Navajo team. So when we gather and make these decisions, it has to be very, very thoroughly thought out and implemented in the management plan.
Kate Groetzinger
And yeah, that’s one reason why it would be so sad to see the monument changed and shrunk. So much work and so many hours have gone into creating these really thoughtful plans. Doug, I want to bring you back in. The Trump administration announced a few months ago that it’s repealing the roadless rule, which currently protects around 4 million acres or half of all the national forest land in Utah. What are some of the implications for the forests here on the Wasatch Front if that happens?
Doug Tolman
Yeah, there’s some really, really significant impacts. So the roadless rule was established in 2001, but we need to go back to the Wilderness Act back in 1964 to understand the roadless rule. So when the Wilderness Act was passed, it tasked land managers in the Forest Service to inventory all areas that were not currently roaded at that time, had no roads in them. And that was initially to understand what areas could become wilderness in the future. Then 40 years passed or so, and we started to see a lot of these roadless areas get roads. So then the Clinton administration passed the 2001 roadless area conservation rule, and that essentially prevented or really significantly limited the amount of roads that could be put on those lands. And it had very broad public support, hundreds of thousands, I think even millions of comments, if I remember right, at least hundreds of thousands in support of it. And now 20 years later, 24 years later, we have the Trump administration has announced they intend to rescind it. They’ll now have to follow the Administrative Procedures Act. And because of that, it’s going to take a long process. We’re going to have multiple opportunities for public comment, one of them beginning in the next few months. And we’re going to be launching a pretty serious campaign trying to get localized and hyper-specific comments about that. So it protects almost 60 million acres of forests in the country, and then about 320,000 of those are in the Wasatch Mountains. Some of my favorite spots include most of Mill Creek Canyon, most of upper Big Cottonwood, like Cardiff Fork, Mill D. If you think about somewhere you hiked, there’s no roads and it’s not in wilderness. It’s really likely that it has roadless designation. And if we remove that roadless designation, it could lead to more roads, logging, development, ski resort expansion, all sorts of permits that need to have roads to be approved. And unfortunately, there’s a lot of misinformation going around saying that we need roads to stop wildfires. And it’s true we need to actively manage our forests. In fact, in Big Cottonwood Canyon, we’re about to treat several thousand acres of really densely wooded areas. happen to also be roadless. We’re treating them with lop and scatter. We’re treating them with prescribed burns, other sorts of things like that. We don’t need commercial logging in more roads because the truth is that 85% of wildfire, this is the federal government statistic, 85% of wildfires are started by humans. Most of those are around roads. More roads is not the answer to wildfire. More logging is not the answer to wildfire. It’s collaborative, shared stewardship projects that involve municipalities, tribes, forest service to bring back in cultural burning, to bring back in good fire that the plants actually want, and prevent catastrophic wildfire without using that as a fear-mongering tactic to really remove important protections that prevent expansion into national forests. So stay tuned. We’re releasing it. As soon as the environmental impact statement process begins, we’ll be sharing a lot of information about it.
Kate Groetzinger
Awesome. Well, thank you guys for your work on that. It’s great to have a local group here working on protecting the forests. Scott, so we’ve been talking about logging and other threats to forests. The BLM manages about 23 million acres of public land in Utah. And the Trump administration has directed the agency to increase drilling and mining drastically on those lands. How does that threaten lands? And how are those threats already sort of coming to bear on the public lands here?
Scott Braden
I think it really does two things. One is the BLM in its organic legislation, the Federal Lands Policy and Management Act, was passed in 1976. And it gives the BLM a multiple use and sustained yield mission. And these directives from the Trump administration to prioritize drilling, mining and other extractive uses for public lands upset that mission. And so what it does is it basically rebalances the way public lands managers are being asked to think about public lands and how they approach their jobs in favor of one particular set of uses, which happen to be the uses that are the most profit driven and ecologically harmful and disruptive to other uses. Those are being prioritized. So it’s putting a hand on the scale on the side of development. Another thought that comes to mind with your question is the way that Secretary Doug Burgum is talking about public lands. He uses language that these are assets on the nation’s balance sheet. So you see a shift in the way the administration is talking about lands that commodifies and only sees value in what can be extracted as a value from the lands. And that completely ignores any other uses for the public lands, whether they be conservation, wildlife habitat, protection of watershed, protection of cultural landscapes, or any of the other values that we’ve been talking about here tonight. So to me, this is one essential element to what I was talking about earlier, which is this systematic dismantling of the public land system in the United States.
Kate Groetzinger
Erika, I want to go to you. The House of Representatives and Trump have both proposed drastically cutting funding for the National Park Service in 2026. How would those cuts affect parks and historic sites here in Utah? And sort of going off what Scott was saying about hollowing out these agencies, what do you think the point of this is?
Erika Pollard
Well, I can just start out by saying that I think like all our public land management agencies, the National Park Service has been operating with inadequate funding and staffing for many years. While visitation has skyrocketed in many of our national parks, we know that since 2010, between 2010 and the start of the new administration, staffing levels had been reduced by about 20 percent, but visitation had risen by about 16 percent. So we know that the Park Service was already doing a lot more with less. And now we’re faced with kind of three visions, three proposals for funding the future of our national parks. And they could have very different consequences for the national park system. The administration made their intentions clear with their budget proposal for the National Park Service. They are proposing to cut $1 billion from the National Park Service budget. And that includes $900 million, a $900 million cut to the operating budget of the Park Service. That’s about a third of their operating budget. They have also suggested that some of the lesser visited and smaller national park units could be transferred to states or other entities for management. So this is really the biggest cut to the National Park Service, the biggest proposed budget cut to the National Park Service I think we’ve ever seen. And PCA has done an analysis on that. And if that proposal were to come to fruition, we could see up to 350 national park sites close. And so that’s about a 75% reduction of the national park system. That would be devastating and really a dismantling of the national park system. In July, the House Appropriations Committee passed their budget for the park service. They did push back on some of the more dramatic cuts that the administration was proposing. And also they were not going to allow the transfer of any of the parks, but they were still proposing $167 million cut. So that’s still a lot to the park operating budget. It will continue to cut into park staffing and what they need to manage these places. Luckily, the Senate kind of sent out a lifeline to our national parks and their appropriations. The committee also passed a bill. It was bipartisan. And basically, they are proposing flat funding for the parks. And really, at this point in time, that’s a win. They rejected some of those most damaging provisions that the administration would not allow the Park Service to transfer any of the units. They would require the Park Service to hire sufficient staffing. um so you know um who would have thought the senate is our lifeline it’s a path forward to protecting our parks and keeping them open um and you know the appropriations process is still going on but so are the attacks from this administration so it’s really it’s not just about the money right now it’s really about whether or not these places are going to stay protected, staffed, and actually open to the public. So we really need people to push back on this administration proposal, the House proposal, get behind this Senate version of
Kate Groetzinger
appropriations. Well, you mentioned transferring parks to the state. Scott, I want to talk to you about that. There’s a lot of hesitancy to trust the state of Utah with our public lands. Can you tell people about the lawsuit that the state filed last year trying to take control of 18.5 million acres and where that stands now?
Scott Braden
Yeah, so the state of Utah filed suit for control and asked the Supreme Court to order the BLM to turn over to the state’s 18.5 million acres of unappropriated public land, which was a novel term, you know, sort of invented for this lawsuit by the state of Utah. And that effort was directly petitioned to the Supreme Court, which denied, you know, without comment, really, they set aside that request. In response to that, our organization, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, SUA filed a lawsuit in state court saying that the state of Utah was essentially violating the terms of its admission to the union back in 1896, when the state of Utah forever disclaimed right to these same public lands that they now say that they want to control. And so what we’re waiting on now, basically, now that the Supreme Court has turned aside Utah’s petition is for them to refile that lawsuit in lower court. Similarly, we’re ready to refile our lawsuit, Suha v. Cox, when that time comes. So we’re ready to fight that tooth and nail legally. But I want to contextualize Utah’s effort in the bigger scale because it connects to everything that we’ve been talking about here tonight, which is a multifaceted effort to dismantle our system of public lands. And so the state of Utah is doing its part in the lawsuit, but also Senator Mike Lee is playing his role where in the big, beautiful bill, he proposed the provision that we talked about as well to sell off public lands, you know, allegedly to help with affordable housing. Fortunately, due to people power, and I suspect people power from a lot of the people in this room, we were successful. Senator Mike Lee’s idea was spurned by a huge coalition of people who care about public lands. So this also continues in the executive, whether it be the administrative and executive orders around increased commodification and industrial uses on our public lands, or whether it be about this sort of vague task force impaneled by Secretary Burgum to identify ways to get rid of more public lands, allegedly again, for public housing. It all connects. And it is a multi-year and huge effort by people who would like to sell off our public lands. And we’re not going to let them. We anticipate that this is going to be a multi-year fight. And we invite everyone to join us in that fight. Because whether you live in Utah or any other state where you appreciate going to public lands, it’s going to affect you. What happens in Utah does not stay in Utah. We’re not like Las Vegas. So it affects us all, and we all have to be in it together, and we’re looking at this as an existential struggle. My group, we care about wilderness-quality lands on the heart of the Colorado Plateau. You can’t protect them if the lands aren’t public lands. So we see this as an existential fight over many, many years against well-organized and well-funded people who really have a lot of power and are dedicated to the proposition of eliminating large swaths of public lands. One final example, the state of Utah, due to some great reporting from our friends at Public Domain, has engaged in a multi-year propaganda campaign with PR firms and everything to convince Utahns that the state of Utah will do a better job of managing public lands than the status quo. And then in court, where they’re under oath and have to tell the truth, they admit, the state of Utah admits that they actually, their goal is to sell off and privatize these public lands. So we’re in it for the long haul. You can find out more to get involved at SUA.org, but we’re going to be in this for a while.
Doug Tolman
Scott, I have a question. Is that campaign the same one of all the people? There’s all these billboards around with people who are rock climbing and having fun on public land.
Scott Braden
It’s the same one. Yeah, the Salt Lake area has been blanketed in billboards, including an ad featuring a testimonial from a disabled person talking about how they need better management from the state. And it turns out that it was just an actor paid to appear disabled. So it’s a very cynical effort.
Kate Groetzinger
I want to shout out my good friend Anastasia here in the front row who actually broke that story way back last year. She found out how much money they spent on that campaign. It was over a million dollars of taxpayer money to convince us that we don’t actually need the public lands to be managed by the federal government, which is not true. Davina, I want to bring you in on this. Obviously, these lands all belong to tribes before they belonged to all of us. How would the land management transferring to the state affect tribal management of those areas?
Davina Smith
Well, where do I begin? I think it would be definitely a, I guess, in a form of disrespect because, you know, tribes actually reached out to the state and had asked support and help with protecting Bears Ears. And when the state turned their heads, we kept moving forward. We moved to speak with Barack Obama at the time. And when we were finally heard, it was a form of joy finally to be heard due to the historical disconnect that we were not able to be included in conversations. I mean, goodness gracious, tribes have been here since time immemorial taking care of Mother Earth, taking care of our water for Navajo people. These are the water is is water is life. There are bloodlines for Mother Earth. Our air, the quality of air, our animals, our plants, everything has a sacred form of of how it’s all connected. and we were taught that these lands are not for us to own but to take care of us. We were given this to take care of. And so those are things in which we wanted to share. Our hope was to share with others that are non-Native. And when that was not being heard, we moved to where those could be heard. And that was definitely with those such as former Secretary Holland, Biden, Obama. And because of that, we definitely have our management plan. But I know now, more and more tribes are reaching out to the Bears Ears Intertribal Coalition Commission and asking for help and asking what are those steps that we took. And we are definitely open to having those conversations. And it’s just, it’s just created this wave of support from across this nation. And I know tribes are ready. Tribes are not going to back down. We’re going to keep moving forward because we can definitely see the issues that are happening across our nation in terms of energy or extracting companies coming and wanting to extract. And that’s the thing that really is upsetting when we hear like Mike Lee, you know, talking about selling off public lands. Excuse you. You have people that live in these areas like my people. We’re still trying to deal with the repercussions of uranium in my community of Monument Valley, Utah. I mean, I can definitely without a doubt talk about how I was impacted by uranium. We drank water that was that had uranium. I remember we had livestock that our lambs had extra tails and we thought we were blessed. We didn’t know that they were infused with uranium. We had no idea. My grandfather worked in uranium mines, but never once was he told there will be some repercussions of that. And he passed away from that. So my story, along with many other tribes across this nation, these are things that we’re going to continue to talk about and continue to support tribes across this nation. because now we’re done. We’re tired of when we hear, oh, our Utahns, we’re speaking for all Utahns. No, you’re not. Definitely not. That’s BS. No. Thank you.
Kate Groetzinger
Well, I feel like we should just cut the mics and end it there. But I do have two more questions, so bear with me. You mentioned the uranium mining, and actually I just want to highlight that the Trump administration fast-tracked an environmental review for a uranium mine in southern Utah. Another story by my friend Anna. The Velvet Wood Mine, they spent 11 days on the environmental review for that uranium mine that is now open and running. So it’s a very real threat that’s coming back. We thought, you know, I think a lot of people thought that uranium, you know, radioactive threats were in the past, but they’re present. So, Doug, I want to talk to you about NEPA and the changes that the administration is making to environmental reviews and how that could affect us locally. How would that affect infrastructure projects in the canyons?
Doug Tolman
That’s a really good question. So NEPA, the National Environmental Policy Act, is what governs pretty much every environmental review that goes through any federal agency or any state agency that is using federal money or federal land. And unfortunately, with many of the departments right now, all of the federal departments actually, the NEPA regulations, the way that they implement that policy has been almost cut, almost completely removed. So, for example, we used to use a tool called the Schedule of Proposed Actions. And that’s something that the Forest Service was required any time, let’s say, a ski resort says they want to realign this lift. Or let’s say a ski resort says they want to build a new lift, or let’s say a new mining operator wants to use public land or a new logging. They had to publish that right off the bat on this thing, on SOPA, Schedule of Proposed Action. It’s gone, just as one example. Or environmental impact statements are now limited to a certain amount of time and a certain length. Environmental assessments, same thing. So all that to say, all environmental reviews going forward across all agencies are going to be much, much less rigorous and much easier to rig. So thinking of how much effort and time was put into the Little Cottonwood Canyon gondola that’s proposed, that would have been over in a year. And that would have been that we’d have a gondola right now if NEPA were regulated or if the NEPA regulations were then as they are now. So it’s going to be bad.
Kate Groetzinger
It really cuts the public out of these projects entirely or as much as they can legally. So this one’s for everyone. We’ll just start with Erika and go down the line. Obviously, we talked about a lot of bad news tonight. What’s giving you hope and keeping you fighting for public lands right now?
Erika Pollard
I would say there are a few things. One is that there are just so many people speaking up for our public lands right now. That public land sell-off was incredible. we are also seeing people speak up for our national parks in a lot of different ways one example is that the administration has recently been requiring parks to solicit feedback from visitors on how they’re interpreting different stories about the history of our country and really looking for negative feedback and i would say that overwhelmingly people have done the opposite. And they have talked about how exceptional our national park system is, you know, talking about these staffing cuts and celebrating these places. So that gives me hope. And then I guess the final thing is just, you know, the staff that are still in these national parks are really just amazing human beings who are kind of putting their heads down and doing the job because they are committed and they, you know, love these places that they work in. And I think they’re wanting to kind of outlast this and be there on the front lines to help build things back up. So
Doug Tolman
that gives me hope too. Awesome. Doug? Yeah. I mean, I’ll keep it short. Sometimes it takes a crisis and I think we’re in that right now. I’m excited for what comes next, but you know, we have a hard couple of years ahead of us in terms of changes that could happen and we need to be ready to, as Governor Cox says, build back better? Or is that, wait, what does he say?
Kate Groetzinger
Disagree better.
Doug Tolman
Oh, yeah.
Kate Groetzinger
But I think build back better was the bill. Okay.
Doug Tolman
Yeah, all that stuff. I’m excited for what’s happening in three years. That’s what I’ll say.
Kate Groetzinger
Just got to hang on until then. Scott?
Scott Braden
So three things, and I’ll kind of synthesize a little bit, I think of nothing unique here. You know, one is, like Davina has articulated, The fact that tribes and indigenous communities are part of the conversation now and not leaving the table, refusing to leave the table, that gives me hope. Another thing is people power, like Erika was just describing. The fact that so many people were incensed by and saw through the sham being perpetrated by Senator Mike Lee gives me a lot of hope. You know, people were not buying that. And whether, you know, people who may or may not agree on how public lands should be managed all came together to say, we should have public lands. And by God, we will have public lands. And seeing that kind of galvanized strength to defeat and welcome people into the public lands movement, but also to defeat Senator Lee’s provision for the big, beautiful bill gives me a lot of hope that we can prevail in other fights. Yeah, we’re going to lose some, but we can also win some. And the final thing for me really is like Doug was saying, is we do have an opportunity to have a restoration in a few years, but not to the status quo before. We’ll have a chance to build something new and sort of maybe reimagine how public lands are managed. And that’s an opportunity that can, you know, propel us forward. Davina.
Davina Smith
I just want to say, you know, me as a Dena woman, I am always grateful constantly. I know this is a lot of heavy work, but my umbilical cord is buried in Mindvalley, Utah. And because of that, I have a connection to Mother Earth. I hear her. Some of you may have known me as I ran from Bears Ears to Salt Lake one year, 330 miles. The second was 426 miles from Bears Ears to Grand Staircase and to Utah. And every day was a form of prayer as I was carrying a medicine bundle filled with all the plant medicines and sand and rocks from Bears Ears, because that was a place of strength. So every step I took was my connection to Mother Earth. So this fight, this is nothing new. This is something we will still continue to do. That’s what we do as tribes. It was a big win when we heard the win of Oak Flat down in Arizona. But then, of course, we saw a message, a tweet saying that was anti-American. Well, we were tribes before Americans. So, okay, you know, we keep moving on. We keep moving forward. But also, lastly, I want to leave with, as you are across this valley, Salt Lake Valley, I want you to remember that this area was full of tribes before this is the place. It was flourishing with tribes across this area. The Delta Center right now was a village. And when it was discovered as a village, but they built over it, there was no connection asking tribes. I’m sure it was a form of hurt for them because they were not included to rebury their community members, their relatives. There was even a small blurb in the Salt Lake Tribune. that needs to stop. That needs, I mean, we’re talking about the passion of our public lands, but also think about the tribes in these areas that love this land, that did everything to protect it and continue to do that in their own way and the reservations that we were herded to. There are a significant amount of tribes along here, but, you know, I know the more and more we hear of victories across this nation of tribes coming together. I know that’s a win for them too, but I hope you recognize that. Also, our other communities of color, our African-American communities, you know, there was a time and place where they were not allowed to enjoy these areas. So I know now we have the Afro Outdoor Organization, we have the Outdoor Latina, So support them as well. I encourage you to do that. And I also, out there on our tables, we also have the postcard about the land management. I encourage you to read that. So you also have an understanding what we worked two years heavy on on that management plan. Thank you.
Kate Groetzinger
All right, guys. I know we’ve been up here for a while, and we’ve probably talked a lot, but does anybody have any questions that they’d like to pose to the panelists? If so, you do have to come up here and say it into the mic so we can record it for the podcast. Come on up.
Lexi Tuddenham
Hi there. Well, thank you so much for having this wonderful panel. It’s been wonderful to hear from everyone. I’m Lexi Tuttle. I’m actually with Heal, Utah. We’re located just down the street. And one question I have for this group right now is, what does this so-called nuclear renaissance that we’re hearing so much about, both in the state and at the federal level, mean for public lands, especially in the state of Utah, and perhaps for tribes as well?
Kate Groetzinger
Thank you, Lexi. Does anyone want to jump in on that?
Davina Smith
Well, I know, I mean, you know, down in Southeastern Utah, I know there’s a lot of heavy discussion. I believe right now we just completed some of our Navajo chapter discussions on nuclear impacts. Also, we have our neighbors, Ute Mountain Ute, that are still dealing with the issues of the White Mesa Mill. And then, of course, with Anfield Mines and Shootery Millard, you know, all of those that are happening. I know we are having these discussions, but I know also the discussions we have are for now within our own communities. I know every time we’re impacted with some form of extraction, it’s how do we learn from previous. But also we have organizations such as SUA or Bears Air’s Partnership, Utah Denebikea Coalition. We have a number in Utah that are there to support us and offer suggestions. But ultimately it is the tribes because I think we’ve learned a lot. We’ve learned a lot. We learned our lessons as well, but we also have attorneys. We have our native attorneys now. We have younger. We’ve grass-rooted our own, and so I think these are discussions we do see. We do see, and so we’re not in a place yet to – you’ll know when we do, when we’ve spoken. Go ahead.
Scott Braden
Maybe I’d add that public lands, the impacts that we’re seeing on uranium mining, Well, we’re already starting to see it. Seeing the velvet wood mine in Lisbon Valley approved with less than two weeks of environmental study is, I think, a preview of what we can expect to see more of. And it fits within what we talked about earlier, this notion of really turning multiple use on its head to prioritize extractive uses. And, you know, when you couple that with the fact that mining on public lands is still governed by the 1872 mining law that was signed into law by President Grant, you know, it’s just there’s sort of no end to the to the mischief and the damage that can cause to wild lands and to public lands to say nothing to the to the human toll. So we’re expecting more of that. I mean, the greatest loss of wilderness lands in southern Utah and on the Colorado Plateau was the previous uranium era, where before NEPA, before FLIPMA, before the sort of bedrock laws of environmental review and public participation. And with some being propelled by price supports from the federal government, we lost an incalculable, well, it’s calculable, millions of acres of wilderness quality lands. And, you know, we’re sitting in a situation where we might see the kinds of development often driven by highly speculative claims and foreign investment could do real damage on the land and to ecosystems.
Kate Groetzinger
I want to hop in here. I used to live down in southern Utah, close to where Davina is from. And some of my friends here tonight still live down in Bluff. And they actually have already started seeing uranium trucks going through their town on the highway from the Pinyon Plain Mine, which used to be called the Canyon Mine, which is right on the edge of the Grand Canyon. They’re currently mining uranium and sending it in trucks through southern Utah to the White Mesa Mill, which is the only uranium mill in the United States. It’s located in San Juan County, two miles from the Ute Mountain Ute tribe, which has been petitioning to get it shut down for years. So, you know, there are direct impacts on those folks. They’re putting more radioactive waste into the ground right upstream from that tribe now. And, you know, I was a reporter down in southern Utah for a while, and I talked to a lot of people about this. And the Ute Mountain U tribe would always say, you know, like, sure, mine uranium if you can do it safely. But the government has not shown that they can do it safely. In fact, they’ve shown the opposite. So, you know, nuclear energy is great in concept, but not if it comes at, you know, the expense of people and the earth. So those are my thoughts. Any other questions?
Allie
Come on up. Hi, I’m Allie. This has been really enlightening and incredibly disheartening, and I’ve learned so many acronyms tonight. But you have a captive audience here, so we have to ask, what can we do? What do we wake up and do tomorrow? You tell us. Sign a postcard. Come to our table, sign a postcard to Congress,
Erika Pollard
spread the word through your networks, thank a park ranger, and join one of these organizations because it really is going to take all of our voices, all of the different pieces of our public lands puzzle and the people who love these places to really make some change and make sure that
Scott Braden
those places stay protected. Yeah, stay involved. Like we’ve shown, we can do it once. We defeated Senator Mike Lee’s provision to sell off public lands. That’s people power. So yeah, just like Erika says, signing up for the organizations that are present here tonight, whether it’s SUA or one of the others, it’s the only thing we’ve got. Yeah. And these groups will send out
Kate Groetzinger
action alerts where they’ll say, okay, go do this specific thing. And, you know, Doug mentioned a comment period coming up for the roadless rule. Talk about the forests that you love and why you love them and why you want to see them remain, you know, forests and not turn into
Doug Tolman
mines or a gondola. Yeah, we’ll have the action alert for the roadless protections out as soon as the comment period opens. But with the way the federal government works, that could be tomorrow and it could be in October. So just stay tuned for that one. I also want to say like what happens
Davina Smith
here in this area does definitely impact down in our southeast area. I know right now another discussion is the Utah Inland Port. There is a proposal that was proposed down in a meeting that happened a few months ago in Monticello for what’s called the Ancient Sky Inland Port, and it would be implemented on the south end of town in Blanding, where I live, also in Lisbon Valley and another location in Grand County. So what happens here definitely will impact us down in Southeast with also understanding that we are, um, the minerals we have are, uh, uranium, vanadium. So, and also oil and gas. Yeah. Yeah. The changes are already
Kate Groetzinger
happening. So stay tuned, stay involved. Thank you all for coming. I will free you to drink beer. Um, yeah. Uh, what? Uh, Oh, Raffle. Thank you. She’s over there doing this. Um,
Aaron Weiss
Hey, it’s Aaron back in Denver. That was so much fun that Kate forgot to say goodbye to all of you. So thank you to Davina Smith, Scott Braden, Erika Pollard, and Doug Tolman. Thank you to everyone who came out to our live episodes in Denver and Salt Lake. If you are listening to this on Friday, August 22nd, we are in Grand Junction tonight at Gemini Beer Company starting at 5.30 p.m. That episode will show up in this feed next week if you are not in Grand Junction. My colleagues Sterling, Lily, and Lauren have a bunch more content from the Keep Parks Public Tour coming as well. Follow us on Instagram for that. In the meantime, I’m Aaron Weiss. On behalf of Kate and the whole Center for Western Priorities team, thank you for listening to The Landscape.