The decade-long tussle over energy development in New Mexico's Otero Mesa has been reinvigorated recently, as hardrock mining claims now threaten the region for the first time.
The area, sometimes referred to as the "Southwest's Serengeti," is a 1.2 million-acre stretch of undisturbed Chihuahuan Desert grassland. The sprawling but sensitive expanses of black grama are home to over 1,000 species of native wildlife including a genetically-pure herd of pronghorn antelope, the endangered northern aplomado falcon, mountain lions, mule deer, bald and golden eagles and hundreds of species of plants, insects and migratory birds.
Otero Mesa is administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) which is mandated to facilitate exploration, development and production of energy on appropriate public lands. During the second Bush's administration there was a push to advance oil and gas extraction on the Otero Mesa.
But whether or not the area's fragile ecology can withstand such activity became central to the ongoing row. Drilling opponents—which then included the State of New Mexico—fought industry all the way to the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals which, in 2009, found that the BLM's Resource Management Plan Amendment fell short in assessing the potential impacts of oil and gas development, including possible habitat fragmentation and contamination of the Salt Basin Aquifer which underlies the mesa.
The BLM is now working on a new management plan, which is expected to be released early next year.
New to the debate is the discovery that Otero Mesa may harbor a cache of valuable minerals. A 2010 U.S. Geological Survey study revealed that the Cornudas Range, including 7,280-foot Wind Mountain, may hold 200 tons of minerals, including highly sought-after rare earth metals. Seeing dollar signs, Colorado-based Geovic Mining Corp. staked 161 mineral claims (five square miles worth) this spring, nearby some of the most visited parts of Otero.
The General Mining Act of 1872 allows companies to develop staked claims but the BLM is required to do environmental reviews of all proposed actions. Conservationists say exploration and mining of the area could lead to destruction on the scale of the mountaintop removal seen in Appalachia. The company says digging for rare earths would mean only minor disturbances.
Regardless, the claims have led to a renewed push to declare Otero Mesa a national monument. While President Obama has yet to invoke his authority to establish monuments under the Antiquities Act of 1906, a BLM memo leaked last year put Otero on a hot list of locations that qualify for nomination.
Although Obama has said that only places with local support for a monument in their backyard will make the cut, the designation is at the president's discretion; it requires no Congressional consideration or approval. Fifteen out of the past eighteen presidents have designated national monuments, some amid a firestorm of criticism.
An elevation to national monument would permanently protect the Otero Mesa from new mining and drilling claims. Existing claims, including Geovic Mining Corp.'s, would remain valid but would be scrutinized for their economic fruitfulness.
Adding their voices to those of environmentalists and outdoor enthusiasts in the drive for monument status are members of the Mescalero Apache, a tribe that took refuge in the mountains of southern New Mexico in the 18th century and still assert ancestral ties to the mesa. In a letter to their tribal president, the group Mescalero Apache Advocates expressed their spiritual connection to Wind Mountain and to the archaeological artifacts that are among the area's attractions. "And on those massive stones that fell from the mountain top, our people expressed through rock paintings their challenges, their visions, and their stories, like their ancient ancestors who dwelled there before them," they said.
Last month, the Mescaleros met with Department of the Interior and New Mexican officials, expressing concern for the natural resources which they believe drilling and mining endanger, including the huge untapped aquifer underlying Otero, which may be the largest remaining in the state. They worry that the fractured geology that characterizes the area makes that reserve vulnerable to contamination.
Despite the desire of many local and national groups to award the mesa a higher level of protection, a monument designation will not come easily. Western lawmakers are particularly touchy about the subject, arguing that states and Congress should have more say in what happens to public land. This type of dissention goes as far back as western members of Congress opposing Theodore Roosevelt's establishment of large new reserves on federal lands.
Last May, the Otero County Commission passed an ordinance opposing national monument protection for Otero Mesa, likely at the behest of local ranchers who fear the status change will threaten their cheap grazing on public lands. While Susana Martinez, the state's new governor, hasn't voiced her stance, her coziness with oil and gas industries makes her an unlikely ally for conservation.
Rep. Steve Pearce (R-N.M.) has been an outspoken critic, and has actively campaigned not only to prevent protection of Otero Mesa but to change the way national monuments are designated nationwide. He is a co-sponsor of H.R. 302, legislation that would require the president—in direct opposition to the Antiquities Act—to secure state consent before declaring a national monument. "When conserving our natural resources, it is important to have a balanced approach that includes local priorities, such as jobs, the economy, private property and support," a Pearce spokesman told the Environment & Energy Daily.
The tired argument that conservation will mean economic paralysis wherever the magic wand of protection lands is a disingenuous one in the case of Otero Mesa. If elected officials in New Mexico are truly interested in acting in the best interests, now and in the future, of their constituents, they need to run the numbers.
An analysis of the potential impacts, on the southern New Mexican economy, of naming Otero Mesa National Monument was done recently by Headwaters Economics, an independent, non-profit research group.
"The short answer is that repeated academic studies have shown that investments in public lands conservation and restoration provide an immediate return through new employment and revenue," says author Ben Alexander. The study cites the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which recently found that "recreation and tourism development contributes to rural well-being, increasing local employment, wage levels, and income, reducing poverty, and improving education and health.”
Unlike the small-scale, short-term benefits of resource extraction that would be expected for Otero Mesa residents, protected public lands also help to promote long-term economic growth, says the Headwaters study, "because of their ability to attract and retain people, entrepreneurs, and the growing number of retirees who locate for quality of life reasons." Published research also shows that natural amenities help sustain property values and attract new investment.
While a national monument designation "would not harm agricultural uses or military employment" in the area, says the study, passing up an opportunity to diversify the economy of southern New Mexico and to boost its long-term resiliency by protecting its unique desert grasslands could be a bad move. "Looking at mineral wealth, the [BLM's] analysis showed little reason to believe that the local economy would benefit from projected fossil fuel extraction on Otero Mesa--and that the limited revenue from mineral extraction might not even cover the share of infrastructure and service costs," says Alexander.
It's difficult to hear amid the anti-environmental mewling that's overtaken Congress nowadays, but here it is loud and clear: conservation pays. If they are honestly focused on "local priorities, such as jobs, the economy, private property and support," as Rep. Pearce's camp purports to be, they would have to support national monument status for Otero Mesa. Anything less is playing politics with our public lands.
Essays in the Range blog are not written by High Country News. The authors are solely responsible for the content.
Heather Hansen is an environmental journalist working with the Red Lodge Clearinghouse /Natural Resources Law Center at CU Boulder, to help raise awareness of natural resource issues.
Showing posts with label Great Outdoors Initiative. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Great Outdoors Initiative. Show all posts
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Obama admin. holds meetings on 'Great Outdoors'
On the edges of a vast landscape that measures in the millions of acres and stretches north through a wilderness area and a scenic national park, ranchers and environmentalists have been able to agree on a lot lately.
The work done to preserve land in northwestern Montana's "Crown of the Continent" was made the shining example Tuesday of what the Obama Administration hopes to achieve with its new "America's Great Outdoors Initiative."
The conservation effort has focused on voluntary land sales of 310,000 acres from a large timber company, deals to retire mining and oil projects and conservation agreements with ranchers and land owners in developing homemade plans for a working landscape in the heart of the Rocky Mountains.
The varied interests behind the effort also agree the Obama Administration should make sure its new initiative doesn't force land conservation ideas from big cities down the throats of rural residents.
"Urban-based conservation movements have really only succeeded in alienating the very best allies: our ranchers, our loggers, our sportsmen and our farmers," said Melanie Parker, who lives in the scenic Swan Valley and has played an integral role in getting loggers and environmentalists in the area to talk with one another.
The administration assured all involved that its initiative will rely on the local ideas gathered in a nationwide listening tour launched Tuesday and Wednesday in Montana.
"The first message, clearly, is that this effort must be bottom up," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. "Far be it from me, from Iowa or Washington D.C. or wherever I come from, to suggest I know better."
Montana is a state, like many in the West, where federal land management and conservation are often hotly debated and can lead to long-lasting policy stalemates.
President Barack Obama expects that the multi-agency listening sessions around the country will result in a report delivered to him by November, Vilsack said. The next event will be in Los Angeles in the coming weeks, following sessions Wednesday in Missoula, Bozeman and Helena.
Watershed preservation efforts from the Great Lakes to Chesapeake Bay will also be covered, Vilsack said. The goal is to include everything from recreation to economic development, particularly for rural areas where incomes languish compared to most urban areas.
In Montana, the administration officials were joined by the state's governor and U.S. senators. They highlighted the decade-long conservation effort around The Bob Marshall Wilderness Area and Glacier National Park that has involved longtime foes in land use battles.
Enhancing wildlife habitat was a main goal, but so was improving the local economy with ways to make sure a working landscape became a sustainable timber source for planned biomass energy production.
State and federal money was secured, but only after it was clear the effort had widespread local support after years of hammering out complex deals.
The administration's new initiative comes as Republicans and others criticize the contents of an internal Interior Department memo and other records that show the administration was considering the potential for presidential monument declarations in nine western states. Those declarations, last done in Montana under former President Bill Clinton, remain a very sore point for some westerners.
Leading Democrats said the monument declarations are not part of the agenda.
"I am opposed to the administration creating monuments," said Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., who holds an influential role in the Senate. "This is bottom up, that was top down."
The work done to preserve land in northwestern Montana's "Crown of the Continent" was made the shining example Tuesday of what the Obama Administration hopes to achieve with its new "America's Great Outdoors Initiative."
The conservation effort has focused on voluntary land sales of 310,000 acres from a large timber company, deals to retire mining and oil projects and conservation agreements with ranchers and land owners in developing homemade plans for a working landscape in the heart of the Rocky Mountains.
The varied interests behind the effort also agree the Obama Administration should make sure its new initiative doesn't force land conservation ideas from big cities down the throats of rural residents.
"Urban-based conservation movements have really only succeeded in alienating the very best allies: our ranchers, our loggers, our sportsmen and our farmers," said Melanie Parker, who lives in the scenic Swan Valley and has played an integral role in getting loggers and environmentalists in the area to talk with one another.
The administration assured all involved that its initiative will rely on the local ideas gathered in a nationwide listening tour launched Tuesday and Wednesday in Montana.
"The first message, clearly, is that this effort must be bottom up," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. "Far be it from me, from Iowa or Washington D.C. or wherever I come from, to suggest I know better."
Montana is a state, like many in the West, where federal land management and conservation are often hotly debated and can lead to long-lasting policy stalemates.
President Barack Obama expects that the multi-agency listening sessions around the country will result in a report delivered to him by November, Vilsack said. The next event will be in Los Angeles in the coming weeks, following sessions Wednesday in Missoula, Bozeman and Helena.
Watershed preservation efforts from the Great Lakes to Chesapeake Bay will also be covered, Vilsack said. The goal is to include everything from recreation to economic development, particularly for rural areas where incomes languish compared to most urban areas.
In Montana, the administration officials were joined by the state's governor and U.S. senators. They highlighted the decade-long conservation effort around The Bob Marshall Wilderness Area and Glacier National Park that has involved longtime foes in land use battles.
Enhancing wildlife habitat was a main goal, but so was improving the local economy with ways to make sure a working landscape became a sustainable timber source for planned biomass energy production.
State and federal money was secured, but only after it was clear the effort had widespread local support after years of hammering out complex deals.
The administration's new initiative comes as Republicans and others criticize the contents of an internal Interior Department memo and other records that show the administration was considering the potential for presidential monument declarations in nine western states. Those declarations, last done in Montana under former President Bill Clinton, remain a very sore point for some westerners.
Leading Democrats said the monument declarations are not part of the agenda.
"I am opposed to the administration creating monuments," said Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., who holds an influential role in the Senate. "This is bottom up, that was top down."
Great Outdoors Initiative forum held in Helena
Federal officials got an earful Wednesday at a listening session in Helena on how to better protect open lands and get people, especially children, into the great outdoors as part of President Barack Obama’s Great Outdoors Initiative.
Jay Erickson with the Montana Land Reliance called for renewal of conservation-easement tax incentives, which could give ranchers more reason to keep from subdividing their property.
Bob Sanders with Ducks Unlimited wants to focus attention on preserving the wide open native prairies of Eastern Montana and the Dakotas, which he called “one of the most productive areas on Earth.”
Jim Quillin suggested keeping the management of public lands in Montana out of the hands of East and West Coast bureaucrats, while Jonathan Matthews with the Sierra Club noted that some limits to local control also are needed.
Many of those attending, though, said they would at least like to see land-management discussions begin at the local level before working their way to Washington.
Chris Bardash would like it to be a lot cheaper to recreate with his family in the national parks.
“It’s $200 a night to stay at a hotel in Yellowstone. There’s something wrong with that,” Bardash said. “When you go there with babies and grandparents, you can’t camp, but you’re priced out of staying in the hotels.”
The five men were among about 200 people who crowded into two banquet rooms at the Red Lion Colonial Inn in Helena, as one of four listening sessions held only in Montana this week on the president’s initiative. One session was held in Ovando on Tuesday, and two others were in Missoula and Bozeman on Wednesday. Additional listening sessions are expected to be scheduled in other states in the near future.
Robert Bonnie, a senior adviser to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, said the sessions were enlightening to the dozens of federal officials attending them. Vilsack, John Jarvis, director of the National Park Service, and Nancy Sutley, chairman of the White House Council for Environmental Quality, were among top federal officials who attended Tuesday’s session.
“This has been a great day and a half,” Bonnie said at the end of Wednesday’s session. “I’ve been in conservation for 20 years and learned a lot yesterday and today.
“We’ll announce more listening sessions in other parts of the country, but felt strongly that the place to kick these off is in Montana, because of the depth of experience in these issues.”
Former Lewis and Clark National Forest Supervisor Gloria Flora urged officials to encourage their forest and park employees to get out from behind their computer tubes and into the public lands, to demonstrate the behaviors the president is calling for.
“I was a Forest Service employee for 20 years, and the employees are spending about half the time they used to in the field,” Flora said. “And stop outsourcing. You’re putting in people who are not trained and with no career dedication that most federal employees have.”
Flora and others also pleaded with the federal government for a more stable funding mechanism instead of relying on one-year appropriations.
“People come up with multiyear plans, and I had to sit there like a fool saying I can fund you through September and then we are done. I can’t promise you anything. A lot of land managers feel that way,” she said.
Along those financial lines, Lynda Saul with the Department of Environmental Quality noted that they had to send about $10 million in wetland preservation funding back to the federal government because it couldn’t be used for a variety of reasons. She said more flexibility is needed with federal funding.
Ellen Simpson with Montana Wood Products and others also said that if the government wants more people to use the outdoors, they need to make it easier to get into the forests.
“We need to open, not close, access to people,” Simpson said. “How you do that is up to the land managers, but if you want people to get off the couch and outdoors, you need to make it fairly easy to do.”
Mary Sexton, director of the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, said the federal government also needs to move faster and be more responsive in land exchanges with the state.
“A Forest Service land exchange in the Lolo took nine years. With private parties it’s usually two years, and we just finished one with the tribes in a year,” Sexton said. “Then, in land exchanges with the BLM, they offer land nobody wants.”
Ken McDonald with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, added that the federal government also needs to change rules regarding matching-fund programs, because instead of the money going toward the highest priority projects, it often is used for those with matching state or private monies.
“So it’s used for where you can get the best match rather than what the best conservation priorities are,” McDonald said.
Jennifer Harris, a mother of three young children, added that what’s really needed to make the Great Outdoors Initiative work is to support teachers doing more hands-on applications as well as finding ways for parents to get reconnected with the land.
“We would get more users who would be more empathetic with what’s going on with the land and have a better voice on policies,” Harris said. “I think we can create some programs to take to state parks and become a model for the nation, to try to get families more connected to the outdoors.”
For more information on the initiative, go to www.doi.gov/americasgreatoutdoors.
People also can send comments, along with stories of favorite places or conservation efforts, to ideas.usda.gov/ago/ideas.nsf.
Obama has asked for a report on the initiative to be submitted on him by Nov. 15.
Jay Erickson with the Montana Land Reliance called for renewal of conservation-easement tax incentives, which could give ranchers more reason to keep from subdividing their property.
Bob Sanders with Ducks Unlimited wants to focus attention on preserving the wide open native prairies of Eastern Montana and the Dakotas, which he called “one of the most productive areas on Earth.”
Jim Quillin suggested keeping the management of public lands in Montana out of the hands of East and West Coast bureaucrats, while Jonathan Matthews with the Sierra Club noted that some limits to local control also are needed.
Many of those attending, though, said they would at least like to see land-management discussions begin at the local level before working their way to Washington.
Chris Bardash would like it to be a lot cheaper to recreate with his family in the national parks.
“It’s $200 a night to stay at a hotel in Yellowstone. There’s something wrong with that,” Bardash said. “When you go there with babies and grandparents, you can’t camp, but you’re priced out of staying in the hotels.”
The five men were among about 200 people who crowded into two banquet rooms at the Red Lion Colonial Inn in Helena, as one of four listening sessions held only in Montana this week on the president’s initiative. One session was held in Ovando on Tuesday, and two others were in Missoula and Bozeman on Wednesday. Additional listening sessions are expected to be scheduled in other states in the near future.
Robert Bonnie, a senior adviser to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, said the sessions were enlightening to the dozens of federal officials attending them. Vilsack, John Jarvis, director of the National Park Service, and Nancy Sutley, chairman of the White House Council for Environmental Quality, were among top federal officials who attended Tuesday’s session.
“This has been a great day and a half,” Bonnie said at the end of Wednesday’s session. “I’ve been in conservation for 20 years and learned a lot yesterday and today.
“We’ll announce more listening sessions in other parts of the country, but felt strongly that the place to kick these off is in Montana, because of the depth of experience in these issues.”
Former Lewis and Clark National Forest Supervisor Gloria Flora urged officials to encourage their forest and park employees to get out from behind their computer tubes and into the public lands, to demonstrate the behaviors the president is calling for.
“I was a Forest Service employee for 20 years, and the employees are spending about half the time they used to in the field,” Flora said. “And stop outsourcing. You’re putting in people who are not trained and with no career dedication that most federal employees have.”
Flora and others also pleaded with the federal government for a more stable funding mechanism instead of relying on one-year appropriations.
“People come up with multiyear plans, and I had to sit there like a fool saying I can fund you through September and then we are done. I can’t promise you anything. A lot of land managers feel that way,” she said.
Along those financial lines, Lynda Saul with the Department of Environmental Quality noted that they had to send about $10 million in wetland preservation funding back to the federal government because it couldn’t be used for a variety of reasons. She said more flexibility is needed with federal funding.
Ellen Simpson with Montana Wood Products and others also said that if the government wants more people to use the outdoors, they need to make it easier to get into the forests.
“We need to open, not close, access to people,” Simpson said. “How you do that is up to the land managers, but if you want people to get off the couch and outdoors, you need to make it fairly easy to do.”
Mary Sexton, director of the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, said the federal government also needs to move faster and be more responsive in land exchanges with the state.
“A Forest Service land exchange in the Lolo took nine years. With private parties it’s usually two years, and we just finished one with the tribes in a year,” Sexton said. “Then, in land exchanges with the BLM, they offer land nobody wants.”
Ken McDonald with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, added that the federal government also needs to change rules regarding matching-fund programs, because instead of the money going toward the highest priority projects, it often is used for those with matching state or private monies.
“So it’s used for where you can get the best match rather than what the best conservation priorities are,” McDonald said.
Jennifer Harris, a mother of three young children, added that what’s really needed to make the Great Outdoors Initiative work is to support teachers doing more hands-on applications as well as finding ways for parents to get reconnected with the land.
“We would get more users who would be more empathetic with what’s going on with the land and have a better voice on policies,” Harris said. “I think we can create some programs to take to state parks and become a model for the nation, to try to get families more connected to the outdoors.”
For more information on the initiative, go to www.doi.gov/americasgreatoutdoors.
People also can send comments, along with stories of favorite places or conservation efforts, to ideas.usda.gov/ago/ideas.nsf.
Obama has asked for a report on the initiative to be submitted on him by Nov. 15.
Friday, April 16, 2010
President Obama Launches Initiative to Develop a 21st Century Strategy for America’s Great Outdoors
Effort will Promote and Support Community-Level Efforts to Conserve Outdoor Spaces
WASHINGTON, D.C. – President Barack Obama signed a Presidential Memorandum today establishing the America’s Great Outdoors Initiative to promote and support innovative community-level efforts to conserve outdoor spaces and to reconnect Americans to the outdoors. The President spoke before leaders representing the conservation, farming, ranching, sporting, recreation, forestry, private industry, local parks and academia communities from all 53 states and territories.
The Presidential Memorandum calls on the Secretaries of the Interior and of Agriculture, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Chair of the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) to lead the Initiative, in coordination with the Departments of Defense, Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, Labor, Transportation, Education, and the Office of Management and Budget. The Initiative will support a 21st century conservation agenda that builds on successes in communities across the country, and will start a national dialogue about conservation that supports the efforts of private citizens and local communities.
“Today, with 80 percent of Americans living in cities and suburbs, it is more important than ever for people to have access to outdoor space. Just as we cherish our childhood memories of hiking and sledding, fishing and camping, and just as we enjoy spending time outdoors with our families, we must guard these places and traditions for new generations,” said CEQ Chair Nancy Sutley. “Through this Initiative we hope to identify new opportunities to work with Americans on a modern approach to conservation that begins at the ground level, and to reinvigorate the national conversation about our outdoors.”
“Since President Theodore Roosevelt held the first White House conference on conservation in 1908, we as Americans have taken extraordinary steps to protect our land, water, wildlife, and history for future generations, but today the places we love face new challenges that require new ideas and new strategies to solve,” said Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. “President Obama’s America’s Great Outdoors Initiative will start a much-needed dialogue about conservation in our country so that we can hear directly from Americans about the places they care about and how they are working to protect them. This is about listening, learning, and finding common-sense ways to support the good work that is happening in communities across the country.”
“President Obama’s America’s Great Outdoors Initiative will play an important role in confronting the serious challenges our natural resources face today: climate change, air and water pollution, landscape fragmentation and loss of open space,” said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. “This effort will bring Americans from across the country together to look for new approaches to protect our national treasures. And it will highlight the importance of working across ownership boundaries to restore and conserve both private and public lands in a way that recognizes that conservation and economic vitality are inextricably linked.”
“Too many of our cities have limited access to parks for children, low-income residents and communities of color. Improving access to open areas and green space in our urban communities should be a focus of a 21st century conservation strategy,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “It makes me proud that generations to come will know that we took action to preserve, restore and protect vital natural treasures.”
The full text of the Memorandum can be found at http://doi.gov/americasgreatoutdoors/upload/2010outdoors-mem-rel-2.pdf
WASHINGTON, D.C. – President Barack Obama signed a Presidential Memorandum today establishing the America’s Great Outdoors Initiative to promote and support innovative community-level efforts to conserve outdoor spaces and to reconnect Americans to the outdoors. The President spoke before leaders representing the conservation, farming, ranching, sporting, recreation, forestry, private industry, local parks and academia communities from all 53 states and territories.
The Presidential Memorandum calls on the Secretaries of the Interior and of Agriculture, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Chair of the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) to lead the Initiative, in coordination with the Departments of Defense, Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, Labor, Transportation, Education, and the Office of Management and Budget. The Initiative will support a 21st century conservation agenda that builds on successes in communities across the country, and will start a national dialogue about conservation that supports the efforts of private citizens and local communities.
“Today, with 80 percent of Americans living in cities and suburbs, it is more important than ever for people to have access to outdoor space. Just as we cherish our childhood memories of hiking and sledding, fishing and camping, and just as we enjoy spending time outdoors with our families, we must guard these places and traditions for new generations,” said CEQ Chair Nancy Sutley. “Through this Initiative we hope to identify new opportunities to work with Americans on a modern approach to conservation that begins at the ground level, and to reinvigorate the national conversation about our outdoors.”
“Since President Theodore Roosevelt held the first White House conference on conservation in 1908, we as Americans have taken extraordinary steps to protect our land, water, wildlife, and history for future generations, but today the places we love face new challenges that require new ideas and new strategies to solve,” said Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. “President Obama’s America’s Great Outdoors Initiative will start a much-needed dialogue about conservation in our country so that we can hear directly from Americans about the places they care about and how they are working to protect them. This is about listening, learning, and finding common-sense ways to support the good work that is happening in communities across the country.”
“President Obama’s America’s Great Outdoors Initiative will play an important role in confronting the serious challenges our natural resources face today: climate change, air and water pollution, landscape fragmentation and loss of open space,” said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. “This effort will bring Americans from across the country together to look for new approaches to protect our national treasures. And it will highlight the importance of working across ownership boundaries to restore and conserve both private and public lands in a way that recognizes that conservation and economic vitality are inextricably linked.”
“Too many of our cities have limited access to parks for children, low-income residents and communities of color. Improving access to open areas and green space in our urban communities should be a focus of a 21st century conservation strategy,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “It makes me proud that generations to come will know that we took action to preserve, restore and protect vital natural treasures.”
The full text of the Memorandum can be found at http://doi.gov/americasgreatoutdoors/upload/2010outdoors-mem-rel-2.pdf
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