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After provisions that would protect more than 1.3 million acres of American wilderness were stripped from a must-pass defense spending bill this month, advocates for America's wild places are looking toward the next Congress. In the Los Angeles Times's Boiling Point, Sammy Roth looks at places that would be designated under the Protecting America's Wilderness Act.
The bill would designate more than 600,000 acres of new wilderness in Colorado, 132,000 acres in Washington's Olympic National Forest, and 550,000 acres in California's Central Coast and northern forests.
The wilderness bill was one of three major public lands provisions that the House passed this year and added to the defense authorization bill, alongside the Colorado Outdoor Recreation and Economy (CORE) Act, and the Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act, which would permanently protect 1 million acres of public lands surrounding the Grand Canyon from new uranium mining claims.
Growing national parks
While those major public lands bills await the next Congress, another bill that would expand Saguaro and Rocky Mountain national parks passed the House on Thursday. The bill, which was championed by Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raúl Grijalva and Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado, would add 1,232 acres of riparian areas, scenic views, and archaeological sites to Saguaro National Park, and connect the park to the nearby Sweetwater Preserve. The Colorado provisions would allow former astronaut Vance D. Brand to donate 40 acres to Rocky Mountain National Park.
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For too long, ‘climate’ policy has been treated as a discrete bucket of ideas divorced from our wider reality. It’s now clear that our entire national policy portfolio—economic development, transportation planning, housing and urban renewal, agricultural practices, not to mention oil and gas drilling—is really about climate change and how we intend to deal with it. It’s not just the elephant in the room. It’s the whole room.”
