{"id":66202,"date":"2020-02-12T19:01:40","date_gmt":"2020-02-13T02:01:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-wilderness-act-passes-u-s-house\/"},"modified":"2020-02-13T02:01:40","modified_gmt":"2020-02-13T02:01:40","slug":"colorado-wilderness-act-passes-u-s-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-wilderness-act-passes-u-s-house\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado Wilderness Act passes U.S. House"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Montezuma
Montezuma County Commissioner Keenan Ertel makes a point to Rep. Diana DeGette in August during a mountain top debate about a proposal to designate wilderness areas in the county.<\/span>Jim Mimiaga\/The Journal file<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The U.S. House of Representatives passed the Colorado Wilderness Act of 2019 by a solid margin Wednesday night despite disagreement among Colorado\u2019s congressional delegation.<\/p>\n

Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Denver, proposed and developed the legislation over the course of 20 years to protect more than 600,000 acres of wilderness in 32 different areas of Colorado \u2013 mostly Southwest Colorado.<\/p>\n

As federally protected wilderness, DeGette\u2019s legislation would give areas like the Canyons of the Ancients and the Ponderosa Gorge on the Dolores River the highest-level of permanent protection possible.<\/p>\n

The vote comes shortly after the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation unveiled plans to construct new roads, power lines and bridges in the remote areas of the Dolores River Canyon.<\/p>\n

\"DeGette\"
DeGette<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWilderness is not owned by me or any member of Congress, it is owned by the people,\u201d DeGette said on the House floor in support of her bill. She cited a recent poll of Colorado\u2019s 3rd Congressional District, which shows 63% of Western Slope residents support new wilderness designations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe people of the United States want to preserve the few wild places we have left,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

DeGette has the support of Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Boulder, who said he is looking forward to enjoying the wilderness areas in the future with his 18-month-old daughter.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a strong tradition of protecting lands in my home state,\u201d and this bill will protect \u201cColorado\u2019s most treasured lands\u201d while helping to curb greenhouse gas emissions, Neguse said on the House floor.<\/p>\n

The bill will also protect species like the Uncompahgre butterfly in the Red Cloud Peak Wilderness Study Area, desert bighorn sheep and the Mexican spotted owl.<\/p>\n

\"Tipton\"
Tipton<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

But Rep. Scott Tipton, R-Cortez, and Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colorado Springs, oppose the Colorado Wilderness Act.<\/p>\n

Lamborn said Colorado already has 3.5 million acres of designated wilderness, and that the proposed bill does not work with local economies to protect them from \u201cunnecessary and harmful restrictions\u201d on land use.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are wasting our time,\u201d Lamborn said, saying President Donald Trump has already indicated he will veto the bill.<\/p>\n

Tipton said the Bureau of Land Management studied the areas and found they were \u201cunsuitable for wilderness designation.\u201d Tipton also emphasized these lands are largely already protected by the federal government.<\/p>\n

The BLM has designated some of the proposed sites as Wilderness Study Areas in the 1980s, and according to DeGette, scientific experts agree these areas should remain as wilderness.<\/p>\n

Tipton said he was opposed to further restrictions on federal land, considering the fact that the Canyons of the Ancients National Monument is surrounded by privately owned land.<\/p>\n

Montezuma County commissioners oppose the bill, Tipton said. But DeGette said the commissioners should not have veto authority over federal land designations, and that the state\u2019s constituents should have a voice. For example, the mayor of Cortez and the City Council support the Colorado Wilderness Act.<\/p>\n

Rep. Russ Fulcher, R-Idaho, and other Republican members of the committee argued that the more unmanaged land there is, the more likely wildfires will occur.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey think they are protecting this land, but they are not,\u201d Fulcher said.<\/p>\n

But Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif., argued states like Colorado and California \u201cdepend on the economic benefits\u201d vast areas of wilderness provide, including the increase in recreational opportunities the Colorado wilderness bill creates.<\/p>\n

Thousands of visitors travel to Southwest Colorado every year to visit some of the \u201cfew pristine areas\u201d left in the country, contributing a great deal to the local economy, DeGette said.<\/p>\n

Mark Pearson, executive director of the San Juan Citizens Alliance, said the bill will \u201chelp elevate in the public\u2019s mind just how spectacular our canyon and plateau areas are.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the Trump administration dismantled national park land designations in Utah and along the U.S.-Mexico border, the passage of the Colorado Wilderness Act is \u201csuch a refreshing breath of fresh air that we can make these advancements,\u201d Pearson said.<\/p>\n

Tipton attempted to add an amendment to the bill that would remove wilderness designations in the 3rd Congressional District, but the amendment was rejected in a vote of 234-183.<\/p>\n

But Democrats and Republicans on the House Natural Resources Committee agreed on an amendment that would protect high-altitude aviation training sites in and near the wilderness areas proposed in the bill.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Sen. (Michael) Bennet and Sen. (Cory) Gardner see how hard we\u2019ve worked, we think they will support it,\u201d DeGette said in a news conference call after the vote.<\/p>\n

Emily Hayes is a graduate student at American University in Washington, D.C., and an intern for The Durango Herald.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Republicans Tipton and Lambert oppose expansion of wilderness areas<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":66203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,13,28,193,29,23,24,25],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-66202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines","tag-land-use","tag-newsletter","tag-u-s-rep-scott-tipton","tag-u-s-sen-cory-gardner","tag-u-s-sen-michael-bennet"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66202","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66202\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66202"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=66202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}