Sunday, February 5, 2017

Bear Essentials February 5, 2017

  Bear Essentials February 5-12, 2017
--Twitter? Anyone who is engaged in the battle and uses twitter, please use your skills and know how to educate the New Sec. Of Interior Ryan Zinke.  He can be a real ally and needs to be treated and tweeted well. https://twitter.com/hashtag/bearsears?src=rela

--Our State Representatives were Great Spokesmen for rural Utah.  See the Utah House of Representatives in Action.
1-    House Concurrent Resolution 11 Representative/ Speaker of the House Greg Hughes discusses Concerns about Bears Ears, and the need to repeal the designation.
2-    House Concurrent Resolution 12  Representative Mike Noel explains problems because of Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument.

--ARRA Newsletter: National Monuments

It looks like the Utah congressional delegation is not about to leave unchallenged former President Obama’s decision to create the Bears Ears National Monument.  Various members of the delegation have spoken personally to President Trump and to Secretary-designate Zinke about the need to overturn this declaration.  Although there are some legal questions as to whether a president can rescind a monument designation of a former president, there is precedent for adjusting the boundaries of National Monuments.  Secretary-designate Zinke has promised that one of the first orders of business as Secretary will be to go to Utah and talk directly to the people affected by this particular monument designation.  Perhaps some sort of change for Bears Ears National Monument is more than just a pipedream.
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has removed National Monument designations from the jurisdiction of its National Parks Subcommittee and made it a subject matter for the full committee.  Some might consider this move as a minor matter, but we see it as something more. Chairman Lisa Murkowski‘s(R-Alaska) decision to kick this issue to the full committee is one way to streamline the process for rewriting of the Antiquities Act.  We see this as a hopeful sign.


Under the Obama Administration, lands in Wyoming and all across the west were the target of aggressive federal regulations that were devastating to our jobs, our land, and our way of life,” said U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney in a statement Monday.”

 Bad News Bears
--“The agent also is accused of bragging that he “owned” the national director of BLM’s Office of Law Enforcement and Security and that nothing would happen to him.
According to the report, Love told the woman she better do damage control after the investigation began in 2015. Once he was removed from his position, she said he told her: “You know, if you don’t side with me, grenades are going to go off and you’ll get hit.”

--Original Deseret News Article regarding Agent Love

--Welfare Recreation and Subsidized Public Lands by Kelly Green, Moab      


Good News Bears – give Phil a Bear Hug!

--Letter to Zinke: Bears Ears is a special interest ‘scheme,’ not the will of the people  by County Commissioner Phil Lyman


As the details emerge of the new Monument, it is clear that scheming special interest groups have been crafting the details of this Monument for years. These special interest groups, who derided the County Commissioners over their concerns about such basic things as roads, hunting, and wood gathering, are now feverishly filing law suits and gathering petitions to coerce the BLM into closing roads, limiting access, and keeping people away from this area.
I have learned since becoming an elected County Commissioner that schemers are always ten steps ahead of people of good will. Those of us who love this place enough to sacrifice for it, to care for it, to call it home; those for whom this land is not a playground but our very soul, we are troubled by decisions made in Washington D.C. without the benefit of knowledge but rather the misinformation of maligning, accusing, agenda-driven organizations who have found a welcome mat at the White House for the past twenty-eight years. Buying influence and, with mob rule, circumventing the representative form of government that is the foundation of this Republic, these groups have bullied their way into becoming a quasi-administration.”  Quotes from Commissioner Lyman 
Bearing Bad Omens

--THE UNSPOKEN BEARS EARS GOAL–CREATING AN URBANIZED NEW WEST (“BEHIND ENEMY LINES”)…By Jim Stiles

“There is an irony in all this. “New Westerners” rail against the “redneck” mentality that used to govern the rural west before we came along to save it. But at the same time, many also long for the West the way it was 50 years ago, when the ‘rednecks’ were running the show.
New Westerners come to live here as permanent tourists. They’ve come to be closer to the beauty they have admired for so long and rail against those who extract natural resources from it. But at the same time, they have no problem consuming those resources. They oppose oil/gas production but heat their new homes and power their hybrid SUVs and urge many more of their stripe to join them. They condemn timber extraction but build new 4000 square foot McMansions in the arid deserts and forests of the West. They oppose new dams and water pipelines but xeriscape their lawns and think that makes them good conservationists. And then they condemn the old timers for not being progressive enough.

As the West becomes less of what it was, what really made the difference?
Us, en masse. Millions of us. We came here to save The West and subsequently ruined it with our sheer numbers and our desire to bring our urban habits with us. I doubt you could get a double-decaf, skinny cappuccino 40 years ago, but who’d be willing to trade it for some real peace and quiet? In today’s rush to be part of The New West, I’m not sure anybody cares.” Conclusion by Jim.  Be sure to read the rest and be forewarned.
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This is why county residents must confront the lies being generated, and the fear mongering.  We need to be engaged in this cause and continue to speak up.  Our next arena is Washington DC where Utah’s Resolutions will be presented.  Find kindred friends in other states who can speak to their representatives and senators in support of these bills.  Thank you for all you have done, and will do.  JW 

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