Monument Designations Likely to Stand

Interior Secretary Gale Norton said Tuesday that the Bush administration is not seeking to overturn any of former President Bill Clinton’s designations of millions of acres of federal land as national monuments largely off limits to mining and commercial activity.

Norton said that the administration, Western lawmakers and private property owners will probably try to adjust the boundaries of the new national monuments and alter the rules governing commercial activities within them, but that there will be no organized attempt to roll back Clinton’s designations.

“I certainly disapprove of the process by which those monuments were generally created . . . [but] I have not yet heard any calls to repeal any of the monument designations,” Norton said during an interview in her office.

While Norton’s spokesman, Clifford May, said the administration has not announced a final decision, the approach outlined by Norton is certain to disappoint some Western governors, lawmakers and property owners who view Clinton’s wholesale use of the 1906 Antiquities Act to make monument designations as a symbol of federal intrusion into their way of life. Coming just a month after President Bush took office vowing to review Clinton’s actions, it suggested that the administration recognized that a battle with environmentalists over land designations would be unwise as the White House seeks to push through its tax cut plan and other legislative initiatives.

During the interview Tuesday, Norton said the Clinton administration designated monuments hastily without adequately conferring with state and local officials and property owners. She said that although Clinton justified the designations as a means of protecting unique or historically significant stretches of the country, there is no money available to carry out the management plans.

“We’re now cleaning up after the fact and doing things that should have been done before the monuments were designated,” she said. “The monument designations were more show than substance. We now have to provide the substance.”

Norton signaled that the Interior Department and Congress could work with local officials, property owners and business executives to address their concerns--such as by allowing existing mining operations to continue.

“We may need to manage those plans in a way that takes into account current uses and that better tailors the monuments for local needs and circumstances,” she said.

Norton, a former Colorado attorney general, was confirmed by the Senate last month as the first female Interior secretary after overcoming harsh criticism of her record by environmental groups. Although she took strong stands in favor of mining, grazing and logging interests during her career as a state official and as a private attorney, she stood behind her record on the environment and as a defender of public lands during her Senate confirmation hearings.

Tuesday she complained that environmental groups had distorted her record and falsely claimed that she would have trouble enforcing federal environmental and mining laws because she had challenged their constitutionality in court cases and in legal writings.

She pledged to be a good steward of the public lands and said she would carefully weigh environmental concerns against plans to increase domestic energy supplies, including the administration’s proposal for oil and gas exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska.

“When you talk about property rights, it’s important that our environmental laws are applied in a way that works closely with landowners,” she said. “Our farmers and ranchers are often the best stewards of wild places. Those who own property are the ones who often understand the habitat on the property and the uses of the property. . . . If the federal government approaches issues by punishing property owners, then it loses an important tool.”

With minimal consultation with Western lawmakers and business leaders, Clinton established 19 national monuments, totaling more than 5 million acres, and expanded three others. Except for the 1.7-million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which Clinton created in southern Utah in 1996, all the other monuments were designated in the final year of his presidency.

Within hours of taking office Jan. 20, Bush delayed and promised to review scores of last-minute Clinton orders and regulations dealing with the environment, health, food, safety and workplace conditions. As the White House and congressional Republican leaders explored ways to turn back the environmental rule-making, however, they concluded that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to undo many of the orders. That’s because of the cumbersome and lengthy procedures for reversing an executive order, and because of the prevailing mood on Capitol Hill, where a strong pro-environment coalition would oppose any major changes.

House Resources Committee Chairman James Hansen (R-Utah), perhaps Clinton’s severest critic on his use of the national monument designations, sent letters last week to Republican and Democratic House members with monuments in their districts, urging them to introduce legislation challenging the monuments if they are unhappy with them.

However, Hansen said he does not intend to introduce legislation of his own and does not foresee a major effort in Congress to roll back Clinton’s designations, arguing that a “slashing and burning” approach would not work.