Tussle Over a Western ‘Jewel’

Monumental red rock walls rise from a canyon rich with ancient juniper trees, tiny pinyon pines and blooming prickly pear cactuses.

Craggy and sometimes whimsical formations -- including one in the distinct shape of a Jeep -- emerge from the sandstone. In the vast space, only the song of a canyon wren breaks the silence.

The rugged landscape of Goldbar has not been designated wilderness by Congress. But it is among the parcels totaling 2.6 million acres in southern Utah identified in 1999 as candidates for the designation, which protects land from development. Until Congress could consider the matter, the Bureau of Land Management barred vehicle traffic and blocked oil drilling.

Then, in April, Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton put an end to that. To settle a lawsuit brought by the state of Utah, she ordered no more special treatment for those 2.6 million acres. And she directed land managers in all Western states to stop protecting additional parcels of BLM land unless Congress formally declared them wilderness. Goldbar is included in a pending wilderness bill supported by about 150 Republicans and Democrats in the House. But the bill has been blocked because it does not have the support of the Utah delegation, which opposes designating large areas of the state as wilderness.

Battles over such federal lands have raged in the West for decades, but now the parties arguing for less restrictive use have been getting a more sympathetic hearing from the administration.

The Interior Department’s about-face was a major victory for rural politicians, oil company executives and others in Utah and elsewhere who want these areas open to resource development and all-terrain vehicles. The decision parallels other administration actions that would remove obstacles to extracting resources -- from Alaska oil to West Virginia coal -- from federal and private land.

Goldbar’s unspoiled beauty and its potential for producing oil help explain the passions fueling the dispute. Oil companies want to tap into its reserves. Local governments want the money that would bring.

Although Goldbar lies between two popular national parks -- Arches and Canyonlands -- and is just a couple of miles west of the recreation hub of Moab, hikers can go hours without seeing another person. Through long stretches of slick rock, desert shrubs and huge sandstone boulders, the only signs of previous visitors are cairns (piles of rocks to guide hikers) and occasional tracks from mountain bikes or bighorn sheep.

In a book describing lands with wilderness qualities, the BLM extolled Goldbar’s “outstanding opportunities for solitude,” one of Congress’ main requirements for wilderness. It also found that much of the area remained “natural,” with the imprint of humans largely unnoticeable, another main qualification.

Goldbar’s sandstone arches, rock-art panels left by aboriginal inhabitants, maze of twisting canyons and spectacular views of the snow-capped La Sal mountains and Arches National Park all support the case for preserving it, environmentalists say.

Even before April’s change in policy, however, hikers were not the only ones with access. A dirt road cutting into the heart of Goldbar leads to one of southern Utah’s longest-producing oil wells, Long Canyon No. 1.

Liz Thomas, a local environmentalist, said she wished it could remain the only oil well in Goldbar. “There are plenty of places outside of [proposed] wilderness to drill,” said Thomas, a lawyer who represents the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance in Moab. When the BLM permits companies to develop, she said, it forfeits the land’s intrinsic value as wilderness without any guarantee of a return. “The oil companies may or may not hit something. But the damage they do will live on and on.”

Oil firms said southern Utah’s oil fields play only a minor role in overall domestic production. But for Grand County, it’s money in the bank. Long Canyon No. 1 has produced millions of dollars in county tax revenue over the last three decades.

Jerry McNeely, a member of the Grand County Council, envisioned more wells pumping to fill the county’s treasury. Goldbar overlaps an area known to contain several million barrels of oil.

Modern techniques, McNeely said, enable oil companies to explore for oil and produce it without significantly hurting the scenery. Small oil wells are painted to blend with the scenery; horizontal drilling allows drill pads to be established away from the most scenic spots. “I would prefer not to have any wilderness areas,” he said. Preserving them, he added, “just stops progress.”

Stopping development was Congress’ intent in passing the 1964 Wilderness Act. Concerned that expanding populations would rob the country of its natural heritage, Congress sought to protect the “primeval” character of wild federal lands for future generations. The law defined wilderness as areas of at least 5,000 acres “where the Earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.”

At first, BLM lands were not included, but in 1976, Congress directed the Interior Department to catalog the “wilderness characteristics” of its lands within 15 years. Since then, 6.5 million acres of BLM land across the West have been designated by Congress as wilderness. Only 30,000 of those acres are in Utah. But the BLM designated an additional 3.2 million acres in Utah for temporary protection as wilderness study areas.

Naturalists argued that many more acres of the state’s extraordinary red rock country deserved to be included. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance was created 20 years ago to fight for more protection.

“We’re talking about setting aside some of the most scenic jewels in the country,” said Heidi McIntosh, the alliance’s conservation director. Her group wants 9 million acres -- more than one-sixth of the entire state -- to be declared wilderness.

Local and state politicians and many others in Utah have said that is too much.

Her group and its supporters in Congress persuaded Bruce Babbitt, President Clinton’s Interior secretary, to take a second look at Utah’s BLM lands. That effort resulted in the 1999 listing of 2.6 million acres with wilderness characteristics. Babbitt and environmentalists hoped that those acres would be protected until Congress could get around to designating them as wilderness.

The BLM started delaying requests for oil leasing and other development on these lands. The state of Utah sued, contesting the BLM’s right to treat those lands as de facto wilderness. Norton settled the suit by agreeing to consider multiple uses for the 2.6 million acres and taking the BLM out of the business of selecting new areas for wilderness protection.

Logan MacMillan, an independent petroleum geologist whose vision for developing oil in a remote area of Utah was thwarted by the dispute over wilderness, welcomed the news.

MacMillan had hoped to produce oil on the northern edge of one of the largest swaths of roadless wild lands in the continental U.S. The aptly named Desolation Canyon is so remote that tourists float down the Green River for four or five days without seeing any sign of civilization. As at Goldbar, the new policy means oil exploration applications in Desolation Canyon will be considered.

MacMillan agreed that the land affords spectacular vistas. “But I don’t believe that should preclude resource development from those lands,” he said. “I think oil and gas activity can occur in lands all of us would enjoy being out on.”

Marc Smith, executive director of the Independent Petroleum Assn. of Mountain States, said he hoped Norton’s new wilderness policy would “signal that the confusion and uncertainty that have surrounded development on federal lands in the West may be improving.”

That is also the hope of Utah’s rural counties, whose economies have long relied on extracting resources from federal land. The wilderness dispute deterred oil development, leaving local governments such as San Juan County “poorer and poorer,” said Ed Scherick, the county’s director of personnel and planning. County taxes generated from oil and gas slid from $4.5 million in 1989 to $2.8 million in 2002, officials said.

Tourists have brought in some money, but not enough to fill the hole left by oil production. “Some of this land has to be left for multiple use, or this area cannot sustain itself,” Scherick said.

Environmentalists responded that the counties’ economic concerns do not justify resource development.

“These lands belong to all Americans from coast to coast,” McIntosh said. “They’re as important to all Americans as the Statue of Liberty is to people in Utah.”