Opinion: Don’t let Trump foul the Carrizo Plain National Monument

To the editor: I recently visited Carrizo Plain National Monument for the first time. The wildflower superbloom was in progress, and Soda Lake was full. (“Leave the national monuments alone,” editorial, April 27)

Carrizo Plain is a spectacular landscape with great vistas. It lacks drainage as a result of the mountain ranges on either side of the San Andreas fault. Nothing larger than a bush grows on the plain, apparently from the alkalinity.

We arrived on a Saturday afternoon and spent the night in the nearby town of Taft, which proclaims itself an oil town. To get to Taft we drove through a dystopian landscape of countless oil pumps east of the Temblor mountain range. The contrast with the pristine Carrizo Plain was unsettling.

President Trump tells us that the government has taken land from the people to create national monuments like Carrizo Plain. His executive order requiring the Department of Interior to evaluate monument declarations made by his three most recent predecessors could ruin this wonderful place. I encourage the president to visit both Carrizo Plain and the nearby community of Taft.

Stephen David Siemens, Monterey Park

..

To the editor: Any discussion of the use by presidents of the 1906 Antiquities Act must include the long battle to protect the Grand Canyon.

Theodore Roosevelt used the act because of the long opposition to the protection of the Grand Canyon (legislation to protect the area failed starting in 1882 until it was finally successful in 1919). Even after the initial protection, there was strong resistance to the park.

Today, because of the long disputed protection, it is the major source of tourism for Arizona, but there are groups that still oppose its protection.

Keith Price, Los Angeles

Follow the Opinion section on Twitter @latimesopinion and Facebook