[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 203 (Monday, December 18, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S18824-S18825]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          UTAH WILDERNESS BILL

  Mr. BENNETT. Mr. President, as you know, I have joined with other 
members of the Utah delegation and Governor Leavitt in introducing S. 
884, the Utah Public Lands Management Act, also known as the Utah 
wilderness bill. Since we introduced this bill earlier this summer, we 
have been criticized up and down by opponents of S. 884 that the 
extensive process we engaged in to study and eventually recommend over 
1.8 million acres in 49 wilderness areas was not extensive enough. 
Since January, over 22,000 public comments have been submitted, over 45 
public hearings were held and 600 personal testimonies were accepted. 
However, our critics choose to overlook this fact as well as the fact 
that it is time to bring to closure this 20-year-old debate.
  Mr. President, I ask that the following document be printed in the 
Record at the proper place as proof that the public comment process has 
indeed been extensive. This is an excerpt from a publication by the 
Coalition for Utah's Future/Project 2000. It details the extensive 
process which the coalition, joined by members of Utah's environmental 
community and county commissioners and citizens of Emery County, 
undertook to discuss and resolve the issue of wilderness. 
Unfortunately, cost and space limitations will prohibit the inclusion 
of the entire text. I would encourage those who are interested in the 
full report to contact the coalition at the address following the 
excerpt. I commend these folks for their tremendous efforts to reach 
consensus on one of the most difficult and contentious public lands 
issues in our State. I believe this report illustrates just how 
extensive the process has been. I wish to express my thanks to the 
Coalition for Utah's Future/Project 2000 for the time and effort they 
have spent in conceiving and implementing this pilot project.
  The material follows:

       A Project of The Coalition For Utah's Future/Project 2000


                              Introduction

       In twelve short months, a traditional rural community in 
     Utah moved from what appeared to be a deeply seated, anti-
     environmental sentiment to a protection oriented public lands 
     agenda. Involved Emery County leaders and citizens alike, are 
     now publicly espousing the desire to work with disparate 
     parties and land managers to solve problems and seek mutually 
     beneficial land protection mechanisms. How did this rather 
     dramatic transformation in the county's approach to public 
     lands issues occur? The answer involves the willingness of 
     several visionary county and environmental leaders to be the 
     ``guinea pig'' in a cooperatively designed Community and Wild 
     Lands Futures Pilot Project sponsored by the Coalition for 
     Utah's Future/Project 2000 (CUF), a non-profit, multi-issue 
     organization comprised of diverse community leaders 
     interested in a quality future for all Utah citizens. It also 
     involves the surfacing of values, long held within the county 
     but unacknowledged, due to the acrimonious nature of 
     environmental disputes throughout Utah and the West over the 
     past fifteen years.
       The pilot was conceived in the summer of 1993 when CUF's 
     conflict resolution consultant, Susan Carpenter, put a 
     hypothetical question before a group of some 25 disparate 
     stakeholders interested in resolving the conflict over Utah's 
     BLM wilderness designation issue. She asked participants to 
     assume the year is 1999, and that a Utah BLM wilderness bill, 
     which everyone could support, had just been signed into law. 
     ``What'', she asked, ``are the steps beginning in 1999 and 
     then working backwards to 1993, that led to the passage of 
     this bill?'' The group's response to this question became the 
     basis for the conceptualization of the Community and Wild 
     Lands Futures Pilot Project (CWFP). CWFP, they hoped, could 
     become a model for other rural Utah communities and 
     interested parties in the West.
       The word future is key here. Conservationists in the design 
     group reasoned that helping communities articulate their 
     values, visions, and goals for an ``ideal'' future, would 
     enable citizens to move beyond current problems and 
     contentious issues toward a more pro-active plan based on 
     commonly shared community values and ``sense of place''. 
     This, they also theorized would lay a more productive 
     foundation for subsequent discussions regarding 
     environmentally sensitive, adjacent public lands. Rural 
     leaders in the design group supported this community-based, 
     grassroots approach. They expressed 

[[Page S18825]]
     the need for local empowerment and a seat at the table when making 
     decisions regarding public lands issues affecting their 
     future.
       The group boiled these ideas down to three community 
     questions, which were to be followed by broad-based wild 
     lands futures deliberations in a focused geographic area. The 
     community questions were: What do we have?, What do we want?, 
     and What can we do?. In short, the hypotheses proved correct. 
     Asking citizens what they valued, how they wanted the future 
     to look, and exploring options to achieve this vision on the 
     front side of a county-wide general planning initiative, led 
     to outcomes such as: 1. the formation of a public lands 
     council, 2. county agreement to enter wild lands futures 
     deliberations with a broad range of interests and affected 
     parties from within and without the county, 3. a county 
     proposal for the protection of over 500,000 acres of BLM land 
     (including 184,000 acres of wilderness), and 4. the 
     conceptualization of a public lands institute involving 
     cooperative partnerships with the BLM and other agencies for 
     the preservation and management of the San Rafael Swell.


         Community and Wild Lands Futures Pilot Project (CWFP)

       In the summer of 1993, the broad-based group of stakeholder 
     volunteers known as the Process Advisory Group, including 
     decision-makers and resource representatives, gave birth to 
     the Community and Wild Lands Futures Pilot Project. As 
     described in the opening of this paper, when challenged to 
     consider how a wilderness bill passed Congress by working 
     backwards from 1999, the Process Advisory Group agreed that 
     the first step should be community-based. Out of the 
     discussions came the following project goals:

       1. Address community and wild lands futures in a rational 
     and scientific manner.
       2. Create a grass roots process for comprehensive local 
     community planning and sustainability.
       3. Identify resources to enrich the process and generate 
     useful information to share.
       4. Connect the local visioning/planning process with the 
     issue of public wild land futures and with state and national 
     processes and players.
       5. Develop a broad based recommendation for the 
     classification of public wild lands in the pilot region.
       6. Educate the broader general public about rural planning 
     and community self-determination, and ecosystem management of 
     natural systems and wild lands issues.
       7. Create a replicable model.

       A concept paper was circulated among approximately 300 
     interested parties at national, regional, state and local 
     levels requesting constructive feedback. The reviews were 
     favorable, which meant the next task was to select from one 
     of several receptive pilot communities. In October of 1993, 
     Emery County became the chosen community for the pilot 
     project, and the newly formed Canyon County Partnership (CCP) 
     received CUF funding to initiate staff support.
       Today, the seed is germinating and concepts are maturing. 
     County initiated deliberations include ideas to 1. develop a 
     resource area partnership among Emery County, the BLM, the 
     Forest Service, and other public land users, 2. become a 
     nationally supported pilot program, and 3. conceptualize a 
     non-profit San Rafael Swell Institute. Today, Emery County is 
     proposing and exploring a planning/management partnership 
     arrangement with the BLM. The purpose would be to:
       Incorporate direct local involvement in land management 
     agency planning processes.
       Incorporate direct local involvement in land management 
     agency decision-making processes.
       Reconcile differences between the Emery County Master Plan 
     and the planning goals and objective of the land management 
     agencies.
       Develop consistency between the ordinances and regulations 
     of the federal and county entities.
       Cooperate in law enforcement activities.
       Cooperate in the provision of emergency services.
       Cooperate in the permitting, design, placement, 
     construction, and costs of public facilities (roads, 
     buildings, etc.).
       Cooperate in the facilitation of allowable uses.
       Cooperate in the mitigation of impacts from various uses.
       Cooperatively work to resolve local conflicts between uses, 
     users, and stakeholders.
       Leverage the limited resources of the local and Federal 
     entities through coordinated efforts.
       Share in a joint stewardship over the public lands within 
     Emery County.
       CUF believes it is a major accomplishment that Emery County 
     is now adopting cooperative, problem-solving principles in 
     newly conceived public lands initiatives within the County.


                        Application of the Model

       In conclusion, the Community and Wild Lands Futures Pilot 
     Project did advance environmental decision-making through 
     inclusive community and interest group participation. 
     Outcomes are evolving and project participant evaluations 
     were overwhelmingly favorable. OPB's Brad Barber writes, ``It 
     [the project] taught us that this type of thing may work in 
     the future. Once a wilderness bill is done in Utah--we should 
     talk about moving into cooperative management.'' CUF board 
     member and Moab Times Editor, Sam Taylor says, ``In the event 
     the [Utah delegation] bill does not become law, CUF has laid 
     the ground work that will still lead to piece-meal resolution 
     for the BLM wilderness issue. We have given them a road-
     map,'' he concludes.
       Many participants believe that the pilot has application 
     value for comprehensive planning efforts in rural areas, and 
     some can see it being applied to growth management, 
     transportation, education and topical problems in urban 
     areas. It clearly is recognized as being superior to the 
     conventional approach of deriving local input from a couple 
     of perfunctory public hearings. Jane Brass suggests that the 
     need for disseminating information regarding the pilot model 
     ``is pervasive as states struggle with public lands issues.'' 
     She cautions that communities should not have consultants 
     dictate a quick way out. Rather, she recommends working 
     through a process to ``find answers that will be more 
     acceptable to your community''. Another participant echoed 
     the concern that it could be dangerous to create a ``cook 
     book approach''. The emphasis from a model should be on need 
     and a few questions to ask in the beginning, he cautioned. 
     Chairman Petersen advises other rural county leaders, who 
     might be considering a similar planning model, ``1. Put 
     together a good steering group, 2. Listen to their input, and 
     3. Listen to people from other areas and take advantage of 
     their successes and failures.''


      Community Visions: a Catalyst for Creating Positive Futures

       CWFP demonstrated that engaging local citizens in 
     discussions about their values and visions of the future 
     enabled them to develop solid plans for economic development 
     and empowered them to approach the highly polarized issue of 
     wilderness as an issue which could be resolved with their 
     traditional adversaries, not as a battle to be won.
       The constructive progress made by the county in the 
     relatively short time will continue to bear fruit for the 
     county on public lands issues and other matters of county 
     interest. In reference to ``Discovering Common Ground'' by 
     Marvin Weisbord, project consultant, Susan Carpenter, 
     summarizes her perspective. She writes, ``Weisbord makes the 
     point that creating the tension between what we have and what 
     we really want is a much more effective way to get what we 
     want than the more traditional methods of problem-solving and 
     conflict management (identify the problem and then develop 
     options to solve it). My experience bear this out. I see the 
     Coalition's Emery County Community/Wild Lands Futures Project 
     as a powerful, effective model which can be applied to a wide 
     range of issues at the county and state level across the 
     West.'' Currently, CUF is moving forward with an initiative 
     focused on quality growth in Utah. History will reveal 
     whether we, as a whole and increasingly diverse community in 
     Utah and the West, are able to build on the lessons learned 
     from the Emery County experience.

                          ____________________