RESOURCES

Press Release:

National Monuments, Wildlife, and Archaeological Sites Threatened by New BLM Plan for Northern Arizona

Contacts:

Nada Culver, The Wilderness Society, 303-650-5818, ext. 117

Peter Bungart, Archaeologist, 928-213-0984

William I. Boarman Ph.D., Conservation Science Research and Consulting, 619-861-9450

Kim Crumbo, Grand Canyon Wildlands Council, 928-638-2304

Kevin Gaither-Banchoff, Arizona Wilderness Coalition, 520-326-4300

Taylor McKinnon, Center for Biological Diversity, 928-310-6713

 

Flagstaff—A Bureau of Land Management plan issued today for a remote area north of the Grand Canyon sacrifices wildlife habitat and archaeological sites to off-road vehicles, livestock grazing, and oil and gas development.  The 20-year plan spans 2.8 million acres of the Arizona Strip, including the Grand Canyon-Parashant and Vermillion Cliffs national monuments.

The 3,000-page plan ignores the very reason the national monuments were created and disregards the public’s desire for them to be protected, says Wilderness Society senior counsel Nada Culver.

“Page after page, the BLM finds ways to promote continued off-road vehicle (ORV) use in places that were set aside for their ancient artifacts, rugged landscapes, and habitat for desert species,” she says.

Despite a presidential proclamation ordering the Bureau to keep off-road vehicles to real “roads,” the plan allows them on more than 1,700 miles of trails and primitive roads in the monuments and across broad swaths of the Arizona Strip. 

 

Only 27 percent of the lands in a wilderness proposal created by the Arizona Wilderness Coalition are protected under the plan, which also ignores the impacts of livestock grazing, fire regimes, and invasive species.

“People here love their wilderness lands and think more should be preserved,” says Kevin Gaither-Banchoff, executive director of the Arizona Wilderness Coalition. “It’s BLM’s responsibility as a public agency to protect what Arizona citizens want and deserve.”

Mountain lions and the deer and elk they feed on need large areas of unbroken wild land to keep their populations healthy and viable, says Kim Crumbo of the Grand Canyon Wildlands Council.

“This plan does very little to ensure that the key species that rely on the monuments are protected from noise and widespread habitat fragmentation that off-road vehicle use causes on a large scale,” Crumbo says.

The plan also covers habitat for threatened, endangered and sensitive species including the desert tortoise, southwestern willow flycatcher, bald eagle, Yuma clapper rail, relict leopard frogs, woundfin minnow, and Virgin River chub.

Dr. William I. Boarman, a desert tortoise specialist who submitted comments to the BLM, said the plan does very little to reduce the threats to the tortoise from motorized recreation, oil and gas development, and high-tension utility lines on which ravens perch and prey on the tortoises.

“In order for national monuments to offer sanctuary, their management must address factors threatening desert tortoise,” says Dr. Boarman. “I’m not convinced this plan does so.”

“The federal government has a duty under the Endangered Species Act to protect imperiled species and their habitat,” says Taylor McKinnon of the Center for Biological Diversity. “This plan falls short of that duty.”

The Arizona Strip is one of the last truly remote places in the West, and its monuments protect the region’s rich archaeology and historical sites, all of which are threatened by looting, vandalism, and unintentional damage by vehicles, says archaeologist Peter Bungart, director of Circa Cultural Consulting in Flagstaff.

 “The BLM is trying to argue in this plan that keeping roads open will discourage looters from accessing sensitive sites. This is simply not a sensible approach,” Bungart says. “The most significant and intact archaeological sites are found in remote places. Conversely, the most seriously damaged sites are near roads.”  

Recreational use of the Arizona Strip will increase dramatically over the 20-year life of the plan. The population of the surrounding five counties is expected to double with the addition of 1.4 million new residents by 2020.  Given the population explosion in the West and the monuments’ growing popularity, this 20-year management plan will determine the future of wildlife and historic and wilderness resources in the monuments.

Find the plan online at http://www.blm.gov/az/st/en/prog/planning/strip.html

*********