The village of Hatch, NM, and town of Mesilla, NM, have joined Las Cruces and Dona Ana County in passing public lands resolutions supporting the designation of all Wilderness Study Areas and two additional citizens' proposed wilderness areas in the County and a 100,000-acre Organ Mountains National Conservation Area. The two new resolutions also express strong concerns about the proposal for large scale public land disposal and ask that the Bureau of Land Management follow existing laws on land disposals. To date, every incorporated community in Dona Ana County has passed similar public land protection resolutions.
Background
New Mexico Senator Pete Domenici (R-NM) has indicated his interest in public lands and wilderness legislation for areas in southwestern New Mexico's Dona Ana County including the designation of existing Wilderness Study Areas in the county and the protection of a 35,000-acre National Conservation Area in the Organ Mountains. Both proposals are significantly less than what local citizens, community groups, and conservationists have proposed. He has also proposed a controversial provision to require the sale of as much as 65,000 acres of undeveloped federal public land near Las Cruces.
The Dona Ana County Commission and the Las Cruces City Council both passed resolutions supporting the designation of all existing Wilderness Study Areas in Dona Ana County as well as two additional citizens' proposed wilderness areas. The resolutions also support a community proposal for a 100,000-acre large National Conservation in the Organ Mountains and express strong concerns about the proposal for large-scale public land disposal (see Wilderness Report #157 and #158 for more detail).
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