Groups respond to management plans that threaten Grand Staircase-Escalante and future of all national monuments

(ESCALANTE, Utah) – Today, local and national groups, businesses and globally-respected scientist organizations, denounced the Department of the Interior’s (DOI) release of management plans for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument as another step toward undermining protections for Americans’ national monuments and other protected public lands.

1. The plan opens up hundreds of thousands of acres of the original Monument (designated in 1996) to drilling and mining, while the administration’s illegal reduction of the Monument (decreasing it by nearly half) is still being actively litigated and while the Government Accountability Office is investigating whether the planning process itself is in violation of long-standing spending law.

2. It is the result of a rushed and closed-door process, opening up land for inappropriate development with little input from the public.

3. The plan changes standards for the management of all national monuments—affecting treasured places across the country—and doesn’t even protect what remains of Grand Staircase-Escalante.

This reckless plan doesn’t protect Grand Staircase-Escalante or the businesses that depend on it, and sets an unacceptable precedent for national monuments across the country. Our irreplaceable public lands are the envy of the world, and the law requires that they be managed on behalf of all Americans.

Phil Hanceford, Attorney, The Wilderness Society

“The Trump administration continues to steamroll forward with illegal actions to open nearly half the monument to drilling, and mining and other destructive activities. This planning process is another blatant example of the train headed down a barricaded track,” said Phil Hanceford, an attorney with The Wilderness Society. “While the BLM continues to disregard the law, the public, and the harm these plans will cause, we will fight in court to return the monument to its original boundary and ensure the entirety is managed in a way that protects this outstanding resource.” 

Nicole Croft, Executive Director, Grand Staircase-Escalante Partners

“The BLM’s management plan attempts to cement the largest roll-back in public lands protections in American history. Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument has demonstrated its worth time and time again, through contributions to science, personal discovery and significant economic benefits to our local communities. These lands belong to every American, not just a few special interests.”   

Joe & Suzanne Catlett, Nemo's Restaurant Group, LLC

"No new Management Plans should be considered or released prior to the outcomes currently pending before the Courts. In our opinion this action is disingenuous, completed recklessly and does not represent the true best interest of this county or the American people. As owner/operators of an Escalante, Utah Main street business, and like other businesses in Garfield County, we have seen an immediate and direct decrease in our sales and revenue compared to years prior.  This is a direct result of the BLM attempting to rush management plans on an Executive action that remains heavily litigated, may be reversed, and continues to impact the local economy."

Nathan Waggoner, Escalante Outfitters

“Escalante Outfitters and many other businesses in our gateway communities rely on the protection and preservation of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument to continue to grow our businesses and support our communities.  We are deeply disappointed in the BLM’s new management plan because it turns a blind eye to the concerns of businesses who support a wilderness ethic and it caters to a small band of special interest groups who want to exploit our public lands for short term profits. Given that the litigation to restore the monument to its rightful size is still on-going, the new management plan is a waste of taxpayers money and detrimental to one of America’s last great expanses of wilderness.” 

Blake Spalding, co-owner, Hell’s Backbone Grill and Farm in Boulder, Utah

“In our restaurant we're talking to guests every day who have travelled from far and wide to enjoy the unspoiled protected public lands of Southern Utah. They desperately want these landscapes preserved, as they were intended to be when they were thoughtfully designated as protected Monuments. The new management plan is a travesty that will devastate the tranquil gateway communities and businesses that were thriving before this incursion.” 

David Polly, Immediate Past President, Society of Vertebrate Paleontology

"If something's not broke, you shouldn't try to fix it.  Grand Staircase-Escalante has been one of the most productive areas for paleontology in the last quarter century. The Monument has been a spectacular success in providing scientific value to the entire world. These new management plans are unnecessary and have already cost taxpayers more than $1 million, a fortune that could have produced thousands of more finds." 

William H. Doelle, President and CEO, Archaeology Southwest

“There is no question that Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was legitimately established through the authority granted by the Antiquities Act of 1906. There is no question that this magnificent landscape is also a cultural one, bearing unparalleled evidence of people’s lives over millennia. What this deeply flawed plan reveals, like the recently released Bears Ears plan, is a troubling question—do national monuments even mean anything anymore? We believe they do, and we stand with our partners in pushing for proper and lawful protections for Grand Staircase-Escalante and all our national monuments.”

Brian Sybert, Executive Director, Conservation Lands Foundation

“Grand Staircase was designated more than twenty years ago, and its boundaries were later ratified by Congressional action. This plan is an attempt to further this administration’s reckless push to open treasured, irreplaceable lands to destructive mining and drilling—despite public outcry and before the courts have a chance to weigh in."

Heidi McIntosh, Managing Attorney of Earthjustice’s Rocky Mountains Office

“Grand Staircase was an exceptionally successful national monument until President Trump rode into town and unlawfully shredded it. These protected lands have been a boon for the local economy and a treasure trove of dinosaur discoveries and new scientific insights precisely because they are protected. We’re disgusted, but not surprised, upon seeing Trump’s latest plans. While the Trump Administration is rushing a new scheme through to let mining companies and ranchers harm vast swaths of Grand Staircase for a quick buck, we’re in court working to stop them. These new plans won’t be worth the paper they’re printed on if the court rules that Trump violated the Antiquities Act and the Constitution.”

Mary O'Brien, Utah Forests Program Director, Grand Canyon Trust 

“The proposals to add more roads, more cattle grazing, more fuel extraction, more non-native grass seeding, more OHV use in wilderness study areas - it's as if the BLM tried to promote every damaging activity they could imagine.”

Theresa Pierno, President and CEO for National Parks Conservation Association

“From ancient dinosaur fossils to ascending plateaus and winding canyons developed over millions of years, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is unparalleled. But now, it’s being taken from the public and handed to the highest bidder. Grand Staircase-Escalante serves as a critical connection to three of our country’s national park sites – Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef National Parks and Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. It shields rock formations and wildlife from harm and provides visitors with opportunities to experience intense quiet and solitude. Despite the monument’s value to the region and the millions of people who have fought to protect it, the Trump administration is green lighting destructive development, including mining and drilling, that will forever change this landscape and all we stand to learn from and experience here.”

Rose Marcario, President and CEO, Patagonia

“The executive order eliminating protections for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was illegal and no management plan for these lands should proceed until the resolution of the lawsuits. If this administration’s reckless agenda is not stopped, it will lead to the destruction of a national treasure protected for over two decades that enjoys support from hunters and hikers as well as local businesses and communities. And even more troubling, it sets a dangerous precedent for the future of all public lands and waters. These wild and wonderful landscapes should not be auctioned off to the highest bidder, and we have every confidence the courts will rule in favor of the plaintiffs and the original boundaries of the National Monument will be restored.”

Kya Marienfeld, Wildlands Attorney, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance

“This illegal plan puts a fine point on the Trump administration’s rapacious vision for America’s public lands. This is a plan of plunder: authorizing rampant chaining of pinyon-juniper forests, unbridled energy development, and a free-for-all of off-road vehicle abuse. Grand Staircase-Escalante is one of the nation’s public land crown jewels; it is the quintessentially wild red rock landscape that people from across the country and  around the world think of when they dream of visiting southern Utah. President Trump broke the law and defied Congress with his illegal order reducing the monument, and SUWA and its partners will persist with our fight in court to undo this damage and restore full protections to the entire monument ecosystem.”

Lena Moffitt, director of the Sierra Club’s Our Wild America campaign

“The bottom line is that the Trump administration acted illegally when it stripped the lands of Grand Staircase-Escalante of national monument status. With this plan, Bernhardt’s Interior is clearly trying to let in mining and drilling before a court can overturn the rollbacks.”

Nicole Ghio, Senior Fossil Fuels Program Manager at Friends of the Earth 

"The new management plan for Grand Staircase Escalante ignores the overwhelming opposition to mining and drilling on this land. Bernhardt’s push to hand the Monument over to fossil fuel interests is possibly illegal and  ignores the ongoing court battles. BLM’s plan is a rushed attempt to undercut established environmental protections.”

CONTACT:

Jennifer Dickson, The Wilderness Society, 303-650-9379, jennifer_dickson@tws.org

The Wilderness Society, founded in 1935, is the leading conservation organization working to protect wilderness and inspire Americans to care for our wild places. With more than one million members and supporters, The Wilderness Society has led the effort to permanently protect 111 million acres of wilderness and to ensure sound management of our shared national lands. www.wilderness.org