[Dialogue] Protecting Public Lands

[Harry Wainwright]

Colleagues, someting to be pleased about. Peace, Harry 
  _____  


 <http://www.nytimes.com/> The New York Times <http://www.nytimes.com/> 
December 15, 2005

Editorial

Protecting Public Lands 

In a legislative season that has produced few victories for the environment,
the sudden death of a destructive mining provision that could have opened up
millions of acres of public land to commercial exploitation is cause for
celebration. 

The provision was inserted into the budget reconciliation bill - always a
handy hiding place for ideas that could never stand up to public scrutiny on
their own - by Representatives Jim Gibbons of Nevada and Richard Pombo of
California, both Republicans. Mr. Gibbons's decision to withdraw it
reflected not so much a change of heart as a recognition of political
reality. Their stealth proposal had inspired intense opposition among
hunters, anglers, governors, local officials and countless ordinary citizens
who argued that there were many nobler uses for the public lands than
serving as a profit center for commercial interests.

The Gibbons-Pombo provision would have allowed the holders of mining claims
to buy land outright instead of leasing it - a radical departure from
present practice. It would also have amended the General Mining Law of 1872
to allow purchases not just for mining, but for any purpose that would
"facilitate sustainable economic development." By some calculations, that
dangerously vague formulation would have exposed at least 6 million acres
and perhaps as much as 350 million acres to commercial exploitation. Even
conservative Western lawmakers who do not usually favor environmental causes
saw this for what it was: a potentially unparalleled raid on America's
public lands.

The controversy stirred by the Gibbons-Pombo maneuver has been so great that
there is even reason to hope that proposals for real reform of the
antiquated mining law will at last receive a respectable hearing.

Representatives Nick Rahall II and Jay Inslee, both Democrats, and
Christopher Shays, a Republican, have put forward a bill to give permanent
protection to lands that are now vulnerable to claims, like wildlife refuges
and roadless areas of the national forests. The bill would also require
"suitability" reviews before mining could proceed, and would allow the
secretary of the interior to withdraw lands judged unsuitable for mining. It
would also require mining companies to pay royalties on what they produced -
just as oil and gas companies do now - and to clean up their messes when
they were through.

Many of these reforms were instituted administratively by Bruce Babbitt when
he was secretary of the interior under President Bill Clinton, but were
withdrawn by the Bush administration at the insistence of mining interests.

It would be a delightful reversal of fortune if Mr. Gibbons and Mr. Pombo,
who are no friends of the public lands, ended up inspiring new protections
for them. 

*	Copyright
<http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html>  2005The New
York Times Company <http://www.nytco.com/> 

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