February 26, 2019

Congress acts to protect America's public lands -- including ours

A sweeping conservation bill, headed to President Donald Trump's desk, protects upper reaches of Washington's Methow Valley and gives go-ahead to expansion of water storage in the always-drought threatened Yakima River basin.

The legislation, passed on a bipartisan 363-62 House vote, makes permanent the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund, which has supported 600 preservation and recreation projects in all corners of Washington State.

"This is truly a remarkable confluence of events," said Maggie Coon, who organized the campaign to protect 340,000 acres of the Upper Methow.

Trump is expected to sign the legislation, a kind of "Parks Barrel" bill that won support from conservation advocates from coastal states, but also such unreconstructed drill-baby-drill advocates as Reps. Rob Bishop, R-Utah and Don Young, R-Alaska.

The public lands package not only covers Washington, but much of the country. Streams in Massachusetts and Connecticut are protected under the federal Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, but also 280 miles of waterways in Oregon. The bill protects more than 1.3 million acres of wilderness in Utah, New Mexico and California.

The bill was crafted by Sens. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., intense opponents on oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge but proponents of measures on which they could agree. It passed the Senate on a 92-8 vote earlier this month.

The state's 10-member House delegation gave it unanimous support. "The leadership and support of our state's entire congressional delegation shows nature unites us," said Mike Stevens, who heads The Nature Conservancy in Washington.

The Methow protection is a notably big win coming at a time when the Trump administration is gung-ho to open up public lands in the West to expanded mining.

The upper valley is familiar to anybody who drives, hikes, fishes or climbs in the North Cascades Highway corridor. It is, however, not part of the North Cascades National Park or Pasayten Wilderness Area.

In 2014, a Canadian mining company proposed to drill test holes and explore developing a copper mine in the upper valley. The proposal aroused residents around the hamlet of Mazama, a well-connected and affluent constituency.

The movement was grounded not just in appreciation for beauty, but dollars and cents. The Methow is rooted in a year-round recreation economy, from cross-country skiers in winter, to Pacific Crest Trail hikers in summer, to climbers hit by thunder storms on Silver Star, to chamber music lovers, to hunters going after the state's largest mule deer herd.

Recreational opportunities have become "key economic drivers for local communities," U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer, D-Wash., noted Tuesday.

Likewise, the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which has underwritten recreation from Gas Works and Magnuson parks in Seattle to acquisition of private inholdings high in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness Area.

"Over the last 50 years, the LWCF has helped to protect and restore green spaces like Ebey's Landing National Reserve, Chuckanut Bay and the Wild Sky Wilderness," said Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash.

The conservation group American Rivers, conservative GOP Rep. Dan Newhouse, and newly elected Democratic Rep. Kim Schrier all sang praises of the Yakima Basin enhancement. It will provide for more water storage, destined to benefit both agriculture and salmon restoration. It authorizes funds to restore creaky infrastructure on Native American irrigation projects.

The Yakima Basin plan "provides a path for our irrigation districts to make it through drought and low snow pack years, as well as supporting important fish (runs)," said Scott Revell, manager of the Roza Irrigation District.

And, added Urban Eberhart, district manager of the Kittitas Reclamation Project, "This is essential for the future water supply and fishery restoration in Kittitas County.

The "Gentle ladies" of the Senate, Murkowski and Cantwell, found other projects on which to agree.

The legislation provides for improved volcano monitoring, a concern in Washington but a greater one in Alaska, where eruptions of the Iliamna Volcano have at times sent ash clouds over the Anchorage airport.

The two senators also put in the go-ahead for a much needed new heavy duty icebreaker, cognizant that climate change is opening up waters of the Arctic to increased navigation.

Good stuff happens when opposites find common ground.


By:  Joel Connelly
Source: Seattle PI