Venture into Southern Utah and you will find yourself surrounded by multicolored cliffs, plateaus, mesas, buttes, pinnacles and canyons that glow in the sunlight.
How is it that an oil and gas industry rolling in profits can manage to receive government subsidies and tax breaks while conservation programs that are only a small part of the federal budget are threatened with the ax as Congress attempts to balance America’s budget?
If you agree that the grand landscapes of the Old West are worth sharing with future generations, then you would have joined in the applause recently at the National Museum of the American Indian.
After months of planning and research, we at the Wilderness Society have recently taken a look at some key public lands in America and how they are being cared for.
The 27 million-acre National Landscape Conservation System includes some of the most spectacular scenic, natural, cultural, historical and archeological places in our country. These National Conservation Lands conserve the essential fabric of the West, by playing a role in protecting lands, water, and wildlife for future generations.
Since its passage by Congress in 1906, the Antiquities Act has been a critically important tool for the preservation of our public lands – lands that belong to all Americans. Serving as a vital “insurance policy” for our nation’s natural treasures, the Antiquities Act gives the president the power to grant national monument status to areas possessing significant historical and/or scientific values.
The public lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) are the last remaining unprotected wild lands in America. It is this generation's challenge to protect millions of acres of these lands by having them included in BLM's new conservation system. Here are eleven priority landscapes for The Wilderness Society.
This is a user’s manual for funding areas of the National Landscape Conservation System and beyond. This guide simplifies the budget process and demonstrates its importance for two aspects of public lands protection that should be part of your work:
Operations and management dollars that support the basic services and programs of your Conservation System unit; and
Land acquisition funding that can be used to consolidate federal ownership and help minimize management challenges.
With Congress back in session, our staff and policy experts have been working full-speed with members of the presidential transition team and with members of Congress to prepare them on steps they can quickly take to right many of the environmental wrongs of the past eight years.
