From redrock canyons to sagebrush prairies, the
Bureau of Land Management (BLM) administers 177 million acres in
the lower 48 states. About 5 million acres – or 3 percent – are
currently protected as wilderness. The National BLM Wilderness
Campaign, a new project of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance
(SUWA), is lobbying the administration to protect far more roadless
lands – 60 million acres. Reaching beyond Utah, the campaign aims
at coordinating the efforts of local wilderness groups as it
collects roadless information to present to BLM managers. SUWA says
people need to move quickly: “The BLM controls more land in the
West than the Forest Service or the Park Service,” says campaign
director Scott Groene, “and much of it is threatened by oil and gas
development and off-road vehicles.” Not satisfied with the amount
of wilderness recommended by the agency in a 1991 assessment, the
group is asking administrators to re-inventory BLM land for
wilderness quality, withdraw unprotected areas from new
development, and rewrite individual management plans to protect
areas with wilderness characteristics.
For more
information about the campaign, contact the National BLM Wilderness
Campaign, 1471 South 1100 East, Salt Lake City, UT 84105,
801/486-2728, or visit www.BLMwilderness.org.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline SUWA goes national.
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