When I made southeast Utah my
home, almost 30 years ago, I came for one reason — the rocks
— the most stunning display of intricately carved,
brilliantly hued red rocks imaginable. It’s the kind of place
one can believe only exists in dreams. I’ve lived here ever
since.
Naturally, I went searching for kindred spirits,
hoping together we could save some of it. Among those quixotic
spirits was the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. In the early
1980s, SUWA was a small grassroots organization dedicated to
preserving wilderness; its passion was palpable.
In the
late-‘80s, SUWA’s Executive Director Brant Calkin made
Utah wilderness a national issue and became a hero to many
environmentalists. Scott Groene, SUWA’s current Executive
Director wrote, “Brant Calkin is the best damn environmentalist
that ever worked on the Colorado Plateau…”
“Brant
offered his staff low pay,” Groene recalled, “but lots of autonomy
to ‘do good and fight evil.’” Brant also believed the
key to success was to “build the membership,” and by the
mid-‘90s its membership had grown nationwide to 20,000.
But if it’s true that good deeds go unrewarded,
SUWA is a notable exception. In the late-‘90s SUWA found
itself flush with money. Substantial grants from the Pew Charitable
Trusts and the Wyss Foundation put the once-struggling wilderness
group in a different financial realm. The Wyss donation was
particularly fortuitous. Its founder, Swiss-born Hansjorg Wyss,
became a member of SUWA’s Board of Directors in 1996 and is
its current chairman. With an estimated $8 billion fortune, he was
named by Forbes Global as the 18th wealthiest European in 2005.
Wyss’s contributions to SUWA include $1.4 million
for a building and renovations in downtown Salt Lake City; the
fashionable three-story home is now SUWA’s headquarters.
Contributions from Wyss and others have swelled SUWA’s bank
account. In 2004, SUWA had almost $5 million in “net assets and
fund balances,” including $2.5 million in “savings and temporary
cash investments,” nearly $300,000 in “non-interest bearing cash,”
and about $1 million in “stocks and mutual funds.”
With
all those assets, a gala party is planned in May as a tribute to
Wyss. The event, to be held in New York City, will cost about
$100,000. But according to Groene, “it’s a fund-raising
event…(it) will raise us money.”
How much money is
enough? No one can fault SUWA for its good fortune, but
Utah’s most prominent environmental organization is starting
to look more like a bank. And while its coffers have grown,
membership, according to a SUWA source, has fallen to less than
14,000.
Meanwhile, threats to Utah’s wildlands are
becoming more complicated and diverse. The explosion of growth in
“New West” towns like Moab and St. George is creating environmental
impacts unheard of 20 years ago.
Urban sprawl isn’t
confined to Salt Lake City anymore. Wildlife habitat in rural Utah
is being threatened by development. Recreation and the commercial
exploitation of Utah wildlands are affecting a key component of
wilderness — solitude. A proposed dam on the Bear River and a
pipeline from Lake Powell to St. George will surely create
environmental nightmares.
And yet, while SUWA remains
Utah’s most vigilant watchdog of off-road vehicle abuse, oil
and gas exploration and public lands grazing, it steadfastly
refuses to involve itself in any of these “New West” issues.
“Our top priority,” says Groene, “is protecting our
wilderness proposal. Until we have protected the lands that qualify
as wilderness, the issues outside our boundaries will be lower
priorities.”
He calls the SUWA surplus its “war chest,
for use in emergencies or when extraordinary opportunities arise,
and with board approval.” SUWA’s rainy day fund. Meanwhile,
it’s raining buckets.
If SUWA isn’t willing
to deal with these other pressing issues, here’s a proposal:
Could SUWA part with some of its surplus and give it to
organizations that will? I can think of several worthy Utah
environmental groups that could effectively use the money,
including the High Uintahs Preservation Council, the Utah Rivers
Council, the Nine Mile Coalition, the Utah Environmental Congress,
Save Our Canyons, Friends of the Great Salt Lake, and my
sentimental favorite, the Glen Canyon Institute. All of these
organizations (and others) are doing good and noble work, and when
someone with SUWA’s assets can lend a hand, why not?
Ultimately aren’t we all on the same side?
Don’t all these groups share a common goal — to improve the
quality of Utah’s natural resources and to preserve and
protect the beauty of a landscape that is dear to us all? What
could be wiser and ultimately more satisfying than sharing its
largesse where it can accomplish the most?
Jim
Stiles is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of
High Country News (hcn.org). He is the publisher
of the Canyon Country Zephyr, based in Moab,
Utah.
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