Desolation Canyon, part of which is in southern Uintah County, is one of 18 Bureau of Land Management areas newly suggested for wilderness consideration by Congress.
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar published his preliminary list of BLM lands in nine states that he would like to be designated as wilderness.
"From President Theodore Roosevelt's bold steps to establish national parks, wildlife refuges and forests to President Obama signing the 2009 Public Lands bill into law in his first days in office, America has a proud bipartisan tradition of protecting the backcountry that matters most to hunters, fishermen, and our families," Salazar said.
The Wilderness Study Area for Desolation Canyon also includes Carbon and Grand counties, and according to the BLM Grand County supports the designation.
Carbon or Uintah county were not available for comment at press time.
Although Salazar, and Deputy Secretary David J. Hayes and BLM Director Bob Abbey, who both came up with the list based on input from Congress, state and county officials, tribes, and other interested parties, are hopeful about the project, Utah’s Rep. Jim Matheson (D-Utah) and Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) are concerned about it.
“I am deeply disappointed that Interior Secretary Salazar continues to be tone deaf about public lands issues in Utah,” Matheson said. “As our success in Washington County shows, wilderness proposals must be the result of a grassroots, stakeholder-driven process, rather than a top-down decree. This is not the way to make progress on public lands decisions and it only ensures that we won’t see a successful outcome on the ground here.”
Hatch said determining and designating wilderness is the job of Congress and he takes this “responsibility seriously.”
“I am in constant contact with the communities across the state who have a stake in wilderness designations,” Hatch said. “This is a process that is very difficult and it doesn’t help to have unsolicited input coming from the administration. Any change in the designation of Utah lands should be made through a collaborative process with those closest to the lands. I don’t believe the administration wants to hear that most Utahns aren’t interested in any more restrictive land-use designations. Utahns deserve better than this.”
In Utah the BLM currently manages: 23 million acres of land, 18 wilderness areas, and three BLM national conservation areas.
Two other backcountry areas in Utah under consideration for wilderness designation include Mill Creek Canyon in southeast Utah and Westwater Canyon located northeast of Moab.
The designation of wilderness areas come from Congress and, according to the Department of the Interior, the listing is tailored to specific landscapes and often protect a wide-range of traditional and local uses.
Salazar said he is “hopeful that these areas can help form a strong foundation for a bipartisan conservation agenda for this Congress."
