By David Grant Long

Fearing the worst, the Montezuma County Commission wants to be the voice of reason in a brewing battle that threatens the welfare of the very BLM lands federal officials say they to want to protect -- 160,000 acres west of Cortez that contain myriad Anasazi ruins along with a plethora of gas wells and some grazing-permit areas. It is also popular with local recreationists.

"The worst scenario we felt could occur here is that we get national-monument designation on one side (from the Clinton administration), and no funding on the Congressional side," Chairman Gene Story said Thursday, resulting in more visitation to the area with no more resources to handle the increase.

And so, Story explained, the commission recently sent a strongly-worded letter to those warring officials -- Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and three Colorado Congressmen -- asking for an end to the political infighting and a solution based on the local concerns expressed last summer. (A previous letter sent in August suggesting such a meeting was mostly ignored.)

"In spite of some good-faith efforts on the part of some of your staff, all that has resulted is that local efforts have been held hostage in a power struggle between Secretary Babbitt and our congressional delegation over the designation of national monuments," the letter states. "If this power struggle follows the course that it is on, President Clinton will exercise his power to designate a national monument, and our congressional delegation will exercise their appropriations power to try and strangle the newly proclaimed monument by limiting funding."

"We are very concerned that the ultimate result would mean an increase in the kind of restrictions that we have all committed ourselves to avoiding."

The letter also outlines a proposed budget to develop and staff a management plan based on current regulations that would require approximately $1 million annually for the first three years and about half that amount thereafter.

After a cursory visit to the Anasazi ACEC (Area of Critical Environmental Concern) in May, Babbitt declared the ruins in need of more protection, noting that one way of achieving this would be to designate it a national monument. But Babbitt indicated he was open to other options, and the Southwest Resource Advisory Council (RAC) formed a working group from the spectrum of local interests to hold a series of meetings and gather public input.

The group then formulated a report recommending an alternate approach that would include no more restrictive designation, but instead proposed an increase in funding to allow more stringent enforcement of the regulations governing present uses. (Currently the BLM is budgeted $1.25 per acre, or roughly $200,000 to manage and patrol the vast expanse of rocky canyons and sagebrush mesas.)

However, Rep. Scott McInnis (R-Grand Junction) expressed great skepticism of Babbitt’s motive in soliciting public input, speculating the process might only be window-dressing to deflect the barrage of criticism that came after the Escalante/Grand Staircase area in southeastern Utah was declared a national monument by President Clinton three years ago, an action taken with no local input.

But when Babbitt returned to Montezuma County in August to accept the report, he assured the RAC it would be seriously considered and promised a response by this fall. So far no more has been heard from Babbitt, though, and his deputy press secretary said Tuesday that it would probably be at least another month before one is forthcoming.

Earlier this month McInnis, along with senators Ben Nighthorse Campbell and Wayne Allard, sent a stern letter to Babbitt urging him to do nothing without first consulting Congress as well as state and local officials.

"We believe that the RAC has been very clear in stating its conclusion that the current management status of the southwest region can adequately address the area’s needs and concerns," it said. "Our fellow Coloradans do not want to face an experience similar to the heavy-handed federal action that led to the designation of the 1.7 million acres for the Grand Staircase/Escalante National Monument in Utah.

"Once again we urge you to refrain from any form of mandated land management, including the designation of any additional national monuments without the participation and final approval of Congress, the state involved, and locally elected officials."

Mike Preston, the county’s federal lands coordinator, said Tuesday he knew of no direct contacts between Babbitt and any of the GOP solons, and that other than some communication with a McInnis aide, he’d had none, either.

Story said that even though both sides stress the value of local input, and this had been provided months ago, no further progress has been made.

"That’s what everyone advocates, the local involvement, and all that was in place," he said, "but nothing was happening after (the report) was submitted -- we never heard from anybody.

"We kept getting little bits and pieces of some of the infighting that was occurring back there," Story said, so the commission offered to go to Washington D.C. last month to meet with both sides, but still heard nothing.

"We felt that there was a bottleneck with Sen. Campbell’s office -- he’s on the appropriations committee," he explained, but an attempt to communicate with him directly also proved fruitless.

"The basic issue with the BLM is that we need some additional staffing here to start addressing some of these concerns, and I don’t think anybody within the public community is opposed to that.

"All these things can co-exist -- not only the multiple-use side of it, but also some protection of these sites," Story added. "Essentially that’s what we’re trying to get on the table, and we’ve been frustrated by the way things have proceeded."

Preston pointed out that federal revenues from gas deposits in the ACEC amount to more than $6 million annually, and suggested this could be tapped to fund the increased management and surveillance efforts.

The proposed budget provides for four additional full-time employees -- a ranger, an archaeologist, a volunteer coordinator and an education/interpretive specialist, as well as money for a stewardship program and for site preservation and maintenance work.

"What we’re starting to sense is if we can get some additional buy-in on the concept we’ve submitted, we might have something (workable)," Story said.